If the rumors of the Lebanese Hizbola being involved are true, would it be a good move to team up with the Lebanese government to go after Hizbola in Lebanon, thereby impeding its ability to help Ahmedi?
Actually, Twitter has turned out to be pretty reliable if you know how to use it. Each poster has their own pseudonym, so you just see who is regularly backed up by pictures later, and trust them as a reliable informant, similar to the trust placed with "anonymous officials."
I get what you're saying and I agree to an extent, but not to the extent of "I would trust this source with no additional corroboration." What ever happened to the two security personnel that were apparently captured by students and change_for_iran passed on the news?
"Anonymous officials" aren't exactly the same thing. The reporter knows who the anonymous official is but is not allowed to give the name of that official. Information released in such a way from the administration is usually through what is called a background briefing. Print news orgs are increasingly agitated with background briefings because it robs credibility from their reports. Television news doesn't care so much because the "anonymous official" in the next day's newspaper will usually be on camera as a talking head. Background briefings were relatively few before Ari Fleischer's press room reign, were suspended for several months under Scott McClellan, were reinstated by Tony Snow and have been occurring with the same frequency through now, under Robert Gibbs.
Here's a good Cheney story concerning background briefings from Politico:
In February 2007, George W. Bush’s White House offered a background briefing with a “senior administration official†who took exception with the way he’d been characterized in the press.
“I've seen some press reporting says, 'Cheney went in to beat up on [the Pakistani government], threaten them,’†the senior administration official said. “That's not the way I work. I don't know who writes that, or maybe somebody gets it from some source who doesn't know what I'm doing, or isn't involved in it. But the idea that I'd go in and threaten someone is an invalid misreading of the way I do business."
Although the transcript made it obvious that the background briefer was Vice President Dick Cheney, his office still refused to waive the not-for-attribution shield.
NO. We cannot get involved officially at all. Period. End of story.
What's he going to do, admit to importing foreign fighters?
The Iranian government doesn't have to do anything. It'll be readily apparent to anyone if the United States does anything without the Iranian government saying something about it.
God the wailing and gnashing of teeth over at the National Review is hilarious. No sooner have they had their shitty president and his would-be-successor relegated to the dustbin of history due to a resounding rejection of his policies, both abroad and in the country that elected him, do they beg Obama to do the same stupid shit all over again.
I see that Rich Lowry is now comparing Obama's decision to sit this out to the Blitz. OMG IT'S TOTALLY THE SAME THING NEVILLE CHAMBERLAIN.
What a cesspool of utter failure.
nameless on
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SarksusATTACK AND DETHRONE GODRegistered Userregular
It doesn't matter. This would give him a real tool to claim that the West wants him out of power.
How? The fighting would be in Lebanon, with permission from the government. How could he possibly link that to himself.
Okay first of all the Iranian government doesn't need much to start raising a fuss. They already claimed the United States was interfering just because of what US government officials have said to the media. Admittedly employing this strategy without substantial evidence is not very effective and sways no one but if the United States chooses to conduct some kind of operation against militant forces in Lebanon the Iranian government has somewhat firmer ground to stand on. I can't say what the reaction would be, but I wouldn't want to risk it.
Additionally I think that willfully causing another conflict in the Middle East right at this moment is a very bad idea. The situation is already bad enough without the United States shoving its hand in it.
God the wailing and gnashing of teeth over at the National Review is hilarious. No sooner have they had their shitty president relegated to the dustbin of history due to a resounding rejection of his policies, both abroad and in the country that elected him, do they beg Obama to do the same stupid shit all over again.
I see that Rich Lowry is now comparing Obama's decision to sit this out to the Blitz. OMG IT'S TOTALLY THE SAME THING NEVILLE CHAMBERLAIN.
What a cesspool of utter failure.
Rich "Shes winking at me" Lowry? Yeah no one should listen to him.
Preacher on
I would like some money because these are artisanal nuggets of wisdom philistine.
It doesn't matter. This would give him a real tool to claim that the West wants him out of power.
How? The fighting would be in Lebanon, with permission from the government. How could he possibly link that to himself.
I think that Iranians standing up for rights and freedoms is awesome. I think that if we add to the bloodshed in any way at all, the best that could come of it is that we would look like assholes. This is not our responsibility. This is not our fight. We don't have the right to interfere on a state level.
No, see, during a civil war is the perfect time to get involved! We can wipe out both sides while they are distracted!
Oh, wait, that's how Russia ended up with Lenin*
Not really, none of the sides involved in the Russian Revolution wanted our help
In Imperial Russia (or rather, by then, the Russian SFSR), we made the fatal mistake in assuming that, since the White Army was fighting Lenin and the Bolsheviks, that they weren't murderous assholes.
As it turned out, they were.
This might be a good lesson to apply to Iran--both keeping ourselves from getting involved, and in the event that we should.
This whole russia conspiracy issue is fascinating especially with the prez being in russia right now. I wonder how much of it has merit.
If things seem to be going the way you don't want, blame the Russians. Doesn't matter why, you just need someone to blame. They're our (Americans) Jews, basically. But I'm a cynic.
Or possibly unaware that Russia supplies Iran with arms.
Too late for that. Russia (or rather, its predecessor) also supplied Iraq with arms even when we were on good terms with that nation. It supplied, and continues to supply, Kuwait, Syria, and the UAE with arms--all countries with wildly different political alignments. Hell, there are even theories that it supplied Israel with arms during one of those lulls of peace that followed the 6-Day War. Really, that's like asking which countries Iran has supplied with oil--it's not a short list. If you want to connect Iran with Russia, you need to find something unique, not "all the countries Russia and its predecessor ever sold arms to".
Oh, I wasn't supporting the conspiracy theories in any way. It is highly unlikely that Russia is involved. However. Russia did intend to supply Iran with the S-300 anti-aircraft system (one of the best, if not the best anti-aircraft system in the world). The S-300 would have been intended to counteract Israel's air superiority.
It's not that the conspiracy theories are correct but rather that they are based on the relationship between the two nations. Not some weird "Russians are the new Jews!" explanation.
That was meant in the context that, frequently, when we want to find a scapegoat for things not going our way, we have frequently blamed the Russians (or their closely-associated national counterparts) for the problem. The conspiracy theories seemed to fall within that category.
Guys I think the poll is rigged. Should we protest?
Nah, just tweet.
Yeah I think a mod rigged the poll. But don't worry, a mod-appointed guardian council of mods will double-check it and make sure the result is right. I'm sure we can trust them.
Guys I think the poll is rigged. Should we protest?
Nah, just tweet.
Yeah I think a mod rigged the poll. But don't worry, a mod-appointed guardian council of mods will double-check it and make sure the result is right. I'm sure we can trust them.
But the cookies were all burnt? How can we recount that which doesn't exist anymore? Next you'll be telling us that Tube delivered the final count as a holy proclamation.
Forar on
First they came for the Muslims, and we said NOT TODAY, MOTHERFUCKER!
No, see, during a civil war is the perfect time to get involved! We can wipe out both sides while they are distracted!
Oh, wait, that's how Russia ended up with Lenin*
Not really, none of the sides involved in the Russian Revolution wanted our help
And yet 20,000 marines ended up roaming around Russia.
