What makes these protests in Iran so different from ones in the past is that the Revolutionary Guard and other police and security forces had previously been able to step in and successfully repress the demonstrators-to the point of deterring such activities from happening in the first place. Not so this time around. According to Mehrdad Mirdamadi, a broadcaster with Radio Farda, “the Iranian people have crossed a threshold of fear and terror. For the last 30 years, these barriers [consisting of executions of reformers in the 1980s and assassinations in the 1990s] kept the people in place.” But now they are out on the streets and there is no going back. One reason for this emboldened attitude is the belief that there is a split among the elites, among the conservative establishment. “If the split widens,” says Mirdamadi, “expect real changes to be seen.” Of equal importance, he says, is the role played by the military and the police, which has been reluctant compared with the plainclothes Basij militia, who are perpetrating most of the killings. “The Revolutionary Guard today” still remembers the revolution of 1979 and thinks, “how can they turn their guns on their own people?” There have even been reports of officers being arrested for not carrying out their orders. If such refusals continue, the Revolutionary Council will have a serious problem on its hands. (Mirdamadi was until a few months ago a journalist and sociologist in Iran. His byline appeared in both the Washington Post and the New York Times. He wishes he were covering the protests directly from Tehran. I told him that while Prague might be boring for him, it is certainly safer. Except for those subway escalators which seem to travel 50 miles per hour.) Editor’s note: The video below is making the rounds and seems to illustrate well the inability of security forces to intimidate the people.
