Home > eNews Article > Ahmadinejad Straining Iran's Confidence

Ahmadinejad Straining Iran's Confidence

from the May 11, 2010 eNews issue
http://www.khouse.org (visit our website for a FREE subscription)

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the "people's friend" of Iran, has been facing more than a little rejection lately, and not just at the United Nations. As the anniversary of the highly controversial Iranian elections approaches June 12, Iran has been taking a variety of precautions to keep down anti-Ahmadinejad demonstrations. More than 1,000 students at Shahid Beheshti University gathered to protest a visit by Mr. Ahmadinejad on Monday after five Kurds were executed in prison. Ahmadinejad also faced large crowds of disapproving students on May 1 when he visited Tehran University.

Whether or not he's a "regular guy", Ahmadinejad has proven himself as much a tyrant as any Islamic cleric. Freedom of the press is a right hardly taken for granted in Iran anymore, and journalists face serious hazards when reporting anything the mullahs do not consider politically or religiously correct. Rudi Bakhtiar, a spokesman for the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran, noted recently that Iran has surpassed China to become, "Number 1 in the world when it comes to journalists in prison."

Ahmadinejad is infamous for his incendiary anti-West and anti-Israeli comments, his sometimes self-contradicting public statements regarding Iran's international relations policies and views on terrorism, and his insistence on developing Iran's nuclear program despite strong words of warning from America, Canada, and a host of European countries.

Ahmadinejad and the People:
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad did come from the common people, but his exploits early on present him as anything but your basic Joe. He was born to a relatively poor, working-class blacksmith and jack-of-all-trades in the village of Aradan, Iran. Before taking political office, he worked as a civil engineer and schoolteacher. There is scant public record about his early career of the 1980's, and even conjecture that he was a revolutionist participating in the Islamic Revolution in 1979, after which 52 Americans were held hostage in the US Embassy in Iran. According to claims by many of those Americans, Ahmadinejad was among their captors, though he firmly denies this. He eventually rose to the position of (unelected) Mayor of Tehran for two years and was still largely a political unknown when, in 2005, he became the sixth president of Iran.

Ahmadinejad supports the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps and apparently called upon them both to vote for him during the presidential campaign and to encourage others to do the same. Ahmedinejad joined the Corps during the 1980's. According to the BBC, "the Revolutionary Guards' power and influence are such that the US government has designated it a 'proliferator of weapons of mass destruction' and its elite overseas operations arm, the Quds Force, a 'supporter of terrorism.'"

Ahmadinijad is the first non-cleric president of Iran in more than two decades. The real legislative power in Iran belongs to the country's unelected Shi'ite religious clerics- the mullahs- and their Supreme Leader, the Ayatollah. The current Ayatollah Al Khamenei is a former Iranian president himself. In the wake of Ahmadinejad's controversial re-election, Khamenei preempted the usual three-day waiting period allowed for contesting the vote and officially approved Ahmadinejad as President of Iran as soon as the votes were tallied. His refusal to allow political parties to dispute the election result further fueled accusations that Khamenei rigged the election to assure Ahmadinejad the presidency. Even those who accepted the election results are not confident the election was fair. One senior member of a group opposing Ahmadinejad, Mahdi Karroubi, was quoted in the Tehran Times as saying, "I still strongly believe that the election was massively rigged. I stand by my word. But since Mr. Khamenei endorsed Ahmadinejad, I recognize him as the head of the government."

Ahmadinejad has fallen from grace in the eyes of many, but he has been greatly admierd among certain sectors of Iran, especially the poor. Among the Iranian public, at least by his own description, he is known as "the people's friend." His lifestyle is purportedly modest; he donated the priceless antique carpeting of the presidential residence to a museum and opted for inexpensive carpeting for the dwelling; he has replaced the official presidential jetliner with a cargo plane and humbler flight accommodations. He claims to be leading a class revolution among the people - supporting the poorer classes in a vie to overthrow the corrupt, wealth-amassing, power-hungry bourgeoisie.

Ahmadinejad and Israel:
"Israel's days are numbered," Ahmadinejad said in a speech before a group in Gorgan, northern Iran, in May of 2008. He continues to lead Iran in backing Hezbollah and Hamas against the Israeli people, and analysts speculate that Iran will take a definite antagonistic action against Israel and her allies in the future if the country is in a position to do so. Experts have warned for years that a nuclear arsenal in Iran is imminent.

Ahmadinejad often talks about the injustices committed by Israel, but in the end, he just does not want the Jewish state to exist, period. The Iranian magazine Emrooz quoted an Ahmadinejad speech to Majlis members on May 10, 2008 when he said, "The [very] basis for the existence of the Zionist regime is in question. This oppressive and false regime is about to fade and collapse... Those who think that they can revive this stinking corpse by celebrating its anniversary are totally wrong. The [leaders] who attend these celebrations should know that they will go down [in history as accomplices] of the Zionist criminals... Having received a slap in the face from the Lebanese people, this regime is now coming to its end like a dead fish."

Ahmadinejad and Obama:
Obama would like to end the Bush-era policies of sanctions and disagreement between the US and Iran and start anew. He has expressed a desire for friendly relations with Iran, but Obama's efforts can hardly be fruitful with Ahmadinejad and the mullahs running the country. As children in Iranian public education are taught that the United States is the "Great Satan," and friendly overtures between the two countries is considered heresy, it is clear that Iran needs fair elections and the Persian people would do well to elect somebody with far more willingness to make peace with the West than the tyrannical Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. America and its allies must continue to keep a watchful, wary eye on Iran's current president and his nuclear and political pursuits.