Iran “censors” its own flag

The green stripe at the top of Iran’s flag has been removed when the flag was displayed at recent official ceremonies. This totalitarian state is now willing to desecrate its national symbol to avoid displaying the color of the green wave revolution.

Ruling in fear is not ruling.

From the link:

Radio Free Europe reports:

[I]n at least two official ceremonies in recent days, images of that flag have been used where the green color has been replaced by blue. The move has led to speculation that the Iranian government is trying to get rid of the green in the Iranian flag because it’s a symbol of the opposition movement that has been challenging the disputed reelection of President Mahmud Ahmadinejad.

Tuesday video — the brutality of Iran’s totalitarian state

No video fun here. This clip was posted at the Daily Dish and graphically illustrates the brutality and sheer immorality of the current Iranian leadership. The state is using law enforcement vehicles to savagely run over Iranian citizens rising against an increasingly totalitarian state.

The Green Revolution continues in Iran

The despotic regime in Iran must be feeling the heat. At every opportunity since the stolen election in June unrest has been breaking out across the nation. Today was an expected protest day, coinciding with a holiday honoring the holiest martyr of Shiite Islam and made even more potent after the death of Grand Ayatollah Ali Hossein Montazeri last week. The one-week day of mourning for Montazeri — a major player in the 1979 revolution and open critic of the recent regime crack-down against the Green Revolution protests — fell on this day adding fuel and emotion to the protest fire.

Here’s a link to the New York Times’ protest coverage, and breaking update’s from the NYT blog, the Lede.

From the second link:

Update | 2:49 p.m. My colleague Nazila Fathi has spoken with a doctor working at Najmieh hospital on  Jomhouri street in central Tehran, close to the site of violent clashes on Sunday. The doctor said that the hospital has have treated more than 60 people who were seriously injured and performed 17 operations on people with gunshot wounds. Three of the patients are in critical condition. The doctor also said that members of the security forces have filled the hospital.

Andrew Sullivan has done as much as any blogger in terms of getting the news of protest in Iran out there from the very beginning this summer. Here’s a very salient point on today’s activities:

This has to be seen now as a crippling blow to the coup regime. This vivid demonstration that they simply cannot command the assent of the Iranian people except by brutal, raw, thuggish violence, and that resistance to the regime is clearly stronger, more impassioned and angrier than ever before is their death knell. They have lost any shred of legitimacy – and the Green Revolution is outlasting them in conviction and energy and might.

The significance of this day, Ashura, the day Khomeini regarded as the turning point against the Shah, cannot be under-estimated. Its symbolic power in Shia Islam, its themes of resistance to tyranny to the last drop of blood, its fusion of religious mourning and political revolt: this makes it lethal to the fascist thugs who dropped any pretense of ruling by even tacit consent last June.

The Green Wave continues

The revolution against Iran’s despotic ruling faction is far from over and there have been a multitude of reports of “Death to the Dictator” shout and defacing and stomping on posters of Khamenei.

From the link:

1902 GMT: Josh Shahryar, having gone through the videos and reports of today’s events, estimates that 25,000 to 30,000 opposition demonstrators were on the streets of Tehran at some point during 13 Aban. An estimated 2000-3000 were marching in Isfahan, but there is not enough information yet to project the numbers in other cities.

Iran pours gas on fire

The heirs of the 1979 revolution currently in leadership positions just don’t get it. By openly falsifying an election — not necessarily the results, but actually turning the entire electoral process into a sham — then cracking down on the not surprising uprising against totalitarianism while issuing clearly false propaganda that “outside forces” were at work during the protests, the ruling mullahs have essentially sealed their own demise.

Iran has long been known as a place of contradictions. Hosting a secular, by middle east standards, population with a hardline Islamic leadership and political face to the rest of the world. The nation existed in something of a state of truce where the people went about their lives and enjoyed the idea of living in an enlightened democratic nation, albeit democratic in a very limited fashion.

