Tehrangeles: Why Are There So Many Iranians In Los Angeles?

Iranians react to Trump's travel ban

A new extended US travel ban is due to come into effect. One of the original countries blacklisted by the White House was Iran. "Death to America" is a protest chant so synonymous with the country that US President Donald Trump even mentioned it in his recent policy speech as one of the reasons Iran's leaders could not be trusted. And though Iranians may resent the US government’s new visa restrictions, how they feel about America as a country is a little different. Al Jazeera's Zein Basravi reports from Tehran.

Courage in Iran
TIMES ONLINE – Leading Article: President Ahmadinejad must be greeted by protests when he attends the UN next week. We must show the courageous people of Iran that they do not protest alone

The thousands of Iranians who took to the streets yesterday to protest against the fraudulent re-election of President Ahmadinejad and the growing repression throughout Iran showed extraordinary courage. The police, the Basij militias and the Revolutionary Guards have been given a free hand by the Government and by Ayatollah Ali Khamanei, the Supreme Leader, to crack down on anyone daring to stand up to the new dictatorship. The result has been appalling.

Hundreds of people have been seized on the streets, thrown into prison and subjected to brutal and arbitrary torture. Students, women, even random passers-by have been beaten, had their limbs broken and their nails pulled out. Most disgustingly, protesters, especially the young men, have been repeatedly raped — a cynical and deliberate humiliation that undercuts Iran’s claims to champion public morality and Muslim values.

It was especially brave of the demonstrators to take to the streets yesterday, a major political occasion for the Government when it flaunts its anti-Israeli credentials by commemorating Quds (Jerusalem) Day. Mr Ahmadinejad set the tone with a gratuitously provocative and mendacious denial of the Holocaust, calling it a pretext for the occupation of Arab land and asserting that Israel was created on “false and mythical claims”. His ravings are hardly surprising and are wholly in keeping with previous attempts to provoke the West and curry support among Islamist extremists. The protesters were all the more courageous therefore in undercutting this chicanery by publicly mocking the regime’s support for militants in Gaza and Lebanon and insisting that “our life is for Iran”. They must have known the likely terrible cost of their courage. >>> | Saturday, September 19, 2009

A Less Familiar Side of Iran and Iranians
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Freedom Craving 'Fuelling Iran Unrest'
BBC: The Iranian leadership is falling into the same trap that their arch-enemy the Shah of Iran fell into in the 1970s.

Photo: BBC News
They are not listening to the people.

After a meeting with Shah Reza Pahlavi, the US ambassador William Sullivan complained: "The king will not listen."

Soon afterwards, the king had to leave the country, and Ayatollah Khomeini returned from exile in triumph.

Khomeini's successor as Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, claimed at Friday prayers at Tehran university that "foreign agents" were behind efforts to stage a velvet revolution.

Change

Having spent 10 days in Iran for the 12 June election, that accusation sounds to me like a classic case of blaming the messenger.

There is a velvet rebellion taking place. It is not a revolution yet - but it could evolve into one if the Supreme Leader and his associates do not listen to the people.

I heard with my own ears dozens of peaceful, young Iranians saying they wanted change.

Sixty percent of the population are under 30 years old. They have no memory of the Islamic revolution in 1979. Many of them use the internet and watch satellite TV. Their window on the wider world is irreversibly open.

Many of them simply want peaceful change - and in particular an end to the strict laws that govern personal behaviour in Iran.

They want to be able to sing and dance. They wonder why the Iranian leadership continue to ban such expressions of human joy - a ban very similar to the rules imposed on Afghanistan during the Taliban regime.

And of course Iranians do sing and dance. I have been to several parties where the dancing was intense. And so was the drinking, though alcohol is also illegal.

Prohibition does not work. Many Iranians simply lead double lives.

An article in a magazine - available at Tehran news stands when I was there last year - carried the headline: "We are all hypocrites now."

Many women only cover their heads because they would be arrested if they did not.

Several women I met openly complained about the religious "guidance" police enforcing the female dress code of the chador, or the hijab and "manto" coat.

One young student told me: "I like the hijab. My friend doesn't like it. I should be free to choose to wear it, and she should be free to choose not to."

Another woman said: "The hijab is not really the problem. The real problem is that men and women are human beings - they are the same, and they should have equal freedoms." >>> By Hugh Sykes, BBC News | Sunday, June 21, 2009

Iranians in France Protest Vote in Iran
Protest in France >>> | June 14, 2009

Iran: A Nation of Bloggers

IRAN: A Nation Of Bloggers from ayrakus on Vimeo.