Funny thing that.
Well, the US hasn't wanted to take 'no' for an answer for a long time. I love the Russian Revolution, primarily because there shouldn't have been a chance in hell for the Bolsheviks to win. Everyone else just fucked up.
God the wailing and gnashing of teeth over at the National Review is hilarious. No sooner have they had their shitty president and his would-be-successor relegated to the dustbin of history due to a resounding rejection of his policies, both abroad and in the country that elected him, do they beg Obama to do the same stupid shit all over again.
I see that Rich Lowry is now comparing Obama's decision to sit this out to the Blitz. OMG IT'S TOTALLY THE SAME THING NEVILLE CHAMBERLAIN.
What a cesspool of utter failure.
I heard a conservative radio host, don't know who, compare this to Poland and Reagan in the 80s. 20 seconds after turning to that station I had to turn it off.
well just because our government can't do anything right now doesn't mean our people can't. I mean since this started I've been thinking about how everything in Tehran has essentially stopped. Win or Lose when this is over, Tehran is going to need help. I mean while this hasn't been a fullblown warzone, this is still a densly populated metripolitan area that has basically stopped operating for4+ days now. Their people are resilient like we've seen so far, but that doesn't mean they won't need food, basic infrastructure repair. Their university probably looks like a hell-hole now and I'm betting a lot more than a handful of people are now homeless. If we really wanted to support them, we would start organizing, post reform aid now.
Guys I think the poll is rigged. Should we protest?
Nah, just tweet.
Yeah I think a mod rigged the poll. But don't worry, a mod-appointed guardian council of mods will double-check it and make sure the result is right. I'm sure we can trust them.
i trust the ayatollah elkameini
its ahmadinajeffe i don't trust
Okay, I'm still catching up on the thread so sorry if this has already been mentioned but:
Holy shit! The CBC still has a reporter in Tehran! They are also not falling for the supporters mixed in with protestors either. The start of the report pretty much went: "Iran is claiming the west is meddling with their affairs but on to the REAL story..." and continued with youtube cell videos, mentioning the protestors were wearing black for the people who died yesterday and the reporter I believe is from the area and has a small camera herself to try to avoid suspicion.
Very worrying report: Supreme Leader Khameini has called for Friday Prayers where he will be present. There are fears that the IRG is going to have a massive presence and that this might be a trap, but on the other hand not attending makes the reformists enemies of Islam and worthy of the death penalty. There are also reports that other Reformist candidate Karoubi and his entire party leadership were arrested.
Nothing much has happened in the last hours aside of that. There are reports of clerics and ayatollahs meeting in the holy Shiite city of Qom in order to plan to overthrow Khameini as supreme leader, as well as a more and more pro-dissenters stance from the army, but we have nothing substantiated so far. I will yet update this tomorrow, adding further information about various other groups operating in Iran right now and relevant to this revolution.
I really am trying to cram the most relevant information and speculation only. Everything is updated as events unfold, especially the timeline and what will happen in the future. If you want to link this, here is the website, updated as the situation changes:
All twitter posts about the army being involved are false as I am writing this Warning, new twitter feeds are most likely government members trying to spread misinformation, ignore them! Also, there is a handful of good twitter feeds, but please do not publicize their usernames, they are in enough danger as it is and they don't need more publiclity. Those in the know will c/p their entries. Major timeline overhaul, including what has unfolded in the last few hours.
Suppression of Dissent - The Players
Currently, there are either two or three maybe four groups who are suppressing the students on the ground that you'll read about throughout this thread:
1. The Basij
2. Ansar Hizbullah (which I will refer to as Ansar)
3. Lebanese Hizbullah (Unconfirmed but highly probable. Der Spiegel, based on a Voice of America report, says that 5,000 Hizbullah fighters are currently in Iran masquerading as riot police, confirming the independent reports. Many different independent reports and video point that way. Even in the last hours other independent twitter feeds have declared witnessing thugs beating on people while shouting in Arabic; I will refer to them as Hizbullah)
4. Lebanese Hamas (unconfirmed and doubtful. This rumour has been cropping up all day, with some of the most twitter feeds saying they had visual confirmation of Lebanese Hamas fighters along with Lebanese Hizbullah member. Take with a grain of salt, but it has been mentioned often enough, by sources generally always right, that it deserves of a mention here. I will refer to them as Hamas)
- The Basij are your regular paramilitary organization. They are the armed hand of the clerics. The Basij are a legal group, officially a student union, and are legally under direct orders of the Revolutionary Guard. Their main raison d'être is to quell dissent. They are the ones who go and crack skulls, force people to participate in pro-regime demonstrations, and generally try to stop any demonstrations from even starting. They are located throughout the country, in every mosque, every university, every social club you can think of. They function in a way very similar to the brownshirts.
They were the ones who first started the crackdown after the election, but it wasn't enough. While they are violent and repressive, they are still Persian and attacking fellow citizens. A beating is one thing, mass killings another.
- Another group was working with them, whose members are even more extreme, is Ansar. There is a lot of cross-membership between the Basij and Ansar, though not all are members of the other group and vice-versa. The vast majority of Ansar are Persians (either Basij or ex-military), though a lot of Arab recruits come from Lebanon and train with them under supervision of the Revolutionary Guard. They are not functioning under a legal umbrella, they are considered a vigilante group, but they pledge loyalty directly to the Supreme Leader and most people believe that they are under his control. They are currently helping the Basij to control the riots, but due to the fact that they are Persians and in lower numbers than the Basij, they are not that active.
- The Lebanese Hizbullah is a direct offshoot (and under direct control) of the Iranian Hizbullah (itself under direct control of the Supreme Leader) and cooperates closely with Ansar though Ansar occupies itself only with Iran's domestic policies, while Hizbullah occupies itself only with Iran's foreign policy unless there is a crisis like right now. However, Hizbullah has been called to stop violent riots in Iran in the past.
(the following paragraph includes some speculation based on reports from ground zero) Hizbullah flew in a lot of their members in Iran, most likely a good deal even before the elections in case there were trouble. They are the ones who speak Arabs and are unleashing the biggest level of violence on the Persians so far. Another wave arrived recently and there is chatter that yet another wave of Hizbullah reinforcements are coming in from Lebanon as we speak. According to Iranians on the ground, they are the ones riding motorcycles, beating men women and children indiscriminately and firing live ammunitions at students.
- The Lebanese Hamas is a branch of Hamas set-up in Lebanon. Like Hamas in Gaza, Hamas in Lebanon is directly under the orders of the Hamas council of Damascus known as Majlis al-Shurah. While it is surprising to hear that they might be involved, and as I said take these reports with a grain of salt until we get more confirmations, it is not illogical either. Iran has become the main benefactor of Hamas in the last years, branching out from only supporting Islamic Jihad. They now provide Hamas with the bulk of their budget, with advanced weaponry and training by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. Not only do Hamas own them a lot, but if the Republic falls, Hamas finds itself in dire trouble. It is very likely that, at the call of Iran, the Majlis al-Shura would have decided to send fighters from their Lebanese Hamas branch along with Hizbullah fighters if it was requested of them.
