International Campaign For Human Rights In Iran Video Warns Against Strike

How would a military strike on Iran affect the country's human rights situation? A new message from 35 prominent Iranians, released in a new video by the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran, warns of devastating consequences.

In the footage above, Iranian civil society activists, lawyers, intellectuals, and cultural figures conclude that military action would be 'an utter disaster' for human rights. According to the interviewees, a strike would empower the current regime, further militarize the state, undermine Iranian civil society, and strengthen radical elements within the regime.

"A military strike will not help the democracy and reformist movement at all because it will cause militarization of the country. The military, Revolutionary Guards, and radical elements will increase their power," argues political scientist Sadeq Zibakalam.

Academic Mohammad Maleki says that international intervention would "undoubtedly lead to a much more closed environment and give the regime the perfect excuse to oppress the people even more."

The video is based on a 2011 report, Raising Their Voices: Iranian Civil Society Reflections on the Military Option. The writers of the report conclude that military action against Iran by the United States or Israel would be futile, counterproductive, and irrational.

"The fact that the government doesn't treat its population well doesn't justify foreigners dropping bombs," says theologian Ahmad Ghabel.

Iran and world powers are scheduled to hold talks over Tehran's nuclear program on Friday. Iran insists on its right to enrich uranium for peaceful purposes, while the West suspects the country is working on a nuclear weapons program. Israel has threatened to strike Tehran's nuclear facilities if the country does not suspend its program.

Watch the video above or click here for live updates on the drumbeat of war.

Also on HuffPost:

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• President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad

  Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad waves prior to entering an airplane leaving Iran for Tajikistan at Tehran's Mehrabad airport on March 24, 2012. (ATTA KENARE/AFP/Getty Images)

• Vice President Mohammad Reza Rahimi

  Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (L) and his First Vice President Mohammad Reza Rahimi (R) listen to their national anthem prior to leaving Iran for Tajikistan at Tehran's Mehrabad airport on March 24, 2012. (ATTA KENARE/AFP/Getty Images)

• Mahmoud Ahmadinejad

  Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad waves at supporters outside a polling station in Tehran on March 2, 2012. (ATTA KENARE/AFP/Getty Images)

• Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei

  An Iranian soldier standing atop an anti-aircraft machine gun, salutes as he passes by a huge poster of Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, during the annual army day military parade in Tehran on April 17, 2008. (BEHROUZ MEHRI/AFP/Getty Images)

• Ayatollah Ali Khamenei

  Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei (L) gives a speech next to newly appointed judiciary chief Sadegh Ardeshir Larijani during a meeting in Tehran on August 15, 2009. (STR/AFP/Getty Images)

• Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami

  Senior Iranian cleric Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami delivers the weekly Friday prayer sermon at Tehran University on May 27, 2011. (ATTA KENARE/AFP/Getty Images)

• Iranian clerics queue outside a polling station at Massoumeh shrine in the holy city of Qom, 130 kms south of Tehran, during parliamentary elections in the Islamic republic on March 2, 2012. (BEHROUZ MEHRI/AFP/Getty Images)

• An Iranian cleric holds a portrait of supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei during the funeral of an unknown soldier from the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war. (ATTA KENARE/AFP/Getty Images)

Comments

[vascopyjama]

10:22 PM on 04/15/2012

I think the whole world can see this for what it is. Israeli aggression.

[peter010908]

09:20 PM on 04/15/2012

Israel is just looking for any excuse to attack Iran.

[Divest Campaign]

02:27 AM on 04/15/2012

Are you worried about an Israeli attack on Iran starting Middle East War III? Then please sign the pledge to boycott Israel if it starts a preemptive war with Iran. By (nonviolently) increasing the cost of starting a war, we can help to prevent it:

http://www.divestfromwar.org/

[Avirahim]

10:01 AM on 04/15/2012

Thank you, for getting the message out, peace the only solution 100% agree.

Just wanted to point out that strike would be "preventative" not "preemptive", which seems like a similar meaning but, the difference is between illegal and legal war in international law.

"The terms "anticipatory self–defense", "preemptive self–defense" and "preemption" traditionally refers to a state's right to strike first in self–defense when faced with imminent attack.[3] In order to justify such an action, the Caroline test has two distinct requirements:

The use of force must be necessary because the threat is imminent and thus pursuing peaceful alternatives is not an option (necessity);
The response must be proportionate to the threat (proportionality).[4]
In Webster's original formulation, the necessity criterion is described as "instant, overwhelming, leaving no choice of means, and no moment of deliberation". This has later come to be referred to as "instant and overwhelming necessity".[5][6]

[edit]Significance

The principle of self–defense had been acknowledged prior to the Caroline test, but it was notable for setting out specific criteria by which it could be determined whether there had been a legitimate exercise of that right.[7] The test was accepted by the United Kingdom and came to be accepted as part of customary international law.[7]

The threat or use of force is prohibited by customary international law and the UN Charter when it is part of a preventive war waged against the territory of any State."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caroline_test

[leutenizer banned twice]

02:20 AM on 04/15/2012

"I love you"

Yet we kill your scientists and don't even apologize. The last scientist that was killed, the person we refuse to even talk about in the country, was a 32 year father whose son has yet to be told his father was assassinated. The boy still thinks dad went to a long business trip. He was only a plant manager, not even working on the physics of nuclear sciences.

