Analysis

An overview of recent protests in Iran

November 26, 2019 Analysis by Anahita Hosseini-lewis

On Saturday 16 November 2019, a large number of Iranian cities witnessed mass demonstrations and protests which overwhelmed the regime of the Islamic Republic (IRI).

The protests initially started as a reaction to the significant cut in fuel subsidies (prices almost tripled overnight) and the subsequent rationing of fuel that was announced on the evening of Friday 15 November. The unrest quickly spread across more than 100 cities, where protestors were demonstrating their deep dissatisfaction with the devastating economic situation and the austerity plans imposed by the state.

In some cities, people stopped their cars in the main streets to block the traffic. Some of these road blockages lasted for hours on end. The protestors were threatened by the security forces and even by the President Hasan Rouhani, who made it clear that the drivers causing the hold-ups would be prosecuted and severely punished. Nevertheless, the blockages continued and demonstrations took place simultaneously. Large groups of people gathered in public spaces, shouting slogans against the regime’s dictatorship and corruption, as well as against some of the regime’s key figures, including the Supreme Leader of the IRI, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei himself.

In reaction to the widespread discontent, the state immediately shut down the internet, almost completely. This made it very difficult (and in some cases even impossible) to spread the news from the protests and make people aware of the brutality of the police and armed forces in dealing with the demonstrators. Amidst the radical protests in many major and small cities, on 17 November Khamenei threw his support behind the fuel price increases launched by Rouhani’s government and claimed that those demonstrating were not ordinary Iranians, but thugs supported by the regime’s enemies, including the Pahlavis (the former royal dynasty of Iran, some of whom, such as the former Iranian crown prince, Reza Pahlavi, are currently politically active and have aspirations of eventually returning to power in Iran) or the MEK (the People’s Mujahedin of Iran).¹

_{It is worth noting that in order to justify its brutality against the demonstrators and the suppression of the protests, the IRI always tries to blame domestic unrest either on foreign influence and meddling or on marginal organisations such as the MEK. It should be stressed that while there is – very marginal – support for Royalist groups and organizations such as the MEK, these groups are clearly not behind these widespread demonstrations, most of which are spontaneous and lack organised leadership.}

Despite the internet blackout and the lack of news coverage by the few international news agencies that are still present in Iran, there are multiple videos demonstrating the regime’s brutality against the civilian demonstrations, including videos which show the regime’s security forces shooting directly at protestors. (One video shows the forces shooting people from a helicopter in Shiraz, a large, mainly Farsi-speaking city in Central Iran). Amnesty International announced that they have confirmed evidence of 106 people killed during the first 4 days of the protests, but the number of casualties is much higher; it is estimated that around 250 have been killed and around 3000 arrested, which makes the ongoing crack-down one of the bloodiest in recent decades.

Unsurprisingly, the two main fractions of the IRI (the so-called “Reformists” and “Principalists”) have supported each other since the start of the unrest. Whilst the mainstream media has a tendency to view the Iranian “Reformists” more favourably and insist that they are generally pro-democracy or at least less repressive, at times like this, when the survival of the regime is in question, the Reformists have never hesitated in seeking to secure their survival through brutality towards the Iranian people and the silencing of their grievances.

Throughout the protests, state TV provided continuous footage of the regime’s security officials and leaders denouncing the protests. One of the chief commanders of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard likened the unrest to a “World War” in terms of scale and complexity, and made the point that the current uprising was incomparable with anything since the revolution of 1979 revolution. This comment, besides demonstrating that the commander has no idea about what global conflict actually entails, reveals the extent of the IRI’s despair in the face of the recent events.

The November 2019 protests bare numerous similarities to the protests of January 2018. Both of these uprisings began in, and mainly revolved around, the margins of Iranian society: provincial cities, small towns with high numbers of unemployment and areas with a high concentration of ethnic minorities who are constantly discriminated against on economic and cultural or political grounds. This also manifested itself in the suppression of the protests, as the majority of the 200+ fatalities during the past days occurred in regions inhabited by ethnic minorities, such as Kermanshah, various cities in Kurdistan and southern cities with large number of Arab residents, such as Ahvaz.

