USADI Dispatch

A publication of the U.S. Alliance for Democratic Iran


Volume III, No. 15                                                                                                                                         September 26, 2006


USADI Commentary

 

The Confidence of a Brute


During his week-long stay in New York, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad performed exactly as a veteran thug turned president would. And he did a good job of being brutish himself. In that sense, he did not at all disappoint his benefactors back in Iran and in the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corp.

He was offensive, brazen, abrasive and crass in substance and tone. Wearing a repugnant smile, he, not so implicitly, mocked his interlocutors and persistently accused them of being the mouthpiece of administration by asking the questions of the “others”, as if he was being interviewed by a state-run media in Iran.

He lied time after time and responded evasively to many questions dealing with Tehran’s nuclear program, support for Hezbollah, meddling in Iraq and his denial of the Holocaust with a question-like tirade against everyone and everything.

Well, Ahmadinejad had not come to the United States and the UN General Assembly for a charm offensive. That was the task of the smiley demagogue, former president Mohammad Khatami in his UN appearances.

Ahmadinejad had not come to New York to win hearts and soften his adversaries or sow divisions among them by being pleasant. If anything he brought a lot of bi-partisan unity in the United States political circles. The House of Representatives passed resolutions concerning political and human rights abuses in Iran on the same day Ahmadinejad was to speak at the UN. One resolution, recognizing the 100th anniversary, of the Iran’s Constitutional Revolution, expressed the lawmakers’ hope for political change in Iran.

Ahmadinejad had indeed come to intimidate, bully, and shake the international resolve. He had come to embolden the appeasers and advocates of his regime and energize the his constituency in Iran.

Ahmadinejad could have called his trip a complete success if it were not for the large and peaceful rally of Iranian-American supporters of Iran’s major opposition coalition National Council of Resistance and its leader Maryam Rajavi across from the UN building. With chants of “Nuclear Terrorist Ahmadinejad out of UN,” and “Democratic Change for Iran,” they held exhibits on Iran’s appalling human rights condition, as well as street plays enacting scenes of political and public executions in Iran. The Iranian dissidents presented Ahmadinejad with the only real challenge he faced during his entire New York visit.

Meanwhile, much has been said in recent days about Ahmadinejad’s “confidence” in the way he had handled himself during speeches and interviews. And why not; one year of continued appeasement does magic. It emboldens and injects confidence to the appeased. Remember Hitler after Munich agreement with Neville Chamberlain?

But make no mistake. Appeasement is not the root cause of Ahmadinejad’s apparent “confidence”. Talk to any of the former political prisoners who were lucky enough to survive mullahs’ firing squads and torture chambers, and they would tell you that it was the exact same “confidence” and dogged attitude which their interrogators displayed in the dungeons: confidence of a ruthless brute.

Some even have said he seemed like a man with nerves of steel. Well, no less should be expected form a man who spent his younger years in the 1980s in the notorious Evin prison as an interrogator and executioner. He was nicknamed “the Terminator” by co-executioners who saw his “steely” nerves when shooting Coup de Grace at the fallen dissidents in front of firing squads.

Few days before Ahmadinejad’s trip to New York, another political inmate in Iran was murdered in prison by Ahmadinejad’s former colleagues. Valliollah Feyz-Mahdavi, 28, a sympathizer of Iran’s main opposition group People’s Mojahedin was killed after nine days of a hunger strike. Not very long before Feyz-Mahdavi’s murder, another political prisoner Akbar Mohammadi had met the same fate. Ahmad Batebi, a student activist arrested during the 1999 uprising in Tehran, is in danger of losing his life according to Amnesty International.

As Ahmadinejad was talking about injustice and violence in the world during his UN speech, a teenage boy was executed in public in Iran; another five were executed in the same fashion several days later.

Too bad no reporter challenged Ahmadinejad’s talk of “justice” by raising these blatant and very recent cases of injustice committed under his regime in Iran. It might be that everyone was so overwhelmed by the “confidence” spewing out of the mouth of an executioner-turned-president that they forgot to ask. (USADI)
 

USADI Commentary reflects the viewpoints of the US Alliance for Democratic Iran in respect to issues and events which directly or indirectly impact the US policy toward Iran

The US Alliance for Democratic Iran (USADI), is an independent, non-profit organization, which aims to advance a US policy on Iran that will benefit America through supporting Iranian people’s aspirations for a democratic, secular, and peaceful government. The USADI is not affiliated with any government agencies, political groups or parties.
Tel: 202-330-5456, Fax: 202-318-0402, E-mail: dispatch@usadiran.org

Copyright U.S. Alliance for Democratic Iran © 2006 All rights reserved