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Uncentred

The obvious problem Ahmadinejad has, whether or not he was elected president of Iran, is that he stubbornly refuses to govern from the centre. The problem Iran has, whether or not the election was settled with the use of fraud, is that it's polarized to a degree where it looks like two different nations inhabiting the same geographical space.
Now that the Iranian government has managed to put an end to the large scale public demonstrations the battle has turned political and geopolitical, with the opposition struggling to use the new clout to pressure Iran's government into giving concessions in the form of reforms.

Already during the protests the Iranian government announced that it would end stonings and amputations, which are currently just a part of the cruel and unusual punishments sanctioned by Iranian Sharia - others are blinding, whipping and hanging. Iran is also the worst offender in the world when comes to execution of children.

This is sufficient to give a picture of how far from the "blue jeans crowd" some Iranians still are. Even if millions marched for Moussavi and few turned out in public support for the Khamenei backed Ahmadinejad wing, we must assume someone voted for Ahmadinejad and backs his policies.
The uglier face of Iran
Even if a part of Iran gave Iran a modern face, the other face is one of fierce Shia militarism and geopolitical ambition displayed by armament, sabre rattling and support of terrorist proxies.

It is that part of Iran Israel is preparing to strike in a preemptive move against an Iran with hostile intentions and nuclear technology, and it is that half making up enough support for Ahmadinejad to repress the opposition.

The outlook of the right wing in Iran is so fundamentalist that before Moussavi and his backers in the Iranian elite can begin to negotiate reforms, they have to negotiate their own way out of threats of prosecution for treasonous acts.

And among the demands from the opposition are demands to release political prisoners, to stop military involvement in the election process and to stop closing down independent media for not airing state propaganda.
The uglier face of Iran
The brutality of the government clamp-down on the protesters and people showing any kind of sympathy to their course has a political purpose other than stopping the protests: It buys you leverage in negotiations.

When you have to negotiate with your own life at stake, the demands you can expect to have met with regard to long term change are few. Rafsanjani, long expected to swoop to the rescue, made a remarkably timid first statement as he decided to stop on to the stage.

Rafsanjani is a man of commerce and academia, listed by Forbes as one of the wealthiest men in the world and credited for a virtual franchise of universities in Iran known as Azad. The mega university has 1,3 million students enlisted.

In the past days the Iranian government proposed to the Olympic Comittee a special olympics for academia, a move that could be seen as both an attempt to give Iran a media facelift, as well as throw Rafsanjani a bone.
What the right wing wants
In reality the academia of Iran is suffering from major brain drain, one of the worst in the world.

With 150,000 citizens leaving the country every year to avoid unemployment and relentless societal hectoring like police inspecting citizens for proper clothing, most of them naturally belonging to the well educated middle class, Iran is growing collectively dumber under the rule of fundamentalist Iran.

An estimated 25 % of the post second grade Iranians have already escaped the regime to gain employment in other countries, making out the prominent elite of 2-3 million Iranian expatriates around the world.

On top of it, the culture war against Western influences is so fierce the right wing proposes barriers to the number of women getting educated - in a country where more women are taking a second grade education than men.
If you say revolution, we say coup
After the protests have stopped, paradoxically, the statements from Mousavi and namely his backer, Khatami, have grown more confrontative. Khatami openly called the 2009 election a "coup".

It is a widespread belief in Iran that the election result was not only the product of voter fraud but a coup involving Khemenei, leading officers in the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and Khamenei's ambitious son, Mojtaba Khamenei.

The allegations of a "velvet coup", however, came in response to the Iranian government accusing the opposition of trying to instigate a "velvet revolution".

They had been reading about "velvet revolution" in the Western papers, and projecting their own media manipulation they concluded the Western media were controlled by governments trying to overthrow the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Mafia style compromise
Again, we see the pattern of making demands from a position so defensive, your life is at stake while you exercise your democratic right to criticize. Leading lawmakers in line with calls from Basiji have already demanded that Moussavi is prosecuted, accusations ranging from illegal demonstrations and upsetting national security to waging war against God, which is punishable by death.