In its earlier years the IRI strove to maintain its ideological hegemony over the impoverished strata of the Iranian society, using tools such as the provision of subsidies for basic goods and by maintaining a discourse that was loosely inspired by, but far removed from, popular leftist pro-working class slogans and ideas. Throughout its 40-year existence, the regime was to some extent successful in keeping the poor under its ideological hegemony through these means. This success also comes in spite of the fact that the economic situation has worsened for most people, especially since the adoption of aggressive neo-liberal economic policies in the 1990s. These measures, accompanied by the political elites’ exclusive control over resources and the supposedly ‘privatised’ sections of the economy (giving an enormous power to forces such as Iran’s Revolutionary Guards) preclude anything approaching a fair or even distribution of wealth, let alone the possibility of reining in corruption. The structural adjustment policies recommended by the IMF – including, notably, the removal of basic subsidies – have been strictly and obediently followed by the Islamic State in recent years. Combined with the state’s corruption, government incompetence and the sanctions imposed by the US, this has dramatically worsened the economic situation and living standards of millions of lower- and middle-class Iranians.

Suppressing the movement’s leaders, to the point of physical elimination if necessary, has been a life-long strategy of the Islamic Regime in dealing with any manifestation of opposition. Every time fundamental opposition has surfaced, it has been quashed, with activists, exiled, imprisoned or executed. This leads to demoralisation and a discontinuation in the development of Iran’s radical forces across generations, thereby preventing the rise of a strong and coherent opposition. As such, these generational gaps between various political movements represent the Achilles heel of Iran’s radical opposition – the absence of coordinated and organised forces was not only evident during the recent protests themselves, but also in their rather rapid defeat.

But regardless of what the future has in store for this newly born and fragile movement, the wave of protests has shown that there is indeed another Iran: an unseen Iran, a wounded but dynamic, uncompromising and hopeful Iran, which is willing to move beyond the superficial rivalry between the factions of the regime and to take its destiny into its own hands. There is a crucial role to be played by progressive international solidarity in supporting and nurturing it.

Terrorism, intervention and repression: Iran after the June 7th Attacks

January 1, 2018 Analysis by Anahita Hosseini-lewis

The June 7^th IS-supported attacks in Tehran, which targeted two of the most symbolic buildings in the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI), amounted to a huge security failure on the part of that country. The Iranian state initially tried to downplay the importance of the attack in order to distract attention from its own failings. Simultaneously, however, it launched a fierce propaganda offensive – blaming both Saudi Arabia and the USA for the atrocity. This offensive has by no means abated in recent times and has major implications for Iran’s future.

The terrorist acts furnished the IRI with the perfect excuse to further its interference within other Middle Eastern countries under the pretext of fighting IS. Of course, since its very inception the IRI has been an active interventionist factor in the development of the Middle East. But, as evinced by the recent missile attack on Syria from Iranian soil, we are likely to see an increase in Iran’s meddling abroad in the future – and not just in IS-controlled territory either. Moreover, the IRI is able to utilise Saudi Arabia’s verbal threats against it – as well as the United States’ increasingly vocal backing of the Saudis under the Trump government – in order to portray itself as a victim on the international stage. (In doing so, it is even attempting to tap into the general disdain towards the Trump administration which currently exists in the government departments of some nation states).

IS’s Tehran attacks will of course give credence to the IRI state’s claims of being a defensive, non-interventionist state which is engulfed by terrorism. The reality, however, is that the IRI is an aggressive and interventionist state which has contributed significantly to the ongoing destabilisation of the Middle East. At this stage, the IRI is not looking to provoke a head-on confrontation with Saudi Arabia and its allies. But it is sending an unambiguous signal to the international community that it is unwilling to renounce the significant role it has recently acquired in the region. Ever since it had to make concessions by signing the nuclear deal in 2015, the Iranian regime has been wary of being seen as ‘weak’ by other countries in the region. The recent missile launch demonstrates how the IRI is using the terrorist attacks to push its luck in the international community – gauging the current mood and ascertaining whether further incursions might be possible.

Even a cursory look at recent history shows how intricately involved Iran has been in the creation and perpetuation of the human catastrophe in Syria – playing its part in turning an initially peaceful protest movement into a bloody civil war. Before this, it pursued a similar project within post-Saddam Iraq. It marginalised the Sunni peoples there by cutting off their access to political and economic resources – thereby contributing to the radicalisation of Iraqi Sunnis and helping to create the conditions within which the forces of Salafism (including IS) could flourish. On occasion, the IRI’s attempts to empower its allies at all costs even led it to support forces such as the Taliban, in order to weaken its enemies.¹

In one important respect, the IS attack scotched one of the myths constantly peddled by the Iranian government and media – namely that the IRI’s involvement in Syria and Iraq is protecting the country from terrorist atrocities on home soil. Seen in this light, the aggressive rhetoric and the launching of missiles is as much driven by the need for the IRI to play to its domestic audience as it is for the need to uphold Iran’s status as a regional power. Now that a terrorist attack has actually taken place, the IRI does not want to be seen as weak by its own people either.