Other Players
Decided to create this section in order to give a wider range of explanations for people who might not be too familiar with Iran's internal politics and structure.
The Police
Iran's police is not dissimilar to your run-of-the-mill law enforcement in other dictatorships, with the difference that they are not generally as brutal and repressive. This is because the Basij are generally in charge of these activities, meaning that Iranian policemen generally concentrate more on the law and order aspect of Iranian daily life.
Today, it is thought that the Iranian police numbers close to 60,000 members, in contrast with up to a million Basij members. This is one of the reasons why we hear much more about the plainclothes militia than we do about the police right now, the other being that the Basij and Ansar are much more willing to violently assault their fellow citizens than even the regular police force. This is not as much a testament to the decency of your average police officers as much as a damning report of what the Basij and Ansar thugs are like.
There are also subdivisions and extra-legal forces attached to the police force. The major subdivision would be the riot police (So-called Unit 110) who are actually much more violent than regular police officers, but also in much, much smaller numbers. There is also VEVAK, the secret police. Very little is known and confirmed about them, except their extreme tactics include murder, kidnapping and torture.
The Army
In Iran, there are actually two armies. They are divided between Artesh and Pasdaran.
Artesh is the regular Military apparatus of the Republic. Their numbers, including reservists, go up to a million members, but only half of them have received anything more than very basic training. As it is often the case in police states, there is very little known and confirmed about the structure of the Army itself.
They were created prior to the Iranian Revolution, in fact this army has existed in one form or another, and is a continuation, for more than 2,500 years. This is not as impressive as it sounds, however, as they often underwent drastic changes, there is no real links between the current incarnations, and the top echelons were most often purged when new rulers took power. In fact, in the last 100 years, those purges happened between two or three times, depending on the count, the last time centered around the time of the Islamic revolution, when most generals were forced to flee, killed, or killed while in exile.
Artesh took the brunt of the military casualties during the Iran-Iraq war, the army is considered to very nationalist and not extremely religious, which explains why they have declared their neutrality and refusal to repress the situation, as they see their purpose to defend the Iranian population.
Everyone agrees they will be the ultimate key to this Revolution when they finally decide to take a side, or alternatively force the Pasdaran to stay on the sidelines with them.
Pasdaran, also known as Iranian Revolutionary Guard
The Iranian Ground forces (I will focus on them, as the Navy and Airforce are currently irrelevant, will update if the situation changes) have been estimated between 100,000 and 130,000 units total. As always, truth most likely resides somewhere in the middle. They are, much like the Basij and Ansar, subservient directly to the Supreme Leader, and ideologically created in the spirit of defending the Islamic Revolution ideals and Republic, not Iran per se. They also control the Basij.
They are a child of the revolution, and they are more geared toward guerilla warfare than they are for military engagements. They are also the force responsible for training the various terrorist groups financed and supported by the Iranian government. They are fanatically devoted to the Republic through intense indoctrination.
The elite troops are called Quds. They are considered the elite of the elite, but they only number between 2000-6000, although rumours say that they are twice or three time as big. They are, however, rumours and quite unlikely.
Ultimately, the Revolutionary Council and the Supreme Leader will call on them if they think they are on the verge of losing power, however it is unlikely that the army will just stay on the sidelines if this happens.
The Guardian Council, formerly known as The Revolutionary Council
The Revolutionary Council was created by Ayatollah Khomeini shortly before the Iranian Revolution. Since then, they have sat as the real authority of Iran. The Guardian Council is made up of 12 Ayatollahs, and they are the ones who dictate every little facet of Iranian life, making the position of President mostly irrelevant, as they do not take any major decisions without first asking permission from Khameini and his cronies. They do not have any qualms about hiding this, as the head of the Council is called "Supreme Leader".
The very goal of this revolution has become not only to elect Moussavi as President, but also elect Grand Ayatollah Montazeri as Supreme Leader. GA Montazeri has been calling for a separation of Mosque and State, and transferring most powers of the Supreme Leader to the President, including control of the Armed Forces.
The Grand Ayatollahs
The Grand Ayatollahs are Shiite clerics who first attained the position of Ayatollahs and then, through their knowledge of Islamic Jurisprudence, attained a supreme position and are regarded as the most important voice in Shia Islam today. They center around the holy Shiite city of Qom, though some live outside Iran.
What will happen
Unless the army decides to intervene in the favor of the Council and to stop the early beginnings of the new Revolution, Ansar & Hizbullah members will be the ones doing the brunt of the killing and repression with Basij as a support while also protecting government buildings and try to do crowd control. The police seems to have for the most part disbanded in centers like Tehran according to all reports, including international media. If the police decides to come back, they will focus less on protection and crowd control, so the Basij will start to crack more skulls).
Currently, this is what is happening. Regarding the repression of dissent.
As for the political scene, the majority of Grand Ayatollahs who expressed an opinion on this have sided with the protesters/against the results of the election. They are GA Ardebili, GA Montazeri, GA Shirazi, GA Golpaygani and GA Sanei. The only Grand Ayatollah who has sided in favor of the election results is Khameini, who is also the Supreme Leader of the Revolutionary Council, and the facto ruler of Iran.
Timeline
note: I built this through both articles and twitter feeds, so I do not claim that this is a 100% factually correct representation of reality, but this is the general narrative.
14th of June - While the previous day had been witness to some protests, they were for the most part peaceful. However, as time grew the protests turned more and more violent. When the first spontaneous riots erupted, the first wave of violence was unleashed. The Iranian Riot Police was called in to support the regular police officers controlling the protests, and shortly after the Basij also took the scene, moving from a passive to active role of repression. The RP concentrated mostly around public buildings and streets while the Basij took position around student groups, especiallly universities.
- As things got more out of hand, more and more Basij troops were called in, as the police started dispersing. The riot police are less inclined (or, rather I should say the Basij are more inclined) to use violence so they retreated and leaving the place to the Basij. The repressive forces concentrated their assault mostly around the main Iranian universities, while the riot police were concentrating on protecting various government buildings such as the Interior Ministry. At least two people had been killed already.
- On the telecommunication front, this is when we started to hear more and more from twitters while videos were being freely updated to youtube (while youtube started to delete the more violent ones a few hours later). This is also the moment where the government realized what was happening, and ordered for the internet, phone lines and cellphones to be cut off, in order to avoid people communicating with the outside world.
late 14th, early 15th of June - This is the second wave of violent repression. At this point, violent riots had spread all over the main cities of Iran. The violence against citizens was not only the fruit of the Basij anymore, but also came from Ansar Hizbullah members. This is the point where firearms started being used. There were reports of a few murders but it was mostly fired in the air or on walls in order to scare away protesters in University dorms. It's also around the same time that the first reports and videos of an important number of non-Persian thugs shouting in Arabic and violently beating people with chains, clubs and electric batons (similar to cattle prods), which led to many speculating that lebanese Hizbullah members were now in Iran. Der Spiegel, through Voice of America, later claimed that 5000 Hizbullah fighters were passing off as Riot Police, validating the claims of many independent sources and twitter feeds.
