Donya Jam, an entering senior in political science at Shenandoah University was born and raised in the greater Washington, D.C. area. Her parents had fled their native Iran years earlier after becoming targets of the clerical regime for their active opposition to the repressive theocracy being established by Ayatollah Khomeini.
Despite the fact that her family can never safely return to Iran for as long as that regime remains in power, Ms. Jam feels a strong connection to her parents’ homeland. To that end, the young woman has campaigned tirelessly for as long as she can remember in favor of the fundamental transformation of the regime in Tehran.
Her parents have remained politically active since coming to the U.S., and Jam says that she has drawn tremendous inspiration from them. Traveling sometimes with her parents and sometimes with other members of the local activist community, Jam has attended rallies and conferences on the topic of freedom for the people of Iran, which have been held as close to home as the US capital and as far away as Germany and France.
Accompanied by her father, Jam will retrace a trip that they have both taken on a number of previous occasions when they visit Paris on June 13 for the “grand gathering” of the Iranians supporting the National Council of Resistance of Iran(NCRI).
The NCRI is comprised of several Iranian opposition groups, chief among them the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK). Supporting the movement made Jam’s parents targets of the regime’s most vigorous political repression in the immediate aftermath of the Iranian Revolution.
The PMOI and its partner organizations have developed significant partnerships in Western policy circles over the years. And this fact is on display at each year’ grand gathering, when dignitaries from the United States, Canada, and various European countries address a crowds of tens of thousands of supporters of the Iranian resistance. Attendance at the June 2014 event exceeded tens of thousands.
For a political science major like Donya Jam, this sort of event is not only the affirmation of the closely held ideas of her and her family; it is also an opportunity for hands-on learning as she listens to foreign policy speeches by influential political figures, capped off at the end of the evening with a keynote speech by NCRI President Maryam Rajavi.
As a member of the younger generation of Iranian expatriate activists, Jam has both the access and the know-how to use the internet and other technological resources for even more extensive participation and information-sharing than her parents and their fellow activists. Having found it difficult to make the trip at the time of last year’s grand gathering, Jam instead watched the event broadcast on Simay-e Azadi satellite television network – a resources also accessed illegally by thousands of Iranian citizens to watch the event from inside the country.
Jam credits the visibility of this and other NCRI events with improving the prospects for Western support of the Iranian Resistance and the accomplishment of her movement’s goals. “Every year it gets more important… more tense,” she says. “We’re getting closer to what we want to achieve with this regime change.”
Given both her developing knowledge of political science and her long-term commitment to the movement, Jam is sometimes engaged by the movement’s supporters in Washington D.C. in a variety of capacities, but especially in online outreach. And her personal communications and presence on social media help to spread the same message, which rejects the key components of current Western strategies with respect to Iran.
Referring to some apparent effort to promote change from within the Iranian regime Jam states emphatically, “Moderation is not an option.”
“Every day in Iran there are executions, public executions, lashings; many arrests are made daily,” she explains. “The only way I see we can put an end to this is through regime change.”
Jam is hopeful that her presence at the June 13 grand gathering will help to continue the progress that she has already observed. Having been motivated by her lifelong activism to study political science, she hopes to bring that to bear on the advancement of the same cause after continuing her studies and securing a professorship.
“It would be cool if I could teach more people about Iran,” she says, “about our history, about some of the great leaders that we have had.” With deliberate finality, she adds that she hopes her activism will play a part in bringing Iran it’s next great leader, and one who stands for freedom, democracy, and her people’s rightful place in the modern world. “In a free and democratic Iran, my vote would go to Mrs. Maryam Rajavi.”
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