American commentators and politicians love to opine about Iran. Everyday there are more articles and op-eds by so-called 'experts' on what to do about the nuclear issue, Iran's influence in Iraq, religious extremism, etc. I would like to offer my perspective as an Iranian woman, with deep knowledge and understanding of her own people and its leadership about what the future course should be for American policy towards Iran.
As one who left my native Iran in the wake of the fall of the Shah in 1979 and came back, periodically, to find a foreign and dark country based on religious rule and intolerance, I know first-hand, what people on the street are thinking and feeling about a nation that has become increasingly isolated, aggressive and intolerant. My country is run by illegitimate and despotic extremists who silence dissent, imprison opponents, and crackdown on anyone who challenges the status quo. Last spring's release of the American-Iranian scholar, Haleh Esfandiari from a Teheran prison, was positive--but it was followed by more round-ups of students and scholars, journalists and pro-democracy activists, seeking to express themselves, freely.
So, for example, while Americans debate the wisdom of electing a woman President, Iranian women live with the reality that the Constitutions bans women from holding the office of President. Yes, we have 9 female parliamentarians in the Majlis, the Islamic Consultative Assembly -- the Iranian parliament) but they hold little sway over the government. Yes, we have women writers and professors -- but they pay a heavy price for speaking out. Women are banned from many walks of life -- relegated to raising children who are taught not to challenge authority.
Iranian misbehavior extends beyond its treatment of Iranians inside the country to those around the world. Take Iraq, where over 3,500 Iranians, who are political refugees, protected under the Geneva Convention, live at Camp Ashraf in Asraf City, Iraq. These pro-democracy Iranians are continuously subjected to harsh threats of expulsion because of Iranian government demands on the Iraqi government.
Beyond the Iranian community, the mullahs in Teheran are directing a campaign of extremism that affects U.S. troops who continue to face the backlash of Iranian-supported militias in Iraq where support for terrorists continues through an infusion of money and arms.
So what can America do? The answer is not war, even though there are some in America who beat the war drums. But neither is the prevailing Western policy, which has relied, hopelessly, on "constructive engagement" to change the behavior of the Iranian regime, effective. We need a firm policy that meets the escalation of the threat from Iran. As Maryam Rajavi, the Iranian opposition leader, said in her speech to the European Parliament last year, "neither war nor pacification of Tehran's religious extremists holds the answer."
The current U.S. strategy towards Iran has failed because it ignores the immense power of the disenchanted people of Iran. Unlike some of its neighbors, Iran has a history dotted with periods of genuine democracy. Today, the Iranian people are endowed with democratic aspirations and a well organized, capable, resistance movement that needs support. As a matter of necessity, U.S. strategy towards Iran must include empowering the Iranian people. On that score, the United States cannot seem ambivalent, publicly or privately. The Iranian people have demonstrated that they are willing to take on a ruling regime that is violent and expansionist because of its weakness. Decisiveness is key in expressing American support for the willingness of people to challenge their rulers. We need statements and actions that reflect American support for democracy groups that are pressing for change inside Iran.
It has been 30 years since the United States has had relations with Iran. In those decades, the Iranian people, despite being silenced, have let the world know that they are unwilling to live with religious zealotry and control. Now the world must get behind them and give them the tools and resources to gain back their freedom.
Soona Samsani is Executive Director of Women's Freedom Forum, Inc. which promotes change in Iran.
Diane Tucker: Freed Academic Haleh Esfandiari: 'Iranians Want Evolution, Not Revolution'
Every two or three years, there has been a wave of protests like this in Iran. But this time I think there has been a fundamental change.
Implementing this article general points would help enhance the situation of Iranian and Middle Eastern people. Also it will create an atmosphere of progress and prosperaty for peace and stability.
Iranian government is a strange creature in this century. It is anti-democracy, anti-women right.
This government has been has no regard for lives and livelyhood of its own people and the citizensof world.
The most viable solution to this dangerous phenomenon is to support Iranian people and their resistance, since they have been resisting this tyrant oppressor for almost 30 years.
They are incapable of governing without execution, terror, public hanging, stonning, maming, beating, arresting... etc. on a daily bases. Last December, Iranian government was sited for the 54th times for human right violations. Iranian goverment is conducting a proxy war in Iraq and Lebanon, pursuing hegemony and domination in Middle East. If this happens, the world will not see peace for a long forseeable future.
The world community must impose a comprehensive sanction against this extremist, anti-democracy, terrorist regime, because If left uncontained, it will impose a catastrophic war upon all.
In pursuit of democracy, peace and stability in Iran and consequently in Middle East, our best hope and least expensive logical partner is Iranian people and their just resistance.
121 political parties and social groups, 700,000 women, 14,000 lawyers and jurists, 19,000 physicians, 35,000 engineers, 320 clerics, 540 professors, 2,000 tribal sheikhs and 300 local officials among 5.2 million signitaries of the declaration
In a gathering attended by 50,000 Iranians, members of Parliaments and international personalities on Saturday June 30, participants called for the full implementation of the European Court of Justice ruling on the removal of the People's Mojahedin of Iran (PMOI) from the terror list and voiced their support for regime change in Iran and called for additional firm policies toward Iran.
It is time for the EU to focus on the democratic aspirations of the Iranian people. Europe and the rest of the world should be on the side of the millions demanding freedom and human rights, not those who have stolen these from them.