- Universities have been the hotbed of protests, serving as a hub of anti-government demonstrations and preparations. 120 teachers from the Sharid University resigned in protest over the election results. Perfectly away of this, the Basij, Ansar and possibly Hizbullah members concentrated their attacks on University Dorms all over the country, storming them and beating students, destroying everything, especially computers.
- The end of the second wave came right before the beginning of the current manifestation. Things were getting quieter with only sporadic reports of dissenters being assaulted. Important to note: at this time. the Supreme Leader authorized the plainclothes militias to use live ammunition against the crowd if things were to get out of hands. By the end of the first two waves of protests, hundreds of people had been arrested.
midday, 15th of June - This brings us to the third wave, which just began around 12:30PM for those of us on the East Coast. Plainclothes militia opened fire on civilians protesting peacefully. Possibly up to 2 million protesters took the street. Chaos erupted in the streets, with reports of fighting all over Tehran and spreading over Iran as the news circulated. Pictures of people shot, some to death, finally surfaced and were published in the mainstream media. Violent and murderous repression has started. At least a twenty people had been killed at this by the end of the 15th of June.
- There is a major national crackdown on students, especially those with connections to the outside world going on right now. Students are fighting back in some areas. Telephones are being bugged and everyone twittering and sending videos outside of Iran are being rounded up. ISPs were shut down, government hackers are threatening people who twitter, and some of them have vanished in the last 24 hours.
- Eventually, the people started to fight back. First, they took over and burned down a Basij base, killing its commander. Later, a Basij shot a young man in the face in front of their HQ, at which point a policeman went to confront them. The Basij beat the policeman, at which point students stormed the compound, throwing molotov cocktails, burning it to the ground.
- During the night, the police entered certain neighbourhood to arrest public servants and force them to appear at tomorrow's pro-Ahmadinejad manifestation, but the people went out in the street and forced them out of their neighbourhoods. The Basij have kept on storming dorms. So far the reports are conflicting, but it appears that the death toll could be as high as 40 for the protesters, with two dead on the side of the repressive militias. This is the end of the third wave.
early 16th of June - Supporters of Moussavi have a manifestation planned for 5pm, Tehran time. Roughly the same number or more is expected to attend. People are dressed in black and told to protest silently.
- The pro-Ahmadinejad crowd however are planning a counter-demonstration at the very same place the supporters are supposed to gather at 3pm. Most agree that basically they are simply going to gather for a confrontation. Rumours are that they are taking position in buildings next to the parade and in bunkers to attack. Basij from all over the country are moving to Tehran and supporters are being bused from all over the country. A major showdown is expected to unfold.
- The crackdown on people using telecommunication is as strong as ever. Anyone with a laptop, camera or cellphone is attacked in the street by plainclothes militias. Tehran hotels are under lockdown to prevent the members of the foreign press not yet expulsed from reporting what is happening.
- As for the Iranian Government and different branches, there are rumours that many Army Generals have been arrested for plotting a Coup d'État, but this is still speculation at this point. The Supreme Leader has also called for a 10-day inquiry into the claims of fraud, but it has been widely dismissed as cosmetic. Moussavi and his supporters have rejected this, claiming that they want new elections. Khameini is now using the armed Basij as his own bodyguards, hundreds of them are surround him and his residence to protect from attempted assassinations. Ahmadinejad himself is in Russia right now, for a planned visit, and tries to pretend that everything is good as usual.
midday 16th of June to early 17th of June - The fourth wave of violence has started, and was expected to flare up very soon. It surprisingly was quite mild. Pro-Moussavi supporters said that there were even more people today protesting against the regime, though raw numbers are hard to get. If this is true, it means there are more than 2M protesters in the street right now. They are dressed in black and protesting silently and without violence so far. Other reports that only 250,000 were in the street, possibly scared by the Basij and propaganda.
- The Basij, surprisingly, did not attacking the march itself but rather assaulted dorms again. It looks like they are using the march as a diversion. In Tehran proper, 2000 Basij are waiting to storm the male dorm, and they are backed by IRG helicopters, which seems to send the message that the IRG has broken from their undeclared neutrality toward tacitely supporting the Regime.
- The crackdown on telecommunications is starting to suffocate all of Iran. As of now:
* Gmail and GTalk are shut down
* Yahoo is shut down
* AIM is most likely shut down
* Phone lines are down most of the time
* HTTPS and other such protocols are down most of the time
* Iranian ISPs have been shut down
* They are trying very hard to close down the Iranian connexion to twitter and giving proxies they control in order to track down people
* Cellphones and SMS are shut down
People are also receiving phone calls from the government saying "We know you were in the protests".
Night fell on Iran, and the Basij were roaming, attacking passerbys at random. They had also surrounded dorms and stormed them once again.
morning of the 17th of June - With the end of the fourth wave of violence, we are currently in a wait and see mode. As of right now, there are many rumors involving clerics, Ayatollahs and the Army plotting to overthrow the government, semi-confirmations from credible twitterers, but nothing concrete so far. These would be extremely big development, so it's better to treat them with caution.
The revolution lives on. Long live the revolution!
Demands from the protesters
1. Dismissal of Khamenei for not being a fair leader
2. Dismissal of Ahmadinejad for his illegal acts
3. Temporary appointment of Ayatollah Montazeri as the Supreme Leader
4. Recognition of Mousavi as the President
5. Forming the Cabinet by Mousavi to prepare for revising the Constitution
6. unconditional and immediate release of all political prisoners
7. Dissolution of all organs of repression, public or secret.
Who is Grand Ayatollah Montazeri?
Ayatollah Montazeri is a pro-Democracy, pro-Human Rights Ayatollah who was at one point on the short list of possible successors of Khomeini, but became marginalized as he adopted what was seen as a too pro-Western, pro-Democracy stance.
Since the beginning of the Revolution, he has been one of the fiercest critics of the Regime, and one of the biggest proponents of women and civil rights for ALL Iranians, including much-maligned minorities like the Baha'is. In fact he goes further than the protections afforded to them under Sharia.
He is also a big critic of Ahmadinejad and has been seen for years as the best hope for Iran if he ever was to come to power, something that was unthinkable a mere week ago.
He has also come out with a statement saying that policemen who beat on protesters and follow orders will not be forgiven under Islam, and that even if the government cuts the lines of communication with the outside world, that it was too late and the truth was getting out
Links
For further information on the Basij, Global Security has a good article about the history of the Basij.
CNN has a good article where eyewitnesses describe the type of violence usually unleashed by the Basij.
Here is another good article from GS again giving more background information on the ruthless Ansar thugs.
BBC profile of Grand Ayatollah Montazeri
important: The Iranian government is looking for dissident twitterers, so if you have an account, change your location and timezone to tehran!
regarding the supposed numbers received by all three candidates giving Moussavi the winner and Ahmadinejad third with 7M votes: The only confirmation is an Iranian journalist. We don't have any external data confirming those numbers. 7M for Ahmadinejad seems quite low, so treat this as an unsubstantiated rumour for the moment
Re: foreign Hezbollah troops being brought into Iran, didn't Andrew Sullivan basically debunk that?
Someone tweeted that there's 5,000 Hezbollah fighters in Iran, but Hezbollah only has ~1,500 fighters, total.
