As opposition candidate, Mir Hossein Mousavi twitters, “Allahu Akbar was heard louder than all the previous nights,” Iranian authorities and their hooligan Basijis, crack down on houses in which people chant “Allah O Akbar,” God is great, on their rooftops in opposition of the current Islamic government.
Government officials and militia forces are determined to muffle the voices of hundreds of thousands of protesters who have been taking to the streets of Iran clamoring for change since the June 12 presidential dispute. Since then, 17 have been reported dead, hundreds injured and the numbers of missing within the walls of Evin prison is uncertain.
Checkpoints have been set up through Tehran by the police and the Basijis, making it clear to the public that the government will not tolerate any further opposition to the re-election of hard-liner President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, reported the New York Times.
Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has been taking sides with Ahmadinejad all along, had announced that the law on the election issue will be implemented and the government will not “yield to pressure at any cost,” according to news reports.
Another showdown of mockery and injustice has been executed at the cost of a bloody performance. Nonetheless, as they say in the west, “it is not over until the fat lady sings.” Currently, however, all voices have been temporarily silenced.
At this point, government officials feel anxiety and fear. They realize that the people of Iran have also taken a stand not to “yield to pressure at any cost.”
The Islamic republic’s concern was clearly illustrated through Mohsen Rezai, a former hard-line commander of the revolutionary guards who had been of three candidates complaining of indiscretion in the presidential election outcome. Rezai withdrew his complaint saying that the “political, social, and security situation has entered a sensitive and decisive phase, more important than the election,” as per Press TV, state television’s English-language satellite broadcaster.
In an attempt to put an end to the uprising, the Guardian Council spokesman, Abbas Ali Kadkhodaei, recently announced that the file on the presidential election “has been closed,” according to Press TV.
Naturally, the mere fact that the12 clerics who make up the Guardian Council are appointed by Khamenei, and that Khamenei, in addition, has the ultimate power to confirm the president’s election, cannot be overlooked.
The outcry of Iranians has echoed throughout the world. Even if they lost the battle, Iran has reached a turning point, and its people have yet to fight a war.
Meanwhile, the actions of other nations, which believe in human rights and claim the name of democracy, toward a government that has so explicitly tarnished the true meaning of freedom, human rights and social justice, is yet to unfold.
For now, the certainty mounted from this upheaval is that Iran has made the initial step toward becoming a free state. Unfortunately, such change will require bloodshed and brutalities beyond what the world has witnessed within the last three weeks, but the strength, unity and determination of the Iranian people can no longer be taken lightly.
