The Regime Chants "Death to America", Iranians Chant "Death to Mullahs"

by Majid Rafizadeh
January 1, 2018 at 4:30 am

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/11649/iran-regime-death

Translations of this item:

Now, people in Iran are demanding not just limited reforms but regime change. The government has been doing all it can to stoke the flames of hatred, but has been trying to deflect it to "Death to America" and "Death to Israel".
The Trump administration is taking the right side by supporting the Iranian people; they are the principal victims of the Iranian regime and its Islamist agenda.
Let us not be on the side of history that would remain silent in the face of such crimes against humanity, let us not join the ranks of other dictators, terrorists, and criminals, that turned a blind eye to violence, and the will of brave, innocent people.

Protests have grown and have spread across Iran in cities such as Tehran, Kermanshah, Shiraz, Rasht, Qom, Hamedan, Ahvaz, Isfahan, Zahedan, Qazvin, and Sari.

The political nature of the protests has been made clear from the outset and the regime is experiencing a political earthquake. The regime's gunmen have been out in full force. Despite the brutal power being deployed to crush these peaceful demonstrators -- four protestors have already been reported killed -- more people are flooding the streets in defiance of the regime.

The scale of these sudden protests is unprecedented during the last four decades of the Islamic Republic of Iran's rule.

These demonstrations, however, are different from other protests in Iran since 1979, when the theocratic regime was established. In 2009, during the popular uprising in the name of the "Green Movement," people were protesting against rigged elections and the presidency of the anti-Semitic politician Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Chants echoed through the streets, "Where is my vote?" while the government ratcheted up its power to silence the protestors.

Pictured: People in Tehran, Iran, protest against rigged elections during the popular uprising in the name of the "Green Movement," on June 16, 2009. (Image source: Milad Avazbeigi/Wikimedia Commons)

Now, people are demanding not just limited reforms but regime change. After almost four decades of living under a theocracy -- with Islamist mullahs controlling them, rampant corruption, and the regime's persistent dissemination of propaganda -- the people have reached the boiling point. The government has been doing all it can to stoke the flames of hatred, but has been trying to deflect it to "Death to America" and "Death to Israel".

Protesters, risking their lives, have been chanting, "Death to Khamenei" -- a serious crime according to the clergy, and punishable, according to the Sharia law of the regime, with death.

People are also chanting, "Death to Rouhani", "Shame on you Khamenei, step down from power", "Death to the Dictator" and "Death to the Islamic Republic". Protesters are tearing down the banners of Iran's Supreme leaders, Khomeini and Khamenei.

Chants being heard all over the nation are, "Forget about Palestine, forget about Gaza, think about us", "Death to Hezbollah", "The people live like beggars / [Khamenei] lives like a God," and "Leave Syria alone, think about us instead".

The outcry leaves no question about the needs of the people, and the real voice of Iran. Demonstrators are making a clear distinction between the Iranian people's desired policies and those being carried out by the regime. All political and economic indications are that protests in Iran will continue to grow.

The Trump administration in the United States is taking the right side by supporting the Iranian people; they are the principal victims of the Iranian regime and its Islamist agenda.

US President Donald Trump tweeted:

"Many reports of peaceful protests by Iranian citizens fed up with regime's corruption & its squandering of the nation's wealth to fund terrorism abroad. Iranian govt should respect their people's rights, including right to express themselves. The world is watching! #IranProtests"

In another statement, the U.S. State Department said:

"On June 14, 2017, Secretary Tillerson accurately testified to Congress that he supports 'those elements inside of Iran that would lead to a peaceful transition of government. Those elements are there, certainly as we know.' The Secretary today repeats his deep support for the Iranian people."

Let us be clear. The fault lines are completely visible. If you are on the side of justice, freedom, and basic human rights, and if you respect humanity, you will not be able to remain silent. Let us at least give moral support, if not more, to the Iranian people. Justice and truth need to prevail. This is what history has repeatedly shown us. Let us not be on the side of history that would remain silent in the face of such crimes against humanity, let us not join the ranks of other dictators, terrorists, and criminals, that turned a blind eye to violence, and the will of brave, innocent people.