Edit: From Wikipedia:
Hezbollah has not revealed its armed strength. It has been estimated by Mustafa Alani, security director at the Dubai-based Gulf Research Centre, that Hezbollah's military force is made up of about 1,000 full-time Hezbollah members, along with a further 6,000-10,000 volunteers.
So yeah. Assuming this is accurate I'm calling bullshit on 5,000 Hezbollah fighters in Iran. Hezbollah is not going to export 50%-200% of its fighters.
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SarksusATTACK AND DETHRONE GODRegistered Userregular
Re: foreign Hezbollah troops being brought into Iran, didn't Andrew Sullivan basically debunk that?
Someone tweeted that there's 5,000 Hezbollah fighters in Iran, but Hezbollah only has ~1,500 fighters, total.
Earlier in the week there were Ansar Hezbollah members who were attacking the protesters. Andrew Sullivan incorrectly identified them as Hezbollah from Lebanon. Now, however, it appears that there are actual Lebanese Hezbollah and also Hamas members who are active in Iran. I'm not sure if it's been confirmed by anyone except Twitter users like Change_For_Iran but they have made the distinction between Ansar Hezbollah and the Lebanese Hezbollah.
I have no idea about the number, though. That's totally unconfirmed.
Re: foreign Hezbollah troops being brought into Iran, didn't Andrew Sullivan basically debunk that?
Someone tweeted that there's 5,000 Hezbollah fighters in Iran, but Hezbollah only has ~1,500 fighters, total.
Earlier in the week there were Ansar Hezbollah members who were attacking the protesters. Andrew Sullivan incorrectly identified them as Hezbollah from Lebanon. Now, however, it appears that there are actual Lebanese Hezbollah and also Hamas members who are active in Iran. I'm not sure if it's been confirmed by anyone except Twitter users like Change_For_Iran but they have made the distinction between Ansar Hezbollah and the Lebanese Hezbollah.
I have no idea about the number, though. That's totally unconfirmed.
I first heard about it before Ansar, during the early reports of people hearing Arabic.
Re: foreign Hezbollah troops being brought into Iran, didn't Andrew Sullivan basically debunk that?
Someone tweeted that there's 5,000 Hezbollah fighters in Iran, but Hezbollah only has ~1,500 fighters, total.
Edit: From Wikipedia:
Hezbollah has not revealed its armed strength. It has been estimated by Mustafa Alani, security director at the Dubai-based Gulf Research Centre, that Hezbollah's military force is made up of about 1,000 full-time Hezbollah members, along with a further 6,000-10,000 volunteers.
So yeah. Assuming this is accurate I'm calling bullshit on 5,000 Hezbollah fighters in Iran. Hezbollah is not going to export 50%-200% of its fighters.
To reports of the transmitter “Voice OF America†Lebanese fighters of the Hezbollah militia are to go to the regime with the showdown to the hand up to 5000.
I mean ... if 5,000 Hezbollah fighters are in Iran, Israel should just invade southern Lebanon.
And by "should" I mean "should not," since that would be a dick move, but militarily sound.
Anyway, extraordinary claims require extraordinary support. 5,000 Lebanese Hezbollah fighters is an extraordinary claim. Quite possibly an impossible claim, since there are probably not that many Hezbollah fighters to begin with.
Qingu on
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lonelyahavaCall me Ahava ~~She/Her~~Move to New ZealandRegistered Userregular
edited June 2009
wow.
I finally caught up.
Holy cow.
Just.... Holy cow.
I don't even know where to start on commenting. Or talking. Or asking questions.
But I have to say, Bless and Thank you D&Ders. Without you, I'd have had no way of really getting into this as much as I have. You guys have all been amazing with keeping the updates coming.
@Hakkekage: I really hope everybody is alright, doll. Keep your head up.
But I have to say, Bless and Thank you D&Ders. Without you, I'd have had no way of really getting into this as much as I have. You guys have all been amazing with keeping the updates coming.
No offense to the people who have been posting tweets in this thread, but the real heroes are the Iranians who have been pretty much continuously risking their lives for the past four days telling us what's happening and fighting for their freedom.
Posts
Oh, wait, that's how Russia ended up with Lenin*
I get what you're saying and I agree to an extent, but not to the extent of "I would trust this source with no additional corroboration." What ever happened to the two security personnel that were apparently captured by students and change_for_iran passed on the news?
"Anonymous officials" aren't exactly the same thing. The reporter knows who the anonymous official is but is not allowed to give the name of that official. Information released in such a way from the administration is usually through what is called a background briefing. Print news orgs are increasingly agitated with background briefings because it robs credibility from their reports. Television news doesn't care so much because the "anonymous official" in the next day's newspaper will usually be on camera as a talking head. Background briefings were relatively few before Ari Fleischer's press room reign, were suspended for several months under Scott McClellan, were reinstated by Tony Snow and have been occurring with the same frequency through now, under Robert Gibbs.
Here's a good Cheney story concerning background briefings from Politico:
What's he going to do, admit to importing foreign fighters?
The Iranian government doesn't have to do anything. It'll be readily apparent to anyone if the United States does anything without the Iranian government saying something about it.
How? The fighting would be in Lebanon, with permission from the government. How could he possibly link that to himself.
The US and lebanon aint exactly friends, they wouldn't let us near their country with a squad of boyscouts.
pleasepaypreacher.net
I see that Rich Lowry is now comparing Obama's decision to sit this out to the Blitz. OMG IT'S TOTALLY THE SAME THING NEVILLE CHAMBERLAIN.
What a cesspool of utter failure.
Okay first of all the Iranian government doesn't need much to start raising a fuss. They already claimed the United States was interfering just because of what US government officials have said to the media. Admittedly employing this strategy without substantial evidence is not very effective and sways no one but if the United States chooses to conduct some kind of operation against militant forces in Lebanon the Iranian government has somewhat firmer ground to stand on. I can't say what the reaction would be, but I wouldn't want to risk it.
Additionally I think that willfully causing another conflict in the Middle East right at this moment is a very bad idea. The situation is already bad enough without the United States shoving its hand in it.
Rich "Shes winking at me" Lowry? Yeah no one should listen to him.
pleasepaypreacher.net
I think that Iranians standing up for rights and freedoms is awesome. I think that if we add to the bloodshed in any way at all, the best that could come of it is that we would look like assholes. This is not our responsibility. This is not our fight. We don't have the right to interfere on a state level.
In Imperial Russia (or rather, by then, the Russian SFSR), we made the fatal mistake in assuming that, since the White Army was fighting Lenin and the Bolsheviks, that they weren't murderous assholes.
As it turned out, they were.
This might be a good lesson to apply to Iran--both keeping ourselves from getting involved, and in the event that we should.
Time Tempers a Challenger Forged in Revolution
@Bryceforvice on Twitter Facebook
And yet 20,000 marines ended up roaming around Russia.
Funny thing that.
That was meant in the context that, frequently, when we want to find a scapegoat for things not going our way, we have frequently blamed the Russians (or their closely-associated national counterparts) for the problem. The conspiracy theories seemed to fall within that category.
Nah, just tweet.
But the cookies were all burnt? How can we recount that which doesn't exist anymore? Next you'll be telling us that Tube delivered the final count as a holy proclamation.
