Protests in Iran

Since the 1979 Iranian revolution, the Shi’ah clerics have used their near divine status among the Iranian masses to control and beguile them into believing that the Iranian regime is the vanguard of Islam against Zionist and American plans for hegemony over the Middle East.

The reality is very different to the facade shown by the regime, just like the regime of Ibn Saud in the Arabian Peninsula, the Iranian clerical regime has facilitated US strategic interests since its inception.

The US invasion and subsequent occupation of Afghanistan was not possible without Iranian support, where Iran sealed its western border to prevent supplies reaching those who resisted the US occupation.

Furthermore the US occupation of Iraq and the horrors inflicted upon the Muslims of Iraq is not possible without the clerical regimes support especially in the initiation of a sectarian war by groups aligned to the clerics to confront the insurgency against US rule.

Most of all it is the Iranian regime’s intervention to support the brutal tyrant of Syria has unmasked the emptiness of the clerical regime’s revolutionary slogans and the pretence of its opposition to the Zionist entity. Why would a regime that barks about its desire to destroy the Zionist state support the al-Assad regime, which has kept the northern borders of Zionist entity safe and secure for the Zionist state for over 50 years?

The clerical regime’s intervention in Syria highlights its strategic alliance with the US and the clerics’ support and cooperation with US dominance over the Middle East. The rescue of the al-Assad’s regime, is such a priority for the US, that in its haste to save the rapidly failing regime in Damascus not only did it facilitate Hezbollah’s (Iranian proxy in Lebanon) illegal drug trade,1 like a Columbian drug lord the US transported $1.7 billion in cash to Iran 2 for its recruitment of hazara and Pakistani Shi’ah militia men to fill al-Assad’s rapidly diminishing army. These cash payment were then followed by up to $33.6 billion of assets unfrozen to allow Iran to finance the US sponsored intervention in Syria.

Rhetorical slogans and howls of fake rage cannot hide the ugly face of the clerical regime of Iran, the murder of over 500,000 Muslims in Syria, the civil war in Yemen and the daily slaughter in its sectarian war in Iraq are just a few consequences of the polices of clerical regime’s and its interventions to secure US interests in the Middle East.

Just like the other client regimes in the Middle East the continued survival of its rule is paramount and all other considerations are secondary. Despite the Iranian economy being the third largest in the Middle East amounting to nearly $340 billion the embezzlement and mismanagement by the clerics and their entourages and the continued costs of the clerics brutal interventions to secure US interests have impoverished the Iranian public. Despite the massive payout from the US there has been a 30% fall in living standards for the average Iranian household over the past 10 years, with over 26000 job losses alone in the past week.

Although the clerical regime will attempt to portray the ongoing demonstrations as a US/Zionist/Wahhabi conspiracy, the demographics of the protestors belie this propaganda, rather than being from liberal constituencies, the protestors are largely from the working class impoverished by the sectarian and nationalistic policies of the clerics.

As both the Iranian clerical regime and the regime of Ibn Saud fall over each other to implement liberal policies to win the favour of the US, Muslims must realise that despite the sickening subservience of these nations to the US, their position just gets worse and worse as any single Muslim country can be impoverished and brought to its knees by western sanctions and trade policies. Rather the resilience to western colonialism can only be achieved by a global ummah united under a Khalifah who works for the interests of Islam and the Muslims.

Written for the Central Media Office of Hizb ut Tahrir by
Muzzamil Hussain

1. http://www.newsweek.com/hezbollah-cocaine-smuggle-united-states-obama-751928
2. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/u-s-paid-1-3-billion-to-iran-two-days-after-cash-delivery/