With great fanfare, Iran’s ruling theocracy held the Revolution anniversary circus. But the chaos among the regime’s supporters, coupled with desperate remarks of the mullahs’ president, Ebrahim Raisi, laid bare Tehran’s weakness and fear of its organized opposition.
February 11 marks the fall of the anti-monarchial dictatorship in 1979. However, it has now become an event where the clerical dictatorship tries to hold state-managed rallies to assert its popularity and legitimacy.
Raisi bragged about economic prosperity, which starkly contrasted the country’s financial calamity with the most important driving factors of the ongoing uprising.
“We have reached many successes, but the enemy cannot tolerate that,” he said. While Iranians continue their anti-regime protests in different ways, Raisi claimed the regime “has overcome the sedition instigated by the enemy.”
Raisi’s litany of lies featured some truths about the advances made by the Iranian opposition, the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK). The president of the world’s most active state sponsor of terrorism complained about the “freedom of activity of a terrorist group.” He also ranted about the U.S. House Resolution 100, which supports a democratic and secular republic in Iran, notably the Ten-point Plan of Mrs. Maryam Rajavi, the President-elect of the MEK’s parent collation, the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI).
The Ten-Point Plan for Iran’s future
I have a dream: An Iran free of execution and torture, where stoning and amputation of limbs would be a thing of the past, where love, friendship and tolerance shall replace mistrust, hatred and vengeance#FreeIran2022https://t.co/T1dieUHt8i pic.twitter.com/pwyNFOjPMd— Maryam Rajavi (@Maryam_Rajavi) July 18, 2022
“The MEK has killed many of our officials. Western governments put the MEK on their list of terrorist organizations, then removed them. Now, surprisingly the U.S Congress pays attention to this organization, which is considered by the entire world as a terrorist organization,” Raisi said on February 11, yearning for the nostalgia of MEK’s terrorist designation, which was the direct result of the West’s appeasement policy.
The U.S. and the European Union’s unwarranted designations were revoked after a lengthy and successful legal battle. By claiming the “whole world considers MEK terrorists,” Raisi only pulls the cover over his own eyes, as the regime is the only state blacklisting the MEK.
The MEK-phobia was not limited to Raisi. Other regime officials acknowledged the organization’s impact and influence on society and its mobilization of the international community against the ruling theocracy.
“They try to imply every day that the Islamic system is inefficient. That if this system falls, could Maryam Rajavi create an efficient government?” Seyed Alireza Ebadi, Khamenei’s representative in Birjand, said during a state-run protest marking the 44th anniversary of the regime’s foundation.
The self-serving comments by Raisi and other officials also featured bogus claims of “victory over rioters,” a hollow claim repeated continuously by them since the beginning of the uprising in September.
Yet, tens of thousands of Iranians called out this lied in their protests across the country, particularly in Sistan and Baluchistan province on Friday, by chanting slogans against the regime’s supreme leader Ali Khamenei and saying, “Death to the oppressor, be it Shah or the [supreme] leader.”
The regime had asked people and mobilized its forces to chant pro-regime slogans from their rooftops on the night of February 11. But instead, people used the opportunity to chant anti-regime slogans, such as “Death to Khamenei,” and repeating the famous slogan against both the Shah and the mullahs’ dictatorships.
Moreover, 10,000 freedom-loving Iranians and MEK supporters rallied in Paris on February 12, echoing their compatriots’ voices and honoring the 1979 revolution, urging the international community to support the current revolution and the Iranian people’s democratic aspirations.
The international community should support the Iranian people’s yearning to establish a democratic, secular, and non-nuclear republic in Iran by recognizing the Iranian people’s right to self-defense and proscribing the regime’s Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) as a terrorist organization.
.@guyverhofstadt: We must impose massive sanctions on those who are responsible for human rights abuses in Iran. We must break the backbone of the Iranian regime, the IRGC. We must cut off funding to this organization and #BlacklistIRGC#IranRevolution2023https://t.co/JLUD9THP15
— NCRI-FAC (@iran_policy) February 12, 2023
Guy Verhofstadt, former Belgian Prime Minister and a Belgian MEP said during Sunday’s event: “As Europeans, we need to do a lot more. We must hold the regime accountable for its crimes. We must impose massive sanctions on those responsible for human rights abuses in Iran. We must break the backbone of the Iranian regime, the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps. We must condemn the ideology and criminal activity of the regime. We must cut off funding to this organization and make sure it is listed as a terrorist entity”.