Well, the US hasn't wanted to take 'no' for an answer for a long time. I love the Russian Revolution, primarily because there shouldn't have been a chance in hell for the Bolsheviks to win. Everyone else just fucked up.
I heard a conservative radio host, don't know who, compare this to Poland and Reagan in the 80s. 20 seconds after turning to that station I had to turn it off.
i trust the ayatollah elkameini
its ahmadinajeffe i don't trust
Holy shit! The CBC still has a reporter in Tehran! They are also not falling for the supporters mixed in with protestors either. The start of the report pretty much went: "Iran is claiming the west is meddling with their affairs but on to the REAL story..." and continued with youtube cell videos, mentioning the protestors were wearing black for the people who died yesterday and the reporter I believe is from the area and has a small camera herself to try to avoid suspicion.
Nothing much has happened in the last hours aside of that. There are reports of clerics and ayatollahs meeting in the holy Shiite city of Qom in order to plan to overthrow Khameini as supreme leader, as well as a more and more pro-dissenters stance from the army, but we have nothing substantiated so far. I will yet update this tomorrow, adding further information about various other groups operating in Iran right now and relevant to this revolution.
I really am trying to cram the most relevant information and speculation only. Everything is updated as events unfold, especially the timeline and what will happen in the future. If you want to link this, here is the website, updated as the situation changes:
https://sites.google.com/site/tatsumairanupdate/
All twitter posts about the army being involved are false as I am writing this Warning, new twitter feeds are most likely government members trying to spread misinformation, ignore them! Also, there is a handful of good twitter feeds, but please do not publicize their usernames, they are in enough danger as it is and they don't need more publiclity. Those in the know will c/p their entries. Major timeline overhaul, including what has unfolded in the last few hours.
Suppression of Dissent - The Players
Currently, there are either two or three maybe four groups who are suppressing the students on the ground that you'll read about throughout this thread:
1. The Basij
2. Ansar Hizbullah (which I will refer to as Ansar)
3. Lebanese Hizbullah (Unconfirmed but highly probable. Der Spiegel, based on a Voice of America report, says that 5,000 Hizbullah fighters are currently in Iran masquerading as riot police, confirming the independent reports. Many different independent reports and video point that way. Even in the last hours other independent twitter feeds have declared witnessing thugs beating on people while shouting in Arabic; I will refer to them as Hizbullah)
4. Lebanese Hamas (unconfirmed and doubtful. This rumour has been cropping up all day, with some of the most twitter feeds saying they had visual confirmation of Lebanese Hamas fighters along with Lebanese Hizbullah member. Take with a grain of salt, but it has been mentioned often enough, by sources generally always right, that it deserves of a mention here. I will refer to them as Hamas)
- The Basij are your regular paramilitary organization. They are the armed hand of the clerics. The Basij are a legal group, officially a student union, and are legally under direct orders of the Revolutionary Guard. Their main raison d'être is to quell dissent. They are the ones who go and crack skulls, force people to participate in pro-regime demonstrations, and generally try to stop any demonstrations from even starting. They are located throughout the country, in every mosque, every university, every social club you can think of. They function in a way very similar to the brownshirts.
They were the ones who first started the crackdown after the election, but it wasn't enough. While they are violent and repressive, they are still Persian and attacking fellow citizens. A beating is one thing, mass killings another.
- Another group was working with them, whose members are even more extreme, is Ansar. There is a lot of cross-membership between the Basij and Ansar, though not all are members of the other group and vice-versa. The vast majority of Ansar are Persians (either Basij or ex-military), though a lot of Arab recruits come from Lebanon and train with them under supervision of the Revolutionary Guard. They are not functioning under a legal umbrella, they are considered a vigilante group, but they pledge loyalty directly to the Supreme Leader and most people believe that they are under his control. They are currently helping the Basij to control the riots, but due to the fact that they are Persians and in lower numbers than the Basij, they are not that active.
- The Lebanese Hizbullah is a direct offshoot (and under direct control) of the Iranian Hizbullah (itself under direct control of the Supreme Leader) and cooperates closely with Ansar though Ansar occupies itself only with Iran's domestic policies, while Hizbullah occupies itself only with Iran's foreign policy unless there is a crisis like right now. However, Hizbullah has been called to stop violent riots in Iran in the past.
(the following paragraph includes some speculation based on reports from ground zero) Hizbullah flew in a lot of their members in Iran, most likely a good deal even before the elections in case there were trouble. They are the ones who speak Arabs and are unleashing the biggest level of violence on the Persians so far. Another wave arrived recently and there is chatter that yet another wave of Hizbullah reinforcements are coming in from Lebanon as we speak. According to Iranians on the ground, they are the ones riding motorcycles, beating men women and children indiscriminately and firing live ammunitions at students.
- The Lebanese Hamas is a branch of Hamas set-up in Lebanon. Like Hamas in Gaza, Hamas in Lebanon is directly under the orders of the Hamas council of Damascus known as Majlis al-Shurah. While it is surprising to hear that they might be involved, and as I said take these reports with a grain of salt until we get more confirmations, it is not illogical either. Iran has become the main benefactor of Hamas in the last years, branching out from only supporting Islamic Jihad. They now provide Hamas with the bulk of their budget, with advanced weaponry and training by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. Not only do Hamas own them a lot, but if the Republic falls, Hamas finds itself in dire trouble. It is very likely that, at the call of Iran, the Majlis al-Shura would have decided to send fighters from their Lebanese Hamas branch along with Hizbullah fighters if it was requested of them.
Other Players
Decided to create this section in order to give a wider range of explanations for people who might not be too familiar with Iran's internal politics and structure.
The Police
Iran's police is not dissimilar to your run-of-the-mill law enforcement in other dictatorships, with the difference that they are not generally as brutal and repressive. This is because the Basij are generally in charge of these activities, meaning that Iranian policemen generally concentrate more on the law and order aspect of Iranian daily life.
Today, it is thought that the Iranian police numbers close to 60,000 members, in contrast with up to a million Basij members. This is one of the reasons why we hear much more about the plainclothes militia than we do about the police right now, the other being that the Basij and Ansar are much more willing to violently assault their fellow citizens than even the regular police force. This is not as much a testament to the decency of your average police officers as much as a damning report of what the Basij and Ansar thugs are like.
There are also subdivisions and extra-legal forces attached to the police force. The major subdivision would be the riot police (So-called Unit 110) who are actually much more violent than regular police officers, but also in much, much smaller numbers. There is also VEVAK, the secret police. Very little is known and confirmed about them, except their extreme tactics include murder, kidnapping and torture.
The Army
In Iran, there are actually two armies. They are divided between Artesh and Pasdaran.
Artesh is the regular Military apparatus of the Republic. Their numbers, including reservists, go up to a million members, but only half of them have received anything more than very basic training. As it is often the case in police states, there is very little known and confirmed about the structure of the Army itself.
They were created prior to the Iranian Revolution, in fact this army has existed in one form or another, and is a continuation, for more than 2,500 years. This is not as impressive as it sounds, however, as they often underwent drastic changes, there is no real links between the current incarnations, and the top echelons were most often purged when new rulers took power. In fact, in the last 100 years, those purges happened between two or three times, depending on the count, the last time centered around the time of the Islamic revolution, when most generals were forced to flee, killed, or killed while in exile.
