Sunni Cleric Debunks Regime’s Narrative Of ‘Bloody Friday’
The outspoken Sunni Imam of Zahedan, Mowlavi Abdolhamid, has reiterated that the Islamic Republic authorities are the main culprits behind the a massacre in his city.
The outspoken Sunni Imam of Zahedan, Mowlavi Abdolhamid, has reiterated that the Islamic Republic authorities are the main culprits behind the a massacre in his city.
The crackdown on protesters in Zahedan, the provincial capital of Sistan-Baluchestan, known as the Bloody Friday, took place September 30, when security forces killed more than 80 people, including women and children.
During a meeting with the directors of Sunni religious schools of the province’s Coordination Council on Wednesday, December 21, Abdolhamid, the top religious leader of Iran's largely Sunni Baluch population living in the province, rejected the narrative of the regime about the tragic incident, saying that the Bloody Friday cannot be reduced to some errors by the security forces.
Underlining that the killing in Zahedan was “a premeditated plot,” he repeated his demands for the prosecution of the perpetrators of this massacre.
He also rejected statements by officials, including a delegation sent by Iran’s ruler Ali Khamenei in November, about protesters attacking a police station before security forces opened fire at them. He emphasized that security forces fired live ammunition at peaceful protesters in Zahedan, insisting that the attack was unprovoked.
"We have evidence that... the police station was not attacked at all and not even a single person went towards the police station. After people were shot at from the police station, some of them moved towards the police station, and pelted stones at the station,” he highlighted.
The claim that the police station was attacked by an armed gang is not true at all, he said, adding that not even one military officer was killed in the incident.
Abdolhamid said that the whole tragedy was a plot by the regime, noting that discrimination against Sunnis and Sunni mosques had already started in several cities before September 30. He added that “the governor of Mashhad had announced that he would not allow any Sunni prayer house to operate in his city. In Tehran, they said either bring a permit or we will close the prayer hall."
The Sunni cleric went on to explain that the main cause of such as incident is the "discrimination against Sunnis" in Iran, saying, "When the government discriminates against Sunnis and they are barred from holding any important positions in the armed forces and the judicial system, it is clear that officers beat our people mercilessly."
Officially known as Sheikh Abdolhamdid Esmailzehi, the Sunni cleric is widely popular because for his willingness to challenge Khamenei’s absolute authority. An audio file recently leaked by the hacktivist group Black Reward revealed that the Islamic Republic planned to tarnish Abdolhamid’s reputation to curb his influence. In November, the outspoken Sunni Imam said women, ethnic and religious groups, and minorities have faced discrimination after the establishment of the Islamic Republic in 1979. He has also called for an internationally monitored referendum in Iran saying by killing and suppression the government cannot push back a nation.
In their open letter released on Wednesday, they addressed US President Joe Biden, European Council President Charles Michel, UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, and Canadian Premier Justin Trudeau as well as UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk urging a firm position on the Islamic regime to stop execution of protesters.
The signatories called on world leaders to step up pressure on the Islamic Republic to halt the execution of anti-government protesters, by imposing sanctions on its officials for human rights abuses, expelling Iranian ambassadors and blacklisting the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
The letter was sent to the leaders of Canada, the EU, UK, and US after the authorities in Iran last week executed two young men, one of them in public, for taking part in the ongoing popular protests – ignited by the death in custody of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini -- and threatened to hang more people as a measure to intimidate protesters against holding further rallies and strikes.
The signatories include a former President of the UN Human Rights Council, three former UN Assistant Secretaries-General, 17 former UN human rights Special Rapporteurs, 15 Nobel laureates, and many other distinguished human rights figures. International judges who signed the appeal include a former President of the International Criminal Court (ICC), a former President of the Court of First Instance of the European Communities, and five former Judges of the EU General Court. Some 34 NGOs and university institutions were also among the signatories.
Expressing their concerns over the regime’s decades-long record of executions, they also mentioned the mass executions of political prisoners, mostly members the exiled opposition group MEK (People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran), who “were extra-legally executed or forcibly disappeared during the 1988 massacre.”
Denouncing “decades of apparent silence and inaction by the international community” that have helped “fuel a culture of impunity in Iran,” the signatories said, “Since the 1980s, the authorities in Iran have extra-judicially executed tens of thousands of dissident protesters and political prisoners, some as young as thirteen.”
