Iran ousts cleric for leniency on reformists

[JanDutchy]

Source: Haaretz



Former Iranian president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani lost his position on Tuesday as head of an important state clerical body after hardliners criticized him for being too close to the reformist opposition.

The defeat for one of the great survivors of Iranian politics since the 1979 Islamic revolution highlighted how opponents to hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad are being isolated and sidelined.

IRNA

Ayatollah Kani elected as head of Experts Assembly
Tehran, March 8, IRNA – Ayatollah Mohammad-Reza Mahdavi-Kani was elected Tuesday as the chairman of the Assembly of Experts.


Winning most of the votes of the 86-member assembly, the ayatollah would chair the outstanding body for the next two years.

The 9th meeting of the fourth round of the Assembly of Experts opened here on Tuesday.

The meetings of the Expert Assembly are held every six months and its chairmanship elections take place biennially.

Foreign Minister Ali-Akbar Salehi and Secretary of the Supreme National Security Council Saeed Jalili were the special guests of the meeting

http://www.irna.ir/ENNewsShow.aspx?NID=30286336



Read more: http://www.haaretz.com/news/international/iran-ousts-cleric-for-leniency-on-reformists-1.347882

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[economic_liberal]

1. This was predicted in 2009

A former diplomat from India named M K Bhadrakumar explained this in an article published June 16, 2009 and it also supports the argument that there was no fraud in the 2009 election:

Rafsanjani's gambit backfires

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/KF16Ak05.html

This was a very interesting article because it explained some of the infighting and drama that goes on in Iranian politics. As Bhadrakumar explained:

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei won a resounding victory. The grey cardinal of Iranian politics Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani has been dealt a crushing defeat. Is the curtain finally ringing down on the tumultuous career of the "Shark", a nickname Rafsanjani acquired in the vicious well of the Iranian Majlis (parliament) where he used to swim dangerously as a political predator in the early years of the Iranian Revolution as the speaker? By the huge margin (64%) with which President Mahmud Ahmedinejad won, it is tempting to say that like the great white sperm whale of immense, premeditated ferocity and stamina in Herman Melville's epic novel Moby Dick, Rafsanjani is going down, deeply wounded by the harpoon, into the cold oblivion of the sea of Iranian politics. But you can never quite tell.
...
Rafsanjani's plot was to somehow extend the election to the run-off stage, where Mousavi was expected to garner the "anti-Ahmedinejad" votes...The regime was already well into the election campaign when it realized that behind the clamor for a change of leadership in the presidency, Rafsanjani's challenge was in actuality aimed at Khamenei's leadership and that the election was a proxy war. The roots of the Rafsanjani-Khamenei rift go back to the late 1980s when Khamenei assumed the leadership in 1989.

The way I see it, this recent news about Rafsanjani losing his position either confirms Bhadrakumar's analysis or at least lends some support to it.

[StevieM]

2. Welcome to DU!!! (eom)

[economic_liberal]

5. thank you

I've visited the site before but haven't gotten hooked enough to post yet. Recently I've been looking for good alternative news sites and this one seems like a good one. There's a lot of activity here.

[StevieM]

3. And farewell to Akbar Shah! (eom)

[economic_liberal]

4. more signs this would happen

from Dec 14, 2009:
Hardliners Step Up Attacks Against Iranian Opposition
http://www.payvand.com/news/09/dec/1149.html

The harshest attack against the reformists was issued today from the Supreme Leader's representative with the Revolutionary Guards, Mojtaba Zolnori...He accused various senior reform figures of insulting Ayatollah Khomeini the leader of the 1979 Revolution and of smuggling people out of the country. He also accused Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani, Chairman of the Expediency Council of playing into the hands of "global oppressors" and "sending his law-breaking son out of the country." He also remarked that they are prepared to confront the opposition leaders as soon as the Supreme Leader gives the go ahead.

There are also other links included in this article talking about the targeting of Rafsanjani. A posting on the NIAC blog also links to this article and mentions that:
"These players want Rafsanjani expelled as Chairman of the Expediency Council."

To understand how significant the fall of Rafsanjani is, Bhadrakumar (link in previous post) describes the Rafsanjani power structure:

For those who do not know Iran better, suffice to say that the Rafsanjani family clan owns vast financial empires in Iran, including foreign trade, vast landholdings and the largest network of private universities in Iran. Known as Azad there are 300 branches spread over the country, they are not only money-spinners but could also press into Mousavi's election campaign an active cadre of student activists numbering some 3 million. The Azad campuses and auditoria provided the rallying point for Mousavi's campaign in the provinces. The attempt was to see that the campaign reached the rural poor in their multitudes who formed the bulk of voters and constituted Ahmadinejad's political base. Rafsanjani's political style is to build up extensive networking in virtually all the top echelons of the power structure, especially bodies such as the Guardian Council, Expediency Council, the Qom clergy, Majlis, judiciary, bureaucracy, Tehran bazaar and even elements within the circles close to Khamenei. He called into play these pockets of influence.

Then Bhadrakumar explains, quite coldly, how brutal the fall of Rafsanjani was:

Simultaneously, Rafsanjani also rallied his base in the clerical establishment. A clique of 14 senior clerics in Qom joined issue on his side. It was all an act of desperation by vested interests who have become desperate about the awesome rise of the IRGC in recent years. But, if Rafsanjani's calculation was that the "mutiny" within the clerical establishment would unnerve Khamenei, he misread the calculus of power in Tehran. Khamenei did the worst thing possible to Rafsanjani. He simply ignored the "Shark".

And then there were other signs that the "Green Movement" was defeated. In early 2010, there were supposed to be large protests in support of the Green Movement but Ahmadinejad supporters outnumbered the protesters by a very large margin. From a posting on the NIAC blog on Feb 11, 2010 (http://niacinsight.com/2010/02/11/bearing-witness-22-bahman/):

“There were 300 of us, maximum 500. Against 10,000 people,” one protester said. “It means they won and we lost. They defeated us. They were able to gather so many people.

It looks like it could be a long time before there are any real reforms in Iran, especially when so many Iranians suspect the reformers as being agents of the United States.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

6. on the other hand, it could mean something quite

different.

Adding pressure and removing leaders like him will stoke even more anger against the current regime. Watch for subtle, but important work slowdowns and stoppages, look for sand being put in the gears of government, and other not quite illegal actions to become the norm, not the exception.

The Soviet Union underwent times like that, in protest against their little afghani excursion. It brought down the country (far more than Reagan's Star Wars). The same will happen to Iran.