Artesh took the brunt of the military casualties during the Iran-Iraq war, the army is considered to very nationalist and not extremely religious, which explains why they have declared their neutrality and refusal to repress the situation, as they see their purpose to defend the Iranian population.
Everyone agrees they will be the ultimate key to this Revolution when they finally decide to take a side, or alternatively force the Pasdaran to stay on the sidelines with them.
Pasdaran, also known as Iranian Revolutionary Guard
The Iranian Ground forces (I will focus on them, as the Navy and Airforce are currently irrelevant, will update if the situation changes) have been estimated between 100,000 and 130,000 units total. As always, truth most likely resides somewhere in the middle. They are, much like the Basij and Ansar, subservient directly to the Supreme Leader, and ideologically created in the spirit of defending the Islamic Revolution ideals and Republic, not Iran per se. They also control the Basij.
They are a child of the revolution, and they are more geared toward guerilla warfare than they are for military engagements. They are also the force responsible for training the various terrorist groups financed and supported by the Iranian government. They are fanatically devoted to the Republic through intense indoctrination.
The elite troops are called Quds. They are considered the elite of the elite, but they only number between 2000-6000, although rumours say that they are twice or three time as big. They are, however, rumours and quite unlikely.
Ultimately, the Revolutionary Council and the Supreme Leader will call on them if they think they are on the verge of losing power, however it is unlikely that the army will just stay on the sidelines if this happens.
The Guardian Council, formerly known as The Revolutionary Council
The Revolutionary Council was created by Ayatollah Khomeini shortly before the Iranian Revolution. Since then, they have sat as the real authority of Iran. The Guardian Council is made up of 12 Ayatollahs, and they are the ones who dictate every little facet of Iranian life, making the position of President mostly irrelevant, as they do not take any major decisions without first asking permission from Khameini and his cronies. They do not have any qualms about hiding this, as the head of the Council is called "Supreme Leader".
The very goal of this revolution has become not only to elect Moussavi as President, but also elect Grand Ayatollah Montazeri as Supreme Leader. GA Montazeri has been calling for a separation of Mosque and State, and transferring most powers of the Supreme Leader to the President, including control of the Armed Forces.
The Grand Ayatollahs
The Grand Ayatollahs are Shiite clerics who first attained the position of Ayatollahs and then, through their knowledge of Islamic Jurisprudence, attained a supreme position and are regarded as the most important voice in Shia Islam today. They center around the holy Shiite city of Qom, though some live outside Iran.
What will happen
Unless the army decides to intervene in the favor of the Council and to stop the early beginnings of the new Revolution, Ansar & Hizbullah members will be the ones doing the brunt of the killing and repression with Basij as a support while also protecting government buildings and try to do crowd control. The police seems to have for the most part disbanded in centers like Tehran according to all reports, including international media. If the police decides to come back, they will focus less on protection and crowd control, so the Basij will start to crack more skulls).
Currently, this is what is happening. Regarding the repression of dissent.
As for the political scene, the majority of Grand Ayatollahs who expressed an opinion on this have sided with the protesters/against the results of the election. They are GA Ardebili, GA Montazeri, GA Shirazi, GA Golpaygani and GA Sanei. The only Grand Ayatollah who has sided in favor of the election results is Khameini, who is also the Supreme Leader of the Revolutionary Council, and the facto ruler of Iran.
Timeline
note: I built this through both articles and twitter feeds, so I do not claim that this is a 100% factually correct representation of reality, but this is the general narrative.
14th of June - While the previous day had been witness to some protests, they were for the most part peaceful. However, as time grew the protests turned more and more violent. When the first spontaneous riots erupted, the first wave of violence was unleashed. The Iranian Riot Police was called in to support the regular police officers controlling the protests, and shortly after the Basij also took the scene, moving from a passive to active role of repression. The RP concentrated mostly around public buildings and streets while the Basij took position around student groups, especiallly universities.
- As things got more out of hand, more and more Basij troops were called in, as the police started dispersing. The riot police are less inclined (or, rather I should say the Basij are more inclined) to use violence so they retreated and leaving the place to the Basij. The repressive forces concentrated their assault mostly around the main Iranian universities, while the riot police were concentrating on protecting various government buildings such as the Interior Ministry. At least two people had been killed already.
- On the telecommunication front, this is when we started to hear more and more from twitters while videos were being freely updated to youtube (while youtube started to delete the more violent ones a few hours later). This is also the moment where the government realized what was happening, and ordered for the internet, phone lines and cellphones to be cut off, in order to avoid people communicating with the outside world.
late 14th, early 15th of June - This is the second wave of violent repression. At this point, violent riots had spread all over the main cities of Iran. The violence against citizens was not only the fruit of the Basij anymore, but also came from Ansar Hizbullah members. This is the point where firearms started being used. There were reports of a few murders but it was mostly fired in the air or on walls in order to scare away protesters in University dorms. It's also around the same time that the first reports and videos of an important number of non-Persian thugs shouting in Arabic and violently beating people with chains, clubs and electric batons (similar to cattle prods), which led to many speculating that lebanese Hizbullah members were now in Iran. Der Spiegel, through Voice of America, later claimed that 5000 Hizbullah fighters were passing off as Riot Police, validating the claims of many independent sources and twitter feeds.
- Universities have been the hotbed of protests, serving as a hub of anti-government demonstrations and preparations. 120 teachers from the Sharid University resigned in protest over the election results. Perfectly away of this, the Basij, Ansar and possibly Hizbullah members concentrated their attacks on University Dorms all over the country, storming them and beating students, destroying everything, especially computers.
- The end of the second wave came right before the beginning of the current manifestation. Things were getting quieter with only sporadic reports of dissenters being assaulted. Important to note: at this time. the Supreme Leader authorized the plainclothes militias to use live ammunition against the crowd if things were to get out of hands. By the end of the first two waves of protests, hundreds of people had been arrested.
midday, 15th of June - This brings us to the third wave, which just began around 12:30PM for those of us on the East Coast. Plainclothes militia opened fire on civilians protesting peacefully. Possibly up to 2 million protesters took the street. Chaos erupted in the streets, with reports of fighting all over Tehran and spreading over Iran as the news circulated. Pictures of people shot, some to death, finally surfaced and were published in the mainstream media. Violent and murderous repression has started. At least a twenty people had been killed at this by the end of the 15th of June.
- There is a major national crackdown on students, especially those with connections to the outside world going on right now. Students are fighting back in some areas. Telephones are being bugged and everyone twittering and sending videos outside of Iran are being rounded up. ISPs were shut down, government hackers are threatening people who twitter, and some of them have vanished in the last 24 hours.
- Eventually, the people started to fight back. First, they took over and burned down a Basij base, killing its commander. Later, a Basij shot a young man in the face in front of their HQ, at which point a policeman went to confront them. The Basij beat the policeman, at which point students stormed the compound, throwing molotov cocktails, burning it to the ground.
