Iran at a Critical Junction

The plans for a smooth and trouble-free coup by Iranian President Mahmood Ahmadinejad and his backers are in trouble. After two days of heavy police crackdowns against protesters, the government relented on 15 June, allowing supporters of presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi to march peacefully in central Tehran. The attendance of nearly 700,000 people in last Monday’s march is considered a major setback for the hardliners.

Mousvai’s supporters are protesting the 12 June presidential elections, which according to the Iranian government resulted in a landslide re-election for Ahmadinejad.

At present, the regime seems badly divided over what strategy to follow next. One faction, comprising chiefly those associated with the executive branch and parts of the Revolutionary Guards and the Basij militia, are urging a massive and bloody crackdown. Their associated newspapers, in tandem with the national broadcaster IRIB, are filled daily with alleged stories of atrocities perpetrated by the seekers of a ‘velvet revolution.’

In a 250,000-large pro-Ahmadinejad rally on 16 June, tens of thousands of flyers were distributed among the participants alleging that Mousavi, and former presidents Mohammed Khatami and Ayatollah Ali Rafsanjani were part of a macabre cabal bent on starting a velvet-type revolution in Iran. The flyer alleged that the plan was orchestrated by the US government and institutes such as the Soros Foundation.

At this point, calls for a clampdown cannot be achieved without involvement of the armed forces. If so, the hardliner’s scheme would change Ahmadinejad’s coup from a political to a wholesale military one. In line with talks of a clampdown, some opposition leaders are of the opinion that the hardliners may stage bombing attacks or selected assassinations of their own famous rightist figures to justify an eventual clampdown.

The police retreat on Monday during the Mousavi demonstration shows that sections in the leadership are seeking other options. The speaker of the hardline Guardian Council, Abasali Kadkhodai, said on 16 June: “The possibility of a vote annulment is not outside the realm of possibility.” Experts believe even the mention of the word annulment means that the political dynamic has already changed.

A military coup would be extremely costly, for although the disturbances are largely confined to the capital, a bloody clampdown could cause a much stronger reaction among the populations of the provinces and the outlying areas such as Kurdistan and Baluchistan.

But even more important, it could strike a blow to one of the two core values of the Islamic Republic state ideology: its legitimacy as a popularly-mandated political entity. Aside from that, it would badly complicate its relations with foreign governments.

Temporal differences

“Powerful factions in the establishment, though evidently happy with Ahmadinejad’s past performance, are not enamored with him as a person and may decide to get rid of him if it would serve their interests,” a well-connected clergyman told ISN Security Watch.

As far as the possibility of bombing attacks or assassinations of right-wing figures, the clergyman said this was something the Mousavi camp was probably aware of also. But he added that the country’s leadership must be aware of these same reports and consequently would have to bear some responsibility if they did occur.

But aside from the constantly radicalizing popular movement and the factional struggle at the very top, the next most important factor in Ayatollah Khamenei’s calculus is the position of the high clergy in Qum. So far, they have neither condemned nor accepted the 12 June results. This has understandably raised the ire of the pro-government forces.

On 15 June, one such group at the far-right website Bornanews said, referring to Qum’s Grand Ayatollahs: “What is the cause of this silence? Is the participation of 85 percent of our people (in the election) a trite issue in the history of the revolution which does not merit any reaction among these gentlemen?”

Another indication that the Grand Ayatollahs may be preparing to distance themselves from the Ahmadinejad crowd was when Ali Larijani, the parliamentary speaker whose faction represents the interests of the traditionalist religious establishment, broke silence and said, albeit vaguely, that the Interior Ministry had to be answerable for some of the violence. He has also directed a commission to investigate reported instances of vigilante attacks on student dormitories in the Kargar Avenue section of Tehran on 14 June, which left many students injured or, according to some reports, killed.

According to the clergyman, Rafsanjani, accused by Ahmadinejad of corruption and theft, is preparing to call for an emergency meeting of the Assembly of Experts or Khobregan, presumably to look into the crisis but really to question the Supreme Leader for the part he may have played in the crisis. Even if an innocent bystander, Aytaollah Khamenei has violated the country’s own constitution and accepted Ahmadinejad’s victory as fact before the three-day waiting period required by law for the Guardian Council to investigate all the outstanding complaints.

Ayatollah Khamenei has announced that he would be this weeks’ Friday Prayer Leader in Tehran. It is expected that thousands of devotees will be bused from Tehran and other neighboring cities to attend the prayer in the hope that it could bolster his position. But this grandstanding can scarcely blind the high-ranking clerics of the reality on the ground and even the holy city has not been immune from riots and street fights. Some eyewitness accounts have reported clashes occurring just yards away from the sacred Massomeh Shrine in central Qum.

Chief among the clerics’ complaints - apart from the endangerment of public peace - is the open contempt with which Ahmadinejad and his government have dealt with the traditionalist clergy’s concerns. It is well known that many of them are sympathetic to Rafsanjani and consider an attack on him an attack on the whole clerical class.

Still for others more neutral on the Khamenei-Rafsanjani rift, the attack on Rafsanjani is too uncouth, too ‘unclerical.’ This is compounded by the fact that five days before the 12 June vote, Rafsanjani pleaded in a letter for Khamenei to condemn Ahmadinejad’s actions.

The letter stated rather prophetically that the Supreme Leader’s continued silence in the face of the Ahmadinejad schemes had extremely dangerous implications for the Islamic Revolution. He called on Ayatollah Khamenei "to put an end to this dangerous conspiracy." Otherwise, Rafsanjani continued, the conspirators will be tempted to add "fuel to the fire" and in doing so they could send the whole country up in flames.

In the next emergency Khobregan meeting held by the 70-odd, clerics-only chamber, one of the issues that Rafsanjani will undountedly raise is Mr Khamenei's unreserved support for Ahmadinejad's candidacy for the election. This is now beyond idle speculation. Two official letters exist - one bearing the signature of Hojatul-Islam Saiidi, the Supreme Leader's chief representative in the Revolutionary Guards, and one allegedly by the Leader himself- in which Mr Khamenei has openly endorsed Ahmadinejad for presidency.

While it is too premature to view these developments as terminal signs for the Islamic Republic, there is no question that this is the worst crisis the Islamic state has faced in its 30-year history.