Solution: Iranian Resistance
It is quiet evident that Iranian government is a menace to the world, sponsering terrorism, pursuing nuclear war heads, expanding fundamentalism in middle east and directing a proxy war in Iraq. So far, Iranian people have paid the price dearly with their lives, livelyhood and more... from this point on, Iranian people and the world will pay the price. Every single day that passes by the price becomes more expensive!
Today, we have to wake up and start supporting Iranian democratic resistance, Iraqi democratic resistance to help the Middle Easterns and the world from the cancer of 21th century, the Mullahs.
The world community mus contain to sanction militerly, economically
Solution: Remove Islam
It is key, absolutely crucial, to see the bigger picture here – support the Iranian people in their struggle for a free country with basic human rights – as a democratic Iran means a better world for us all.
For those people who’ve posted nothing but hatred for this democratic group, for God’s sake, put aside your blinders, anger, and narrow-mindedness and get it through your head that YOUR future is in danger with this clerical regime. Listen to what this pro-democracy organization is proposing and if you had an ounce of logic, forget heart, you might actually understand the true nature of what is going on.
What more do we need to have happen to realize who we are dealing with? What more do we need to have happen to realize what the true answer is? The demonstrations by the Iranian people over the last several years should be enough to show that they are ready for change--change that they wish to bring themselves. However, there is only so much that these unarmed men, women, university students, etc. can do. They are already paying the ultimate price--their lives. The international community must also help to knock down the regime at its root, which is economic strength. Countries must stop their economic ties to Iran so that they will no longer have the means to continue their nuclear weapons program, and in turn, stop infiltrating the MidEast.
We must support the democratic movements that are occurring inside and outside Iran. Any excuse not to support the democratic movements is an excuse to empower the terrorist regime of Iran.
You are right about one thing: "the immense power of the disenchanted people in Iran." But, you are absolutely incorrect in asking for US funds to mobilize this power.
What we need from the United States is to stop getting in the way of people-led power, not to try to create it! The United States over threw Iran's democratically elected president in 1954, as one example. Over the last 30 years, the US has not even given moral support to students, dissidents and others calling for change within Iran. And, most importantly, by engaging in torture and human rights abuses in Abu Graib and others, the US is losing its moral high ground, and is becoming easier to demonize. By making human rights abuses acceptable for the world's biggest power, the US has made it harder for others who are fighting for human rights around the world.
If you want to change Iran, change the U.S. and makes the U.S. stand for what it is and claims to stand for!
The U.S. needs to talk to the Iranian government because the last 30 years of not having formal diplomatic relations has not worked and the situation in the region is not getting any better for it. But, we cannot interfere in Iran's internal affairs, we did that in 1953 which led, eventually, to the current government. Iran's people are some of the best educated in the region and their society is one of the most advanced. It was a huge mistake on their part to install the mullahs as leaders of their country although I think they were right to rid themselves of the Shah. He was a puppet of the U.S. (we installed him with the help of the Brits in 1953) and brutilized his people while our country looked the other way.
In the last few decades western countries, including US, have adopted policies that have failed one after another. From "dual containment" policy while Iran-Iraq war was going on, to the support for "Moderates" in Iran during Khatami's presidency in Iran to now that war is presented as the only alternative to surrendering to the Mullhas and sitting down with them at a table to "talk".
The wrong policies of the past have only put a road block in front of people of Iran to succeed in replacing the religious fascists running their county with a democratic and popular government. It is time for anyone who is truly anti-war to get behind people of Iran and support them in their struggle for democratic changes in their country.
As my Iranian pro-democracy activists, of many decades, and my self Majid
Saatchi likes to tell people, "appeasement of the moderate Rafsanjani
and the reformist Khatami got us Ahmadinejad"; in the same sense, it
is frightening to imagine what appeasement of Ahmadinejad will get us.
By the way, Iran has an elected government with approval-rates of the Iranian people which are over twice as high as the actual approval ratings of US-president Bush - or, for that matter, of the US-Congress, too.
Makes you think - doesn't it?
Regarding her what she advocates: the real democratic fighters in Iran, such as Ganji, the Iranian Freedom Movement (Nehzateh Azadi), Nobel-prize winner Shirin Ebadi and the reformist parties have all said loud and clear: any support from the US government, with its not-so-benign history in the Mid-East in general and Iran in particular, will only make the government more repressive and brutal toward all those struggling for home-grown democratic change. The US does not have the standing in Iran to advocate democracy; Iranians are well-informed and wise enough to look around and see the kind of "genuine" democracies the US has promoted in the Mid-East (Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Gulf Sheikhdoms, Iraq, Palestine, Pakistan, ...).
I hate the Iranian government as much as Soona here does, but the MEK are not the answer, they're a religious marxist cult who if given control of Iran, would on the very first day wipe out hundreds of thousands of people as payback for being kicked out 30 years ago. They are people who mostly left Iran in their teens and have never forgiven the country for that. The Camp Ashraf people are not "freedom fighters", they are Iranian traitors who gave Saddam Hussein info on how to strike at Iran and often participated in killing Iranian troops, not because they loved Saddam but because they hated Khomeini, that's the kind of petty people they are. They are extremely dangerous and should not be a part of any US effort to engage Iran.