The scholars called on the world’s leading democratic nations to act urgently to prevent the Iranian authorities in their attempts to quell the ongoing protests through the use of the death penalty in contravention of international law now while brave young Iranians continue their defiant protests to end decades of tyranny.
Urging the international community to hold the leadership of the Islamic Republic to account for committing crimes against humanity and the killing of children and public hanging of protesters, they called for using all internationally available means to bring the regime’s authorities to justice.
They also asked for more targeted economic sanctions that would help cut off funds to the state’s machinery of repression, and in particular blacklist the IRGC and its affiliated entities that are leading the crackdown. They finally demanded that world countries downgrade diplomatic ties with the Islamic Republic, including by withdrawing your ambassadors and likewise expelling the representatives of what is in fact a murderous government.”
Earlier in the day, Human Rights Watch confirmed that the Islamic Republic security forces used excessive and unlawful lethal force against protesters in Kordestan’s provincial capital, Sanandaj, in October and November 2022
“The Iranian authorities have unleashed alarming violence against protesters in Sanandaj since September,” said Tara Sepehri Far, senior Iran researcher at Human Rights Watch, adding, “Both the protests and the government’s brutal response to them reflect the government’s longtime repression of the Kurdish people’s cultural and political freedoms.”
Iranian sociologist Taghi Azad Armaki told Etemad Online on December 18 that Iranians want the Islamic Republic to change its views and rhetoric. At the same time, the regime's official project is all about its survival.
Armaki added that regime insiders' exit strategy from the current crisis is merely eliminating all of its critics and those who protest against its performance. They call the critics "traitors" and label protesters as "rioters".
The political system is too old and outdated, the sociologist argued. It is clear that a new society has emerged which is pluralist, has many different demands and criticizes the outdated system. But the Islamic Republic wishes to change this new society and force it to become compatible with the old system. This is what has created the current political crisis.
Armaki believes that the new society does not accept this and naturally, the government's policy is likely to lead to an impasse. "The new generation of Iranians wants a civil society, civil rights, government accountability, as well as economic progress and welfare, but all government policies are only meant to ensure its survival.
Meanwhile, former Roads Minister Ahmad Khorram, a reformist figure, believes that the current crisis is the outcome of concentrating all political and economic powers in the hands of one political faction (hardliners). Khorram told Rouydad24 that concentration of power leads to misery and Iranians do not deserve all the problems they are facing.
Khorram added that even officials have said that the public's trust in the government has been declining. This, he said, plunges the society into despair and will lead to violence, which is certainly not a cure for the Iranian society's problems.
Based on some research, trust in the government has dropped from 98 percent to around 20 percent since the inception of the Islamic Republic, he said. This is mainly because the government is against civil society and civil institutions such as NGOs, political parties and so on.
In another development, the former chief of the Iranian parliament's national security and foreign policy committee Heshmatollah Falahatpisheh in an interview criticized the government for trying to solve its problems with protesters unilaterally, in an extremist way and by shedding blood. He added that some of the individuals who pour gasoline on the fire of protests are the members of the extremist group Hojjatiyeh. He reiterated that this group's policies can never solve the country's problems. They easily talk about execution and promote it as a remedy for Iran's current problems. He was probably referring to individuals such as hardliner lawmaker Mostafa Mirsalim who has said detained protesters should be executed within five to ten days.
Falahatpisheh said the members of the extremist group have crept into the government. The group has always been a hardliner proponent of compulsory hijab and confiscation of assets belonging to religious minorities such as the Baha’is since the 1970s. Falahatpisheh said that opposition to blue jeans is part of the group's teachings. He explained that after the 1979 revolution, the Islamic government has been trying to isolate this group but currently they have become powerful again.
Falahatpisheh added that this group has been taking the lead in nearly all the attacks on foreign embassies in Iran.
A current member of parliament’s national security and foreign policy, Jalil Rahimabadi has also criticized the government for not listening to the people. He reiterated that no political system will be weakened by accepting people's demands. Rahimabadi pointed out that some elements in the government wrongly believe that if they accept some of the demands of the protesters, this will lead to further unrest. "I think it is wrong to believe that listening to protesters means a retreat on the part of the government."