The stolen election changed the equation overnight. There has now been almost two months of protests against first the election, and now simply against the increasingly desperate and brutal leadership. Recently graffiti that would have been unthinkable even a month ago — “Death to (supreme leader) Khamenei” — is showing up with some frequency.

How do the floudering tyrants react? Like this. Stupidly.

From the link:

The Iranian authorities opened an extraordinary mass trial against more than 100 reformist figures on Saturday, accusing them of conspiring with foreign powers to stage a revolution through terrorism, subversion and a media campaign to discredit last month’s presidential election.State television broadcast images of the defendants, many of them shackled and clad in prison uniforms, as prosecutors outlined the charges in a large marble-floored courtroom.

The trial, coming just days before President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is to be sworn in for a second term, suggested an intensified government effort to undermine the opposition movement, which maintains that the election was rigged and continues to muster widespread street protests.

Revolution and politics

I can’t shake the feeling that if the events in Iran were occurring under a United States led by the current GOP brand there would be immediate political spin how Republican foreign policy and pressure created the green wave revolution.

It’s a fair guess that the U.S. has almost nothing to do with what’s happening in Iran right now. There’s also a certain amount of evidence Obama’s new year’s address to the Iranian people and his Cairo speech did resonate among the people of Iran, and I’m pleased this administration is taking a very cautious and humble approach to what is playing out right now in the bloody streets of Tehran and other cities.

I also fully expect the Democrats to eventually make political hay out of the green wave if it were to overturn the current despotic Irani regime and look for, and probably get, some foreign policy and security bona fides.

The Irani people have suffered long enough suffering under what I’ve seen characterized (probably correctly) as a “Fascist Islamic Mafia” and deserve our support. They don’t need, and thankfully so far are not getting, our politics.

Live green wave coverage from the Daily Dish

Andrew Sullivan is doing an exhaustive (and exhausting even for me just to attempt to keep up with it all) job of live blogging the green wave in Iran and now today’s crackdown from the despotic ruling regime.

He’s continually adding tweets from inside Iran, embedding video and providing fresh images of the protests and state-issued violence against a democracy seeking population.

Hit the Daily Dish link in my blogroll for his latest posts, and this link goes to “Live-Blogging Day 8.”

From the link:

2.58 pm. good source: Hospital close to the scene in Tehran: 30-40 dead thus far as of 11pm and 200 injured. Police taking names of incoming injured.

Voice from Iran: Shame on a country in which foreign embassies are safer than hospitals 😦

Gunfire Is Hearing From Near Resalat SQ. (East Teharan)

2.47 pm. New footage of fighting in the streets. And another protester is shot.

2.31 pm. Canadians, call your foreign office. It’s confirmed Canadian Embassy rejects injured protesters

Australian Embassy reportedly accepting injured

My Friend Wounded At Haft Hooz SQ, No Clinic Is Open!

Iran-I-am, a green wave comic

This is a great comic from the Atlanic Online’s Sage Stossel:

Iran-I-am by Sage Stossel

(Hat tip: the Daily Dish)

 

Technology and the Green Revolution

Technology is playing a huge role in the fight against the coup in Iran. Twitter has especially been a great boon to the Iranians fighting against a corrupt leadership. This is a story that is still very much playing out with no potential end result showing itself with clarity. One thing is certain — Iran 2009 will go down as the first true information age revolution in terms of technology driving getting information to both internal protesters and the outside world.

Here’s a breakdown from CIO.com on some of the relevant tech. Mentioned include Twitter, Facebook, proxies, DDOS, YouTube and Flickr.

From the link:

As political tensions increase in Iran, online communities are ramping up their opposition efforts. The Iranian government continues to restrict access to the Web, but many opposition supporters are still able to share news and information online. In response to the publicity around opposition protests, Iran has reportedly begun the process of restricting the movements of foreign journalists. But when any Iranian citizen carrying a cell phone or camera can become an instant journalist, how important is Iran’s crackdown on foreign media?