Between I-rock & and a Hard Place

I blogged before about the fundamental (pun intended) difference between that form of Islam practiced by the majority (85%) of Muslims – the Sunni path – and that practiced by the minority (15%) – the Shiite view of the faith. Aside from questions of the ancestral linkage to the Prophet Mohammad, the core difference between these two sects focuses on how they view their holiest of books, the Qur’an.

Sunnis see their disciples as reading the literal words of the Qur’an, forming an individual one-on-one relationship with God, and view their legitimate leadership as “protectors of Islam,” but not as interpreters of the faith. Shiites, on the other hand, believe that the Qur’an is a mystical book, capable of interpretation only by the holiest of scholars and religious leaders, so followers are required to adhere to the dictates of such interpretations. On the Shiite path, government and religion are far more intertwined. Iran is considered the bastion of the Shiite side of the equation, with many followers in neighboring Iraq and in more distant areas within Lebanon and Syria.

Until the 10^th century AD, the Shiites were led by a spiritual leader, a Pope-like prelate, called the Imam. At that time in history, the 12^th Imam simply disappeared, and the Shiites simply fell apart, persecuted fiercely by Sunnis who saw them as heretics. In 1979, when the Shah of Iran was deposed, and an Islamic (Shiite) Republic was formed under the spiritual leadership of the Ayatollah Khomeini, many Shiite faithful perceived that Khomeini was the return of that 12^th Imam, imbued with the supreme power to interpret the faith and bring God’s will into the political structure, putting religious leadership above the elected government. While no supreme ayatollah has ever acknowledged that they have the power of the Imam, their behavior often suggests a comparable power.

Why is this remotely relevant to the modern world? Because the supreme spiritual leader of Iran, the Ayatollah Khamenei (Khomeini’s replacement) is viewed as virtually infallible, much like the Pope in the Catholic Church. So as Iran struggled to silence a large number of young reformists who backed opposition leader, Mir Hossein Mousavi, against Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the incumbent conservative President in the recent election, as technology (like Twitter and Facebook) became tools of the opposition, Khamenei’s autocratic power came under attack in a way that the established Iranian government could never have foreseen and seems powerless to control.

Khamenei literally announced, prematurely it seems, that Ahmadinejad had won the election, despite a rising tide of popular protests in support of the opposition. Mousavi directly challenged the directives from Khamenei, who has already backed off and accepted a “traditional” ballot recount (not a deeper inquiry of how the ballots were actually “created” – he specifically eliminated “fraud” in the election in a June 19^th speech), and called for increasing demonstrations against the election. That Khamenei had backed off at all seemed to fly in the face of his purported infallibility, a challenge to the underlying basis of the Republic.

As protests increased, as electronic media seemed to evade the strict censorship policies of the government, Khamenei now faces a very difficult decision. Should he sacrifice Ahmadinejad to avoid a rising confrontation with the protestors (heavily comprised of younger urbanites) and settle the country down into complacent acceptance of the status quo (allowing Khamenei to survive to fight another day) – by finding election irregularities and accepting Mousavi as President – or should the Supreme Leader call out the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) to enforce Amahdinejad’s purported victory and suppress the protests, risking a situation that could threaten the viability of the Islamic Republic itself? Is Khamenei slowly pushing the accelerator pedal of repression to see what happens?

“Secret vigilantes,” known as the Basij, have tracked the most vocal protestors during the day, seeking them out at night – murders and beatings “happen” where the government looks the other way. This creates official plausible deniability but begins the kind of repression that may ultimately create new social “martyrs” and result in a seething underlying force that could alienate the coming generation, planting the seeds of destruction for the Islamic Republic.

The June 19^th Los Angeles Times: “Though Ayatollah Ali Khamenei criticized some of Ahmadinejad's campaign season conduct and condemned the killing of students by pro-regime loyalists earlier this week, he came down strongly on the side of the president and his faction while warning supporters of losing candidate Mir-Hossein Mousavi of consequences if they don't end their civil disobedience.” Note his separation of direct government involvement in the killings from the “loyalists” who alleged perpetrated this violence on their own.

Who are the Basij, really? The June 19^th New York Times: “ ‘It is the special brigades of the Revolutionary Guards who right now, especially at night, trap young demonstrators and kill them,’ said Mohsen Sazegara, an Iranian exile who helped write the charter for the newly formed Revolutionary Guards in 1979 when he was a young aide to Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. ‘That is one way the regime avoids the responsibility for these murders. It can say, “We don’t know who they are.” … The death toll now stands at 13, said Shahram Kholdi, a graduate student at the University of Manchester in England, who is building a Web site to track all killings.”

Desperation is rising as the Basij are beginning to call for open action on the part of angry conservative Iranians to root out the hooligans in the protest movement. Is this a declaration of war by the government or another escalation in testing the waters of hardline repression? We have a very real interest in both the long and the short term outcome of this “election.” Since Amahdinejad has been very confrontational with the West over the development of Iran’s nuclear capacity, the results have global ramifications, well beyond the price of oil. But if U.S. policy intervenes too deeply in Iranian politics, this could give the government the excuse it needs to crush the protestors as a means of resisting “American interference.” This must remain an Iranian internal issue.

I’m Peter Dekom, and I approve this message.