These threats, as real as they may seem, are also part of the negotiation tactics. It's the government's way of proposing a mafia style compromise:

"We get what we want, and you get to live. Get it?"

It is unlikely Mousavi would face a death sentence, particularly with Rafsanjani's backing. It is not tradition in Iran to let its elite face the harshest of punishments. First of all, it would make everybody in the ruling institutions anxious about their position - if mohareb can be called on one, then who is to say who is the next?

The second reason is Iran's immense fascination with martyrs. Making a political opponent like Moussavi a martyr would surely ignite the ticking bomb of revolution in this revolution prone nation.
Next targets: Women, students
In the end the polarization of Iranian politics will lead to the opposition getting nothing, and incremental onslaughts on the few remaining rights of the freedom seeking Iranians will be made over the years or, perhaps even in months.

First of all, women played a crucial part in the post-election pro-Mousavi landslide and in the following protests. Women with Western looks and emancipated attitudes are a thorn in the eye of fundamentalists, so anti-feminist sentiments will be stronger now the male chauvinists have been publicly humiliated by those outspoken lionesses.

Khamenei said it is time to teach the protesters a lesson, and the lesson will be to follow doctrine. It will be preached from the podium in the universities. A focal point in the protests and the clamp-downs were the universities, and they are also one of the key elements to Rafsanjani's relative immunity from persecution.

Culture war all over the world is similar, and rigging education is a consistent move by governments involved in societal hectoring. A government that has no problems closing down papers and locking up journalists en masse will have no scruples initiating brain washing of the young. Arrested students are already subjected to worse treatment than other prisoners.
If the peaceful movement crumbles, revolution
No amount of persecution, however, can stop what has begun. The liberalization has already gone too far, and every oppressive resolution will be directly reflected on the bottom line of an already troubled Iranian economy. Still, this will not prevent the authorities from trying.

Their actions - even their lies - are founded in belief. They are right, even when they are wrong, simply because they consider any level of Westernization of Iranian society a worse threat to the Islamic Republic of Iran than any other problem. To a fundamentalist chronic stagflation, diplomatic isolation and even military defeat seems like a breeze in comparison with the corruption of the puritan ideals.

The response from the oppressed crowds - the Mousavi supporters, the dissidents and the frustrated and underemployed youth - will be radicalization to match the onslaught. That, or Moussavi is allowed to have his staff returned, independent papers are reopened and rights restored to some degree, to provide an outlet for the frustrations.

Moussavi can then act as an organizer of a completely irrelevant opposition or use the regained channels of communication to carve out the autocratic power. Knowing the Iranian mindset it is unlikely he will succumb to passivity. Instead he will grow still stronger, even if it may possibly be at a slower rate and with a more cautious approach than during the post-election protests.
A tired dictatorship out of rational options
The Iranian government does not have sufficient control of its citizens to be able to afford an Iran without a Moussavi. They need him back in the establishment, and it is the leverage he has. It was the card he pulled, when he proclaimed he was ready to become a martyr.

He also has another card, the declaration made by an increasing number of clerics that the election is illegitimate. This can keep his movement protesting in infinity, bogging down the Iranian government and preventing it from utilizing options, in particular to reaffirm ties with the few allies left.

Ahmadinejad is already condemned by most leaders in the free world, at odds with the Arab world and snubbed by Russia and the African Union. Constantly criticized, subjected to strikes and, possibly, further international sanctions, his next four years will be very uncomfortable.

Ahmadinejad will be hard pressed to provide tangible results, and even Hugo Chavez may soon begin to see him as more of a liability than an asset. All this will increase the malcontent in the Iranian population and swing voters to the pro-Western opposition.

Look out for those dark circles under the eyes and other signs of fatigue.

July 4 2009
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