Jeff Blankort writes:
Here's an interesting post by an Iranian writer recommended to me by Nader Hashemi. The
writer's critique of the left's position, those supporting Ahamdinejad,
is important. Frankly, I could have predicted almost exactly how the
pundits of the Left, some of whom I admire and whose positions on
Israel and the lobby are in accord with mine, would interpret the
Iranian elections, i.e., the "Western"opposition to Ahamdinejad has
been orchestrated by the US and/or Israel. [Phil Weiss falls into this puddle here.]
On the other hand,
Mohammad of Vancouver seems to be the only Iranian commentator that I have read so
far that defends Ahamdinejad. This reminds me of the years of the
Soviet bloc when its intervention into Hungary and Prague and its
crackdown on Solidarnosc in Poland were justified by much of the Left
since the Soviets were opposed to the US, the result being that the
resistance movements in those countries turned to the West, and then
were blamed by the Left for doing so.
From the post by Ali Alizadeh, Researcher at the Centre for Research in Modern European Philosophy, Middlesex University, which, by the way, presents a strong circumstantial case for a rigged election:
What is more surprising in the midst of this media frenzy is the
blindness of the western left to the political dynamism and energy of
our movement. The causes of this blindness oscillate between the
misgivings about Islam (or the Islamophobia of hyper-secular left) and
the confusion made by Ahmadinjead’s fake anti-imperialist rhetoric (his
alliance with Chavez perhaps, who after all was the first to
congratulate him). It needs to be emphasized that Ahmadinejad’s
economic policies are to the right of the IMF…
Musavi emphasized the universal demands of ‘people’ who wanted to be
heard and counted as political subjects. This subjectivity, emphasized
by Musavi during his campaign and fully incarnated in the rallies of
the past few days, is constituted by political intuition, creativity
and recollection of the ‘79 revolution (no wonder that people so
quickly reached an unexpected maturity, best manifested in the
abstention from violence in their silent demonstrations). Musavi’s
‘people’ is also easily, but strongly, distinguished from Ahmadinejad’s
anonymous masses dependent on state charity. Musavi’s people, as the
collective appearing in the rallies, is made of religious women covered
in chador walking hand in hand with westernized young women who are
usually prosecuted for their appearance; veterans of war in wheelchairs
next to young boys for whom the Iran-Iraq war is only an anecdote; and
working class who have sacrificed their daily salary to participate in
the rally next to the middle classes. This story is not limited to
Tehran. Shiraz (two confirmed dead), Isfahan (one confirmed dead),
Tabriz, Oroomiye are also part of this movement and other cities are
joining with a predictable delay (as it was the case in 79 revolution).
History will prove who the real participants of this movement are
but once again we are faced with a new, non-classical and unfamiliar
radical politics. Will the Western left get it right this time?
