The Latest from Iran (7 May): Message to Mahmoud --- "Say Uncle!"

1740 GMT: News has slowed today from Iran, so EA staff will be on a break tonight. We will return at 0600 GMT to bring you up to date.

1235 GMT: On Campus. The Deputy Minister of Science for Research and Technology, Mohammad Mehdi Nejad Nour, has said at least 36 university courses will be changed by September to make them more "Islamic".

Authorities announced last year that Iran would review 12 disciplines in the social sciences, including law, women's studies, human rights, management, sociology, philosophy, psychology, and political sciences, to consider if their contents were too closely based on Western culture. A group of university and seminary experts was appointed to carry out the review.

1230 GMT: Remembering. I had overlooked the attention given by Eli Lake of The Washington Times to the suicide of leading journalist and essayist Siamak Pourzand, who was detained and then kept under house arrest for much of the period since 1979, including the last years of his life.

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1200 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Tehran University law student Mojtaba Hashemi has been sentenced to one year in prison and 74 lashes. He is also suspended for three years from higher education.

0940 GMT: Another Message to Mahmoud? Brigadier General Yadollah Javani, a senior commander of the Revolutionary Guards, has said that the Iranian nation's “vigilance and their recognition of the leadership as the flag-bearer of the path of obedience to God have thwarted plots”.

While Javani's comments were a restatement of the Supreme Leader's declaration this week that the Islamic Awakening in the Middle East and North Africa will spread to Europe and the US, his remarks are yet another affirmation of the authority of Ayatollah Khamenei.

And it may be notable that they were carried by the State news agency IRNA, which has up to now backed Ahmadinejad in the political crisis.

0925 GMT: Supreme Leader v. President In the midst of a lengthy analysis of the tension between Ayatollah Khamenei and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Muhammad Sahimi addresses our question about the forces the President can summon for the battle:

In Khamenei's camp are the top leadership of the military/security/intelligence establishment, reactionary clerics, and part of the Basij forces. They are worried about Mashaei, believing that if he ever becomes president, he will eliminate the clerics from power, which is why they refer to him and his inner circle as the "perverted team"....

In the opposite camp, Ahmadinejad is supported by those who have benefited directly from his largesse -- a large number of them mid-ranking Guard officers -- a segment of the very poor population whose extent is difficult to estimate, and perhaps some who agree with him that the clerics should get out of politics.

0515 GMT: For those of you who have not had an American childhood, "Say Uncle!" is the demand you hear when you are losing a fight, your arm, leg, or other body part twisted beyond pain. Until you utter the submission, the grip will not be released.

And so it is for Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Friday was distinctive for the series of warnings and commands issued by political and clerical figures. Beyond the black comedy --- Presidential allies arrested for "sorcery", Tehran's Friday Prayer Leader using Mrs Ahmadinejad and the prospect of a divorce to make a point --- there was a serious unifying theme: the Supreme Leader is the authority, and it is time for the President to acknowledge that.

So although the flutter of "Breaking: Ahmadinejad to Resign" was false news, started by one woman who thought she heard something on "Arab TV", the President appears to face a stark choice. With no counter-attack apparent, he either steps down or he takes the public stage --- through a written statement or a televised repentance --- and says "Uncle".