Dr. Majid Rafizadeh, is a business strategist and advisor, Harvard-educated scholar, political scientist, board member of Harvard International Review, and president of the International American Council on the Middle East. He is the author of "Peaceful Reformation in Iran's Islam". He can be reached at Dr.Rafizadeh@Post.Harvard.Edu.

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Related Topics: Iran

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Comment on this item

23 Reader Comments

Daniel Passer • Jan 7, 2018 at 13:30

As a God fearing, patriotic American, I thank God every day that we do now have courageous national political leaders consisting of President Trump, Vice President Pence, and their closest advisors, including the likes of Jay Sekulow, Secretary Mattis, Mike Pompeo, Jared Kushner, and Nikki Haley. It sort of feels like a re-birth of Reaganism, and that is a good feeling, indeed.

I pray to God that He gives constant aid, protection, support and comfort to the Iranian people who are most courageously carrying out their grass-roots revolution against the unspeakably evil, oppressive, freedom-hating, terrorist mullahs. I fervently hope and pray every day that these God damn mullahs - from the pit of Islamist hell - are wholly excised from power as soon as possible.

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Andy Paul • Jan 2, 2018 at 06:16

Iran or rather it's Islamic regime is an enemy of the West and Israel. Despite the moral ambiguity displayed by previous US president Obama and leaders of the EU who have been constructing a narrative that somehow Iran is an ally and friend, it is an enemy.

Iran's regime seeks the end of Israel and the genocide of the Jews and if it could it would have no issue whatsoever with imposing it's worldview on the West. However there are signs that the people of Iran have had enough with demonstrations continuing in the face of an aggressive response from the authorities.

While liberals in the West make common ground with those who sponsor the wearing of burkas they are silent as brave women in Iran tear theirs off in the face of batons or bullets. Where are the demonstrations in support of these women?

Why are Western leaders, with the sole exception of current US incumbent, Donald Trump, so lacking in moral fibre and courage that they would continue their kid glove approach towards the 7th century clerics and theocrats?

The people of Iran are seeking a release of the shackles and stagnation imposed upon them by Islam. Let us not forget, when Iran was Persia, long before it fell to Islam, it was one of the great civilizations of the world.

CNN reports the events in Iran as merely driven by economic factors, toeing Tehran's line. While economic stagnation is of course an issue, so are the issues of freedom of thought, expression, enquiry, belief, all that we take too easily for granted in the West but manna for those who have been deprived of them for so long.

Perhaps this new year could see the leaders in the 2018 develop moral courage and integrity and lose their supine and craven approach to the Islamic world.

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Henry • Jan 1, 2018 at 22:26

The regime will drown the protests in blood, as they are doing right now. Protesters should shout "death to islam", the platform of their subjugation. The peaceful transition from the islamic dictatorship to democracy is impossible despite the hypocritical Tillerson's declaration. People have no choice but to fight for their rights to live in a free society. Islamic power will never transition to democracy.

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Odo Saunders • Jan 1, 2018 at 12:39

At least Trump is taking a proactive role in supporting the basic needs of the protesters, unlike Obama who cravenly submitted to the demands of the Iranian government.

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Abhishek Ghosh • Jan 1, 2018 at 11:09

I believe Iran will dwarf Syria.

One falls into the grave one digs for others.

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Attilla

Abhishek Ghosh • Jan 1, 2018 at 15:39

Agreed. I always thought the next ME domino to fail would be Turkey. It seems The Iranians are beating The Turks on that front.

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af • Jan 1, 2018 at 10:56

Yet another reason why Obama was such a pathetic POTUS. My hope is that these protests continue and work. There is always the chance that the regime is able to pull an Ali rope-a-dope and the protests lose steam when the protestors see no real change.

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Ron Thompson • Jan 1, 2018 at 10:42

I hope Dr Rafizadeh is right that the popular demonstrations are as broad and deep as he says. It was one of Obama's great failures that he flatly refused to support the demonstrations of 2009.

Here's a question - since Iran is the only Muslim country that has a strong identity and proud history outside of Islam, is it possible (and desirable) that the country might reject the religion under some leader similar to Ataturk, who partially freed Turkey, or at least its educated classes, from the religion for over half a century?

Put another way, can the people of Iran possibly escape theocracy and autocracy WITHOUT rejecting the totalitarian religion of Islam? Isn't that what the demonstrators are doing when they say 'forget about Palestine and Gaza', 'leave Syria alone'?

