Today Everyone is Iranian

Regrettably, despite November 2019 and 2022, the vast international support for the Iranian revolution ultimately resulted in the usual business with the Islamic regime. As more Iranians and activists called for satellite internet, Tech entrepreneur Elon Musk announced that the Starlink satellite internet company would seek an exemption to the US sanction to provide service to the Iranian people. The entire people of the world expressed solidarity with the Iranian women.

World leaders have condemned the Iranian government’s actions since news of Amini’s death and protests spread. Protests have expanded abroad, and people outside the country have circulated Iranian accounts and footage to raise awareness. Despite the attention, Iranian authorities have not stopped suppressing and arresting protestors. The country’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said the “riots and insecurities were designed by America and the Zionist regime” to undermine his government’s authority.”

“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.” John F. Kennedy Today, all Iranian expatriates are united in solidarity with the Iranian people inside Iran. Today, we are all standing tall to let the world hear our continuous aspiration for a free and democratic Iran. Today, we pledge ourselves, under divine inspiration, to stand beside the Iranians in Iran and echo their voices around the globe to make history yet again.

It is critical that freedom-loving people, governments, and media rally behind the Iranian people and end the tyrannical mullahcracy that is a scourge on Iran and the world. The Iranian people are competent and are determined to remove the cancer of Islamism from their country. The United States, Israel, and other democracies have a considerable stake in the success of the Iranian people to rid themselves of Islamic oppression and tyranny.

The situation in Iran has been dire indeed. Anyone who believes that sane, rational people on both sides are engaged in brinkmanship to secure the best advantage, but would eventually work out a compromise, is deluding himself. Sometimes, time works as a healer and even as a solution to thorny problems. Yet, this problem will not go away, and time will only make the cataclysmic clash more likely and deadly. The best chance for resolving the impasse is regime change in Iran. For the past forty-four years, the intrepid Iranians have been paying with their blood for liberty, independence, and human dignity. The world looked the other way and did business with the Islamist rulers in Iran.

Forty-five years ago, a fanatic Shi’a Muslim named Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, with the assistance of Western governments (with Jimmy Carter on top of the list), succeeded in overthrowing the Shah of Iran during Iran’s 1979 revolution. Khomeini promised Iranians heaven but created hell on earth, turning Iran into a bastion of Islamic fundamentalism and terrorism.

Ever since tens of thousands of political activists have been killed or imprisoned, tens of thousands of opposition groups, women, and ethnic and religious minorities have been subjected to inhumane treatment, and tens of thousands of political prisoners are spending their precious lives, in the medieval barbaric Islamic Republic dungeons. Since 1979, this illegitimate government of the Islamic Republic has been waging a brutal war against the entire population of Iran, which has been fighting for individual and religious freedom. Despite tens of thousands of political executions, other inhumane practices, and years of a reign of terror, the Islamists have not succeeded in uprooting the nationwide movement for democracy in Iran.

We honor Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. for proclaiming from a Birmingham jail, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” To demand justice for others, he risked his life, left his native Georgia, and ended up in jail in the then-bigoted south, Birmingham, Alabama.

“Iranians” must do no less. We demand justice for our compatriots suffering under the yoke of Islamofascism in Iran. We also do well to recall the example of an Irish-American President—John F. Kennedy—looking at the Communists’ Wall of Shame in Berlin, proclaiming, “Ich bin ein Berliner”—“I am a Berliner.” By so claiming, he helped rally free people of the world that brought down the wall and created a momentum that eventually swept the totalitarian Communist wall-builders into the dustbin of history.

Another great American President, Ronald Reagan, took a stand for freedom with the Polish people.  “The Polish nation, speaking through Solidarity, has provided one of modern history’s brightest, bravest moments. The people of Poland are giving us an imperishable example of courage and devotion to the values of freedom in the face of relentless opposition. Left to themselves, the Polish people would enjoy a new birth of freedom. But some oppose the idea of freedom, are intolerant of national independence, and are hostile to the European values of democracy and the rule of law.”  “History records that Reagan’s decision to take a strong stand for Polish freedom — and bringing down the Communist system itself — was the right one.” Reagan led and inspired the Poles to continue the struggle, which resulted in half of Europe being freed from iron-fisted domination by then, the Soviet Union.

During the 2009 Green movement, even the European Union called on Islamic authorities to investigate voting-rigging allegations during Iran’s presidential election expressing concern at Tehran’s crackdown on protesters. German chancellor Olaf Scholz took a much tougher stand than President Obama, calling the oppression “totally unacceptable.” At the same time, all Biden could say was that it was “deeply troubling” President Obama’s halting comments only made clear his fundamental misunderstanding of the nature of the Islamic regime. It appears

Like President Obama, the Biden administration is betraying the Iranian people as Jimmy Carter did four decades before. Late  Senator John McCain, President Obama’s rival in the US election, described the president’s response as “tepid” and blasted him for abandoning the “fundamental principles” of the United States.

I wanted to clarify: Iranian people don’t expect the Americans to come to Iran and fight for them. Every decent and freedom-loving nation knows that the Iranian people have the right and the duty to change their form of government. What Americans can do for the Iranian people is to lend them their support, not to fight on their behalf, but to rally to their side and to cheer their struggle.

Today, brave women and men of Iran shall demonstrate until every Iranian is free. Today, everyone is Iranian.

©2023. Amil Imani. All rights reserved.

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