Iran Photo Feature: Former Revolutionary Guards Commander Warns the Supreme Leader --- What Happened Next?

This week, former Revolutionary Guards commander Hossein Alaei dared to warn the Supreme Leader about the consquences of represssion. In an article in Etelaat, Alaei wrote of the Shah's response to the Qom uprising of 9 January 1978, noting, “The wrongful behaviour of the Shah’s security forces...amplified the people’s dissatisfaction with the monarchy and helped maintain it. As the number of people killed on the streets, imprisonments and political prisoners rose, the Shah’s regime essentially lost its valour too.”

This weekend, the regime offered its response to Alaei. As 12 current Revolutionary Guards commanders denounced Alaei as an agent of the "enemy", a crowd gathered in front of his home, chanting derisory slogans and covering the property in graffiti.

Alaei's reaction? "I will spend my whole life to fight against tyranny".

Click to read more ...

Iran Opinion: How to Engage Iran --- First, Break the Rules (Limbert)

John Limbert & Ali KhameneiHistory is littered with the wreckage of these American efforts, which foundered on a combination of mistrust, misreadings, bad luck, bad timing and negative precon­ceptions. After 30 years of hostility, floun­dering and missteps, officials in both Teh­ran and Washington find themselves in the unwavering grip of five rules that, like the biblical "laws of the Medes and the Persians that alter not", have come to control both sides.

Click to read more ...