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SaEFan

Ron Thompson • Jan 1, 2018 at 16:18

A proud pre-Islam history is also the patrimony of Egypt, Iraq-Babylonia, Syria-Assyria, and many modern countries that were politically something else but nevertheless existed, such as the entities making up Lebanon, Yemen, Sudan, and Ethiopia/Abissinia.

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Dajjal

Ron Thompson • Jan 1, 2018 at 17:36

Ron, your question answers itself. There is no way for Muslims to escape from theocracy without abandoning Islam entirely. Attaturk's failure in Turkey is ample evidence of that. Islam persists; it never takes no for an answer. It festers, it seethes, then it breaks out like a pimple, boil & carbuncle.

The chants about Iran, not Gaza & Syria are proto-Trumpism, nationalistic, not contra-Islamic. They flow from personal and communal desperation born of bad resource allocation.

While the IRG & Basiji have the arms and will to kill, it is unlikely that the Green Revolution can succeed short of great carnage.

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Ron Thompson

Dajjal • Jan 2, 2018 at 10:18

Dajjal, I agree with your statement that "there's no way for Muslims to escape from theocracy without
abandoning Islam entirely". But I must respectfully dissent afterwards.
First, I think Ataturk was largely successful, at least in the middle, educated, and military officer classes, for more than two generations. This was a remarkable accomplishment and should have become a blueprint for the rest of the Muslim world.
But what nobody, inside or outside the world of Islam (except for the True Believers - see
Eric Hoffer's definitive description of them in his book of the same title) seemed to realize was that if the
core commandments of Islam were revitalized, then the Muslim world would become inflamed with
intolerance, hatred, and violence, especially against ...... other Muslims. Which is what the True Believers
have brought about in the Muslim world from North Africa to the southern Philippines, and in the burgeoning Muslim communities of vulnerable Europe. (Think especially Khomeini in 1979 for Shia Islam, and bin Laden in 2001 for Sunni Islam)
So if the chants in Iran about 'not Gaza or Palestine or Syria, but about us', are to have any hope of success or lasting change, they must be about theocracy too, and hence about Islam.
What would help them most is if those in the West, for the FIRST TIME EVER, raise the issue of whether it is Islam itself which is holding back the whole Muslim world from escaping its intolerance and violence and embracing the values and practices of Modernity which have brought prosperity to so much of the world.
There are tensions and conflicts and concerns everywhere, but I would argue that the only truly existential threat to the world community is Islam. lf this is so, then what choice do we have, and do the brave Iranian protesters have, but to question Islam itself. Ironically, it would seem that if we can somehow, summon the courage to face the obvious, that Islam is incompatible with freedom of the individual and true freedom of religion (which respects the religious beliefs of others) that this intellectual and philosophical confrontation offers the best hope of avoiding an ultimate military showdown or Armageddon further down the road.

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Dajjal

Ron Thompson • Jan 5, 2018 at 06:08

Precedent: "The River War", Winston Churchill 1899 "No more retrogade force".

He knew and wrote. Gladstone knew and spoke. J.Q. Adams knw and wrote. Their warnings went unheeded.

There is a hadith, if memory serves, in Sunan Abu Dawud, in which Moe says that Allah will, every 100 years, rise up someone to 'renovate his religion'. Ibn Abd al-Wahhab was one such. Al-Banna & Qutb followed. Thus Attaturk's vallient effort failed. Kemalization is reversed. You can not chain a vampire, you must stake it.

Today I read a Hugh Fitzgerald post at Jihad Watch about a letter to the Pope from a group of converts from Islam. Hunt for that post, click through, then click the link to the letter and read it. It may induce some tears but it is worthwhile.

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UNCLE VLADDI

Ron Thompson • Jan 5, 2018 at 16:05

Re: "What would help them most is if those in the West, for the FIRST TIME EVER, raise the issue of whether it is Islam itself which is holding back the whole Muslim world from escaping its intolerance and violence and embracing the values and practices of Modernity which have brought prosperity to so much of the world."