Another scientist was killed with his wife while picking up their kid from school. Now this must really be "I love you." The boy received minor injuries and lost both parents.

This is yet another campaign to bypass the Iranian government and attempt to create this elusion that we have not had an agenda to dominate Iran since 1953 no matter who rules that nation.

[Yorksgal]

11:46 AM on 04/15/2012

If left to the ordinary citizen there would be peace - all over the world.

We must do what we can to spread the message and get the war-mongers out - it won't be easy, they will resist, but "we shall overcome".

[mrgene2004]

02:13 PM on 04/14/2012

attacking iran would only destabilize the region remember the balkans in the 1990's? in this case the u.s. would be drawn in because of commitments in the region.a possibility that could happen if we are not careful .

[Robster]

08:09 AM on 04/13/2012

Iran will not be attacked unless Israel is seriously threatened. Iran will continue it's proxy terror war from Lebanon till one day Hezbollah gets lucky and takes out an Israeli school or hits the Israeli capital, then Iran will feel the "heat". Iran is playing a dangerous and unnecessary game. And it makes no sense because Iran is hated by the Sunni Arabs; Iran will never lead then based even on a mutual hate of Israel.

[leutenizer banned twice]

01:51 AM on 04/15/2012

I seem to remember Israel went home from Lebanon like a little girl looking for her bottle, in 2006.

What is it with people and they need to pump up Israel into something she is not. If Israel could even handle a militia, as it failed to handle Gaza strip in 2007, then why would their PM, Mr. Netanyahu, come to washington and beg for help. Let's be realistic. That's all.

[Chockolate]

06:43 AM on 04/13/2012

Your impassioned voices are futile, Israel need to feel secure and the only way it can do that is by bombing you. Sorry about that.

[midtown]

11:54 PM on 04/14/2012

Just like Hitler said about about the Jews, and the need for a secure Germany.

[pflickner]

12:44 AM on 04/15/2012

He'll probably say that never happened. He's deluded. Israel won't bother Iran as long as Iran doesn't bother Israel, and Iran's puppet president is all bluster.

[peter010908]

09:24 PM on 04/15/2012

Why do people always refer to Hitler like he's still alive? Seriously move on, get a life.

Why not take it a step further and refer to the Roman empire or the Egyptians?

[v eyepete]

05:53 AM on 04/13/2012

All this talk and pseudo discussion is preparing us for war with Iran, so Israel can feel safe. Why has the United States become a vassal state of that tiny, rude and grasping nation? Do you really want your children to die or come back maimed because Israel refuses to get along with their neighbors? They send spies to spy on us (J Pollard and others) and still we just give them $6 billion a year and more in weapons. This must stop and people have to get over the way we have been programmed not to speak out against them and voice their opinion. They do not deserve this from us. They are a warlike nation. They must fight their own battles and stop oppressing all those around them.

[Steve1828]

09:20 AM on 04/13/2012

"Tiny" - meaning too small to be of any significance? So they're rude and grasping because they don't want to be incinerated by someone who hates them (again)? Does "get along with its neighbors" mean being polite and accommodating to someone who is loading his gun and ranting that you shouldn't exist? Has any Israeli spy ever hurt US interests? Has anyone stopped you from voicing your opinion? If they're a warlike nation, what is the US? Has anyone threatened to destroy the US, repeatedly, since its establishment? American soldiers have left their blood all over the world fighting others' battles. Has a single US soldier ever died fighting for Israel? They're practically the only nation that has fought its own battles, consistently.

Here's what their oppressed victims say; this is what Israel is dealing with while you denigrate them from your comfortable living room:

"My message to the loathed Jews is that there is no god but Allah, we will chase you everywhere! We are a nation that drinks blood, and we know that there is no blood better than the blood of Jews. We will not leave you alone until we have quenched our thirst with your blood, and our children's thirst with your blood. We will not leave until you leave the Muslim countries."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sdw4K6MfVZg

[yankees]

06:28 PM on 04/13/2012

Great Response

[hoabinh]

11:05 PM on 04/14/2012

Are you, by any chance, a comedian?

[escholar]

05:46 AM on 04/13/2012

Presumed Guilty -
How can another country be attacked and destroyed based on unverified suspicions? Haven't we learned anything from Iraq and recently Libya? How many more countries will be destroyed, using this dubious standard? When will this stop? Who is next after Iran? Venezuela? Cuba? Zimbabwe?

- http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=30109

[KIVPossum]

04:45 AM on 04/13/2012

FTA - The fact that the government doesn't treat its population well doesn't justify foreigners dropping bombs," says theologian Ahmad Ghabel.

That sure didn't stop us in Iraq or Libya

[JRonin]

01:05 AM on 04/13/2012

Good to get some Iranian voices heard. I doubt, however, that any attacking powers care even one iota about the devastating impact an attack on Iran would have on Iranian civil society and infrastructure. To take it one step further, I wonder if that would be part of the plan, in order to "help them rebuild" after the attack, a very lucrative and long-term plan no doubt for many parties pushing for war.

[greasy]

06:52 PM on 04/12/2012

what an interesting way to see an Iran perspective, dAH!