In the past few years the schism between the IRI state and some of the less marginalised sections of Iranian society (such as the Persian-speaking urban upper and middle classes) has become much less pronounced¹ and the regime is keen to keep this group of the population on board. One of the most successful ways in which the regime has done so is by adopting elements of a national discourse² and by appealing to the Iranian ‘national interest’. Both serve to unify the nation behind a guiding idea, but also – crucially – to marginalise and exclude critical voices.

The Iranian regime has a long history of invoking crisis in order to silence oppositional voices through spreading fear, torture and executions (as in the war with Iraq in the 1980s). Now though, there is the distinct danger that the IRI will ramp up its repression of social movements in the name of ‘anti-terrorism’, while the majority of the population remains silent because it has taken the rhetoric of ‘defending the nation from terrorism’ as good coin. Against this backdrop, the prospects of any meaningful reforms within the Iranian regime remain as distant as ever.

In fact, the threat of terror can only produce more repression.³ National minority activists in Sunni regions of the country, for instance, can currently be arrested, tortured and even killed – all in the name of cracking down on ISIS. In the absence of transparency and access to legal representation, fair trials and so forth, many of those affected by this crackdown will probably not be connected to IS at all.

In pursuing their own agenda in these difficult times, Iranian social movements – and those of us outside of Iran who support them – should not forget that the horrific cycle of terror and repression can only hinder the cause of genuine progress in Iran and in the region as a whole.

1 It is worth noting that all of the five terrorists involved in the June 7^th attack were Iranian citizens of Kurdish descent. In the recent past the IRI has supported Salafist movements (such as Ansar-al Islam) in Iraqi and Iranian Kurdistan. Given that Kurdistan has historically been a stronghold of leftist and nationalist movements, the Islamic republic has supported Salafist groupings there in the hope that the Salafists would weaken secular tendencies. We now know that two years ago one of the five IS assailants of June 7th had been freely recruiting Kurdish youth with the knowledge of the IRI.

1 This fact might come as a surprise to those who are not familiar with the current state of affairs in Iran, since this layer of Iranian society has typically been seen as most vocal in its opposition to the IRI’s ideology and policies (as in 2009). But during the past few years this relationship has been transformed.

2 The role played by nationalism in modern Iran is a complex sociological phenomenon which deserves to be analysed separately.

3 In fact this process of repression has already started. The regime brutally attacked a miners’ strike in Agh-dare, injuring many in the process. This was accompanied by a number of arrests across the country. The public reaction to this outrage has hitherto been minimal or non-existent.

Anahita Hosseini June 2017

A spark of hope in Iran: why 2017 isn’t 2009

January 1, 2018 Analysis by Anahita Hosseini-lewis

Protests, rallies and demonstrations have engulfed Iran since Thursday. Beginning on a relatively small scale in the provincial city of Mashhad in Eastern Iran, where a thousand protesters voiced their grievances over their dire economic situation, the demonstrations quickly spread to a number of provincial towns. By December 30th, this oppositional sentiment had arrived in Tehran, the Iranian capital.

At the time of writing (Sunday December 31st), protests have sprouted up in more than 30 towns and cities in – something that has surprised both the Islamic regime itself and analysts inside and outside of the country. For although dispersed protests and small-scale strikes against Iran’s spiraling inflation, huge unemployment and the lack of payment of wages and pensions have been a rather common occurrence during the past few months, the rapid growth and radicalization of the recent protests has created scenes which we have not witnessed since the mass mobilizations in the wake of the contested presidential election in 2009.

Although it is far too early to provide a comprehensive analysis of the ongoing events, it is evident that thus far the focal point of the unrest has been economic in nature. Alongside the above-mentioned economic problems, there has recently been a significant rise in the price of basic daily goods, which has exacerbated the gulf between the rich and poor. Calling for support for the movement, the Iranian labor movement leader Jafar Azimzadeh argued that, given the terrible social conditions faced by most Iranians, there is a certain inevitability to what we are currently witness: the toxic combination of neo-liberal privatisation and Islamic corruption is exacting a heavy toll.

The growing inequality in Iran is becoming evident not only to the working classes of the towns and cities (particularly those living in the harsher conditions in the provincial regions inhabited by a variety of national and ethnic minorities), but to the lower sections of the urban middle classes as well. All appear to be outraged by the Iranian state’s seeming refusal to do anything to address their plight. It is for this reason that, as the protests continue, their focus appears to be moving beyond economics. Protest slogans such as ‘Bread, Work, Freedom!’, Capitalist Clergy: Give us Back our Wealth!’, ‘The Unpaid Wages of the Retired are Hidden under the Clergy’s Cape’ or ‘The Supreme Leader is living like a God, Whilst the People are Begging’ highlight how the protesters are laying the blame for their economic plight squarely at the feet of the Islamic Regime. And despite the claims of almost all reports in the mainstream press outside of Iran, such oppositional energy is clearly aimed at the IRI (Islamic republic of Iran) state as a whole, not one or other of its ‘principalist’ or the so-called ‘reformist’ factions.