I think it's the Western leaders' own, liberal racism at work: clearly, the reason the muslims are violent is due to nurture, not to nature; to the software (the Qur'an), not their 'racial' hardware. After all, when your barbaric, parasite "culture" is based on "THOU SHALT KILL!" it's obvious that you're bound to get completely different socio-economic results, (like living in dirt & ruins, and forcing your women to wear their own burka funeral shrouds) simply because your society is based on distrust, and on constantly plotting defenses and raids on other tribes - than if you were born into a civilized, stable and industrious culture that relies on "THOU SHALT NOT KILL!" and so, trusting each other not to attack first, can devote time to inventing and making things. But then again, politician's motto is "There's No Money In Solutions, so Please Give Generously - AGAIN!"

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John Forbes • Jan 1, 2018 at 09:21

Let us all PRAY that this does produce huge changes in Iran & does end in a democratic country. Still the Middle East & Islam are both very unpredictable !

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John Forbes • Jan 1, 2018 at 12:39

What is unpredictable about Islam and the Middle East? They are, au contraire, sadly too predictable. How many true democracies exist in the Middle East? IF the Iranian citizens overthrow the mullahs, and I hope deeply that they do, it will be far more the exception than the rule.

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joe k • Jan 1, 2018 at 08:36

I went to the NYT for some in depth analysis and all I found was a brief AP article. I guess in their biased view the enemy (Iran Islamofascist regime) of my enemy (Trump) is my friend.

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jeb • Jan 1, 2018 at 07:36

How much money was spread around to the DNC by Iran that their news outlets are pushing for President Trump not to take sides and follow the path President Obama took in 2009? President Obama's rapprochement with the Ayatollah was ill conceived and not understandable considering after they got their "deal" they seized American sailors for ransom that wasn't ransom and continued their illegal ballistic missile program and did nothing to stop the ayatollah's lust for a doomsday bomb. How the left and defunct communists trying to recover from counter revolutions are trying to hold onto their long held dream of an America more like a "revolutionary" anti American Iran is finally being seen as the corrupt backwards lack of movement it is and always was.

I was moved by IDF soldiers who are asking Americans to ask their representatives why the RNC is being funded by American "charities" essentially it is funding an anti-draft movement in Israel. Upon a quick look at the funding much of it is funneled from an old time Communist cell that would rather not be named. That is how evil flourishes, by remaining anonymous. How they retain a non-taxable not for profit distinction is despicable.

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Albert Reingewirtz • Jan 1, 2018 at 07:30

Persia again now! I remember very well super tanker delivering oil from Persia to Eilat, Israel. I used to work for EPC, Eilat Pipeline Company. It was a two way commerce. Peaceful friendship between a state mostly Muslim and a state mostly Jewish. Nothing similar exist between Israel and any Arab state even with a signed peace agreement. No comparison possible. Shah Pachlawi was a friend. The Ayatollahs on the other hand are mortal enemies of Israel and it's friends the Persian people.

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Dorothy Webb davies • Jan 1, 2018 at 06:17

They will free themselves if they can get the army on their side, as the Egyptians did when they got rid of the Muslim Brotherhood, but it seems unlikely in Iran. It's more like Nazi Germany when the army totally supported the government. The Iranians need all our constant prayer.

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Morton Winner

Dorothy Webb davies • Jan 1, 2018 at 15:56

Aren't the Revolutionary Guards similar to the Nazi S.S./S.A.? And The Iranian military similar to the Wehrmacht? If I remember correctly, the Wehrmacht were not more "nice" to people than S.S. (the S.A. having been eliminated first). Is it really possible that the Army would side with the aspirants for freedom? Parenthetically, could the American people be of any help within the parameters of American law, to encourage a Green Revolution, now that Carter/Obama/Clinton are not a palpable factor in defeating freedom? And-is there any hope that the late Shah's son might return?

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Dajjal • Jan 1, 2018 at 06:00

Expect draconian repression, it's what they do. I suspect that Iran will use Hamas & Hezbollah rocket attacks on Israel as a distraction tactic.

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Patricia Canon • Jan 1, 2018 at 05:54

Our prayers are with the people of Iran -- for their long-awaited freedom. Their courage in the face of such oppression is an inspiration to the world.

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Jennifer Epstein Katz • Jan 1, 2018 at 05:11

This could have a happy ending like it was the case in the former GDR in 1989, but it could be the beginning of another ruthless repression by the Ayatollahs like the Assad regime unleashed in Syria. I don't know what will happen, although of course I do wish freedom and prosperity to the Iranian people.

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