- During the night, the police entered certain neighbourhood to arrest public servants and force them to appear at tomorrow's pro-Ahmadinejad manifestation, but the people went out in the street and forced them out of their neighbourhoods. The Basij have kept on storming dorms. So far the reports are conflicting, but it appears that the death toll could be as high as 40 for the protesters, with two dead on the side of the repressive militias. This is the end of the third wave.
early 16th of June - Supporters of Moussavi have a manifestation planned for 5pm, Tehran time. Roughly the same number or more is expected to attend. People are dressed in black and told to protest silently.
- The pro-Ahmadinejad crowd however are planning a counter-demonstration at the very same place the supporters are supposed to gather at 3pm. Most agree that basically they are simply going to gather for a confrontation. Rumours are that they are taking position in buildings next to the parade and in bunkers to attack. Basij from all over the country are moving to Tehran and supporters are being bused from all over the country. A major showdown is expected to unfold.
- The crackdown on people using telecommunication is as strong as ever. Anyone with a laptop, camera or cellphone is attacked in the street by plainclothes militias. Tehran hotels are under lockdown to prevent the members of the foreign press not yet expulsed from reporting what is happening.
- As for the Iranian Government and different branches, there are rumours that many Army Generals have been arrested for plotting a Coup d'État, but this is still speculation at this point. The Supreme Leader has also called for a 10-day inquiry into the claims of fraud, but it has been widely dismissed as cosmetic. Moussavi and his supporters have rejected this, claiming that they want new elections. Khameini is now using the armed Basij as his own bodyguards, hundreds of them are surround him and his residence to protect from attempted assassinations. Ahmadinejad himself is in Russia right now, for a planned visit, and tries to pretend that everything is good as usual.
midday 16th of June to early 17th of June - The fourth wave of violence has started, and was expected to flare up very soon. It surprisingly was quite mild. Pro-Moussavi supporters said that there were even more people today protesting against the regime, though raw numbers are hard to get. If this is true, it means there are more than 2M protesters in the street right now. They are dressed in black and protesting silently and without violence so far. Other reports that only 250,000 were in the street, possibly scared by the Basij and propaganda.
- The Basij, surprisingly, did not attacking the march itself but rather assaulted dorms again. It looks like they are using the march as a diversion. In Tehran proper, 2000 Basij are waiting to storm the male dorm, and they are backed by IRG helicopters, which seems to send the message that the IRG has broken from their undeclared neutrality toward tacitely supporting the Regime.
- The crackdown on telecommunications is starting to suffocate all of Iran. As of now:
* Gmail and GTalk are shut down
* Yahoo is shut down
* AIM is most likely shut down
* Phone lines are down most of the time
* HTTPS and other such protocols are down most of the time
* Iranian ISPs have been shut down
* They are trying very hard to close down the Iranian connexion to twitter and giving proxies they control in order to track down people
* Cellphones and SMS are shut down
People are also receiving phone calls from the government saying "We know you were in the protests".
Night fell on Iran, and the Basij were roaming, attacking passerbys at random. They had also surrounded dorms and stormed them once again.
morning of the 17th of June - With the end of the fourth wave of violence, we are currently in a wait and see mode. As of right now, there are many rumors involving clerics, Ayatollahs and the Army plotting to overthrow the government, semi-confirmations from credible twitterers, but nothing concrete so far. These would be extremely big development, so it's better to treat them with caution.
The revolution lives on. Long live the revolution!
Demands from the protesters
1. Dismissal of Khamenei for not being a fair leader
2. Dismissal of Ahmadinejad for his illegal acts
3. Temporary appointment of Ayatollah Montazeri as the Supreme Leader
4. Recognition of Mousavi as the President
5. Forming the Cabinet by Mousavi to prepare for revising the Constitution
6. unconditional and immediate release of all political prisoners
7. Dissolution of all organs of repression, public or secret.
Who is Grand Ayatollah Montazeri?
Ayatollah Montazeri is a pro-Democracy, pro-Human Rights Ayatollah who was at one point on the short list of possible successors of Khomeini, but became marginalized as he adopted what was seen as a too pro-Western, pro-Democracy stance.
Since the beginning of the Revolution, he has been one of the fiercest critics of the Regime, and one of the biggest proponents of women and civil rights for ALL Iranians, including much-maligned minorities like the Baha'is. In fact he goes further than the protections afforded to them under Sharia.
He is also a big critic of Ahmadinejad and has been seen for years as the best hope for Iran if he ever was to come to power, something that was unthinkable a mere week ago.
He has also come out with a statement saying that policemen who beat on protesters and follow orders will not be forgiven under Islam, and that even if the government cuts the lines of communication with the outside world, that it was too late and the truth was getting out
Links
For further information on the Basij, Global Security has a good article about the history of the Basij.
CNN has a good article where eyewitnesses describe the type of violence usually unleashed by the Basij.
Here is another good article from GS again giving more background information on the ruthless Ansar thugs.
BBC profile of Grand Ayatollah Montazeri
important: The Iranian government is looking for dissident twitterers, so if you have an account, change your location and timezone to tehran!
regarding the supposed numbers received by all three candidates giving Moussavi the winner and Ahmadinejad third with 7M votes: The only confirmation is an Iranian journalist. We don't have any external data confirming those numbers. 7M for Ahmadinejad seems quite low, so treat this as an unsubstantiated rumour for the moment
Someone tweeted that there's 5,000 Hezbollah fighters in Iran, but Hezbollah only has ~1,500 fighters, total.
Edit: From Wikipedia:
So yeah. Assuming this is accurate I'm calling bullshit on 5,000 Hezbollah fighters in Iran. Hezbollah is not going to export 50%-200% of its fighters.
Earlier in the week there were Ansar Hezbollah members who were attacking the protesters. Andrew Sullivan incorrectly identified them as Hezbollah from Lebanon. Now, however, it appears that there are actual Lebanese Hezbollah and also Hamas members who are active in Iran. I'm not sure if it's been confirmed by anyone except Twitter users like Change_For_Iran but they have made the distinction between Ansar Hezbollah and the Lebanese Hezbollah.
I have no idea about the number, though. That's totally unconfirmed.
Tatsuma's been posting updated version of that post in the beginning of all/most of the Fark Iran threads, which are up to like #16 now.
Also, that Friday Prayers thing, what? Is that for, like, the political candidates? Or the Ayatollahs? Or everyone in Iran?
I don't know who announced it first but the supreme leader and mousavi have both told people about it
I first heard about it before Ansar, during the early reports of people hearing Arabic.
Andrew Sullivan links to some German website that claims Voice of America as a source.
http://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/0,1518,630463-2,00.html
And by "should" I mean "should not," since that would be a dick move, but militarily sound.
Anyway, extraordinary claims require extraordinary support. 5,000 Lebanese Hezbollah fighters is an extraordinary claim. Quite possibly an impossible claim, since there are probably not that many Hezbollah fighters to begin with.
I finally caught up.
Holy cow.
Just.... Holy cow.
I don't even know where to start on commenting. Or talking. Or asking questions.
But I have to say, Bless and Thank you D&Ders. Without you, I'd have had no way of really getting into this as much as I have. You guys have all been amazing with keeping the updates coming.
@Hakkekage: I really hope everybody is alright, doll. Keep your head up.
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