For although Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, is, by some margin, the biggest symbolic target of the demonstrations, there have been slogans and placards directed against the current (purportedly ‘progressive’) President Hassan Rouhani, the heads of the Iranian parliament, the judiciary and also some of the financially dubious and institutions which are closely tied to the state. The state’s foreign policy has come in for much criticism too.

And the defiance has not been limited to rallies, slogans, chants and pulling down public portrayals of the Supreme Leader either. In a demonstration at Tehran University, for example, female protesters reportedly removed their headscarves in public. Indeed, one of the most iconic images of the bravery and defiance shown by the protests thus far is of one such unveiled young woman standing on top of a statue on one of Tehran’s busiest crossroads, waving her headscarf above her head as the crowds pass by (she has since been arrested).

2017 and 2009

It is tempting to compare the current movement to the 2009 protests, or even to view the ongoing protests as the continuation of the 2009 events. Regardless of what lies ahead in the coming days and weeks, I believe that the current protest movement is already exhibiting several characteristics which are fundamentally different to those of the 2009 Green Movement.

This movement began when Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was declared the president of Iran against his pro-reformist rival, Mir-Hossein Mousavi. As a result, many people in Tehran, and other major cities, took to the streets and thereby initiated something which, in terms of numbers, was the biggest revolt in Iran since the revolution of 1979. This mass mobilisation was certainly not devoid of radicalism, especially during its later stages, but from the outset it was very much in the control of the disgruntled reformist faction, who were mainly concerned with the disputed election results and whose overriding focus was to oust Ahmadinejad. Accordingly, many of the protests were characterised by Shia’ symbolism and religious rhetoric, which became particularly evident in their chants and slogans. The kind of universal economic demands which are so forthright today were utterly marginal back then.

And while the numbers mobilised in 2009 were truly impressive, with the majority of the protests taking place in the capital. Indeed, aside from the misleadership of the reformists, one of the reasons why the Green Movement petered out so quickly was the minimal involvement of the Iranian working classes – particularly those from smaller cities, the provinces and the ethnic minorities, who felt alienated from it.

For the reasons discussed above, the ongoing events, while still in embryo, already show signs of taking on a different direction than in 2009. As we have seen, the impetus for what is unfolding now came not from Tehran, but from working working-class neighbourhoods and provincial towns and cities. The placards, chants and slogans we are currently seeing on social media differ from those of the Green Movement in both form and content.

The response of both fractions of the IRI further underlines the point regarding the contrast between the 2009 and 2017. Initially, both the ‘principalists’ and ‘reformists’ adopted a rather ambivalent stance, watching and waiting to see whether they could exploit the situation to their own factional advantage. But it soon dawned on them that the protests were uncontrollable and were assuming a significant anti-regime dynamic. Unsurprisingly therefore, both factions have quickly found common ground in calling for the protests to be suppressed.

The state has resorted to extreme violence, hundreds have been arrested, assaulted, beaten and shot. Internet access has been heavily restricted, as has access to social media and the popular mobile-phone messaging service Telegram. At least two campaigners have been shot dead in the Western town of Dourd. All the while, both fractions of the regime (and their acolytes outside of the country) are stepping up the propaganda war to undermine the protestors – desperately trying to pass the movement off as Western-led, Zionist-imperialist conspiracy.

It is too early to say with certainty whether the protests will be able to last, whether or not they will be able to withstand the violence of the Iranian state’s repression. But what is undeniable is that the past few days represent a spark of hope for genuine and fundamental change from below, beyond the existing fractions of the IRI, which can only take the form of a fundamental political upheaval.

At this time, creating international support for the cause of the Iranian people and raising awareness about the emerging movement is crucial – and it could help to counter the efforts of the IRI and its supporters in seeking to undermine the movement and its ramifications.

Moreover, in seeking to spread the inspiring message of the Iranian people internationally, it should be stressed that the meddling of foreign powers such as the Trump administration in the USA (which has no credibility among the majority of the people) cannot be of any help to the protests. Such hypocritical intrusion can only make things worse for the burgeoning movements, providing a pretext for the Iranian state to crackdown on all opposition all the more ruthlessly. There is a lot to play for – and it is encouraging to see that, in spite of everything that this brutal state throws at its people, the very best traditions of Iranian radicalism and bravery have not gone away.

Anahita Hosseini December 2017,

anahitahosseinilewis@gmail.com

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