It is as if history were repeating itself in Iran. Those who rebelled against the Shah's dictatorship, tyranny and contempt towards his people are playing today more or less the same role, after the effect of the “bribes” made to the people for deluding them with the promise of difference and change has expired, and after they had become themselves a system that represses to survive, oppresses to govern, and bends wills to impose itself. The current clashes have not yet reached the momentum witnessed in the 1979 revolution against the Shah's regime, for the clashes at the time had begun as a result of a long accumulation and daily growing public discontent caused by Reza Pahlavi's domestic and foreign policies for decades. At that time, the political forces - especially the Left - had prepared themselves for the great explosion and the massive confrontation with the regime's bodies. This was achieved through the organization of cadres and supporters within networks that ensured continued contact with their leaders in case the repression campaign escalated and also ensured the reception of necessary instructions on the location and mechanisms of demonstrations including how and where to gather and act. What enabled them to achieve this is their long-term experience which they earned in dealing with security agents and its terrifying repressive secret police, the SAVAK. This technique was later imitated by the religious movement led by Khomeini with the help of Muslim clergy secret networks. The same scenes are being witnessed today in the various Iranian cities. Not intimidated by the Revolutionary Guards' or the Bazeejs' sticks, weapons, and prisons, protestors wear green arm bands and rush into the streets, calling for the fall of the new “dictator”. Suppression only increases their determination to express their opinion and claim their right for change. Every time the regime confirms that the “election conspiracy” is over, they show that murder, imprisonment, and tear gas grenades will not stop their movement. They are like a slowly burning fuse that is inextinguishable and will eventually reach a “gunpowder store” and confirm that the Iranian bomb, which the world fears, is not capable of concealing the time bomb which swells in the streets of Tehran, Isfahan, and even Qom. A simple review of the statements made by Iranian officials yesterday and today unveils the similarity in attitudes and beliefs: the Shah also could not believe that his reign would fall and remained convinced until the last moment before he fled that nothing he did during his mandate justifies his departure or calls for such rage, and that he would regain control of the situation as soon as the “conspiracy” is over. Only a few months after the success of the revolution against the Shah, Khomeini surprised the Iranians by inviting them not to use the term “democracy”, for it is a “western concept”. By that time he had established a plan to banish all “his enemies” who took part in the overthrow of former regime, through bombings and assassinations, then executions, imprisonment, and exiles based on mock trials. And thus Khomeini was able to impose himself as the sole supreme reference whose orders and opinions were not to be opposed, following his intentional mixing between religion and politics culminating in the Guardianship of the Islamic Jurists (or Wilayat el faqih) which meant the abolition of any independent role of the state institutions and apparatus, including the judicial one. The strongest evidence for his rejection of any opposition – including this which came from within his own regime – was the expulsion of his designated successor Ayatollah Montazeri who dared to question Khomeini's disregard of human rights and excessive suppression of freedom. Thirty years later, an increasing number of Iranian people share the opinion of Montazeri, who passed away a few days ago, as they wish to stop wasting the country's power and wealth in policies that have put Iran in a confrontation with almost the whole world and which, moreover, rely on the control of the secret services to silence any dissenting voices. And yet, what is happening now is nothing but the beginning.
