Broadcast 15 February by Simaye Azadi (Mojahedin-e Khalq)

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Translation

Announcer: In its "Panorama" program the al-Arabiya TV service said; The assassination of Imad Moghniyeh in Damascus after it was rumored that he was living in Iran came as a startling shock. What is clear is that Imad Moghniyeh is gone and with him have gone many secrets that no one knew anything about.

The Kuwaiti journalist Mohammad al-Qahtani said: I believe that like Carlos and Sabri al-Banna (Abu Nidal), someone killed Imad Moghniyeh who had used him, and there are many people who used Imad Moghniyeh, in other words regional parties that we all know. He had a hand in the killing of innocent Kuwaitis. He bombed the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia. He was responsible for many assassinations, the latest of which was the assassination of Sadeq Sharafkandi, the leader of the Kurdish Democratic Party of Iran, at the Mykonos Restaurant in Berlin.

When I say that someone killed him who used him, we know that he was used by various intelligence organizations.

Dr. Ahmad Mosali, professor of political science and Islamic studies at the American University in Beirut, said on al-Arabya: Imad Moghniyeh traveled between Iran, Syria, Lebanon and Iraq. He even went to places other than these. He came from the Khomeini group, and was part of the primary Hezbollah cadre.

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Broadcast 14 February on Iranian domestic TV, rebroadcast 15 February by Simaye Azadi (Mojahedin-e Khalq)

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Broadcast on 14 February on Iran's al-Alam Arabic satellite news service

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Broadcast 19 January on Iranian state satellite TV (IRINN)

[Off-screen announcer]: The people of the Kurdish lands, who were on the front lines during the attack by the Ba'thist enemy, with minimum resources and equipment showed in the fight against an enemy that was armed to the teeth that all the ethnic groups in Iran are more concerned with the national interest than anything else.

During the eight years of imposed war, zealous Iranian Kurds presented tens of thousands of martyrs and wounded pwople to the Islamic revolution and demonstrated their loyalty to the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Commander Karamollah Khalkhali: Our dear Kurdish people who live in the Kurdish areas have supported the revolution since the time of its first victory. When the revolution was first victorious our enemies tried various plots to disrupt our unity, and this region experienced crises. There were people who got orders from outside the country to disrupt order in Kordestan. For this reason they created trouble in Kordestan right from the beginning of the revolution.

Separatists were calling for achieving the rights of the Kurdish people and were saying externally acceptable and ultimately good things but the truth of the matter was that enemies who were terrified by the triumph of the revolution, were trying to undermine cooperation from Iran's ethnic groups including the Arabs in Khuzestan and the [sunni] Muslims in Azerbaijan. However with the alertness of the dear Kurdisn people these plots were thwarted one after another.

However this required that the Kurdish people get more seriously involved with the system. Commanders such as Martyr Borujerdi, Martyr Chamran, Martyr Sayad Shirazi and Martyr Hemmat made much effort in this region. We must note that these dear ones made much effort to create unity throughout the country and especially in the Kurdish regions.

The sworn enemies of the Islamic revolution made a serious effort to separate Kordestan from Iran, but the Kurdish people, with the information made available to them due to the political freedom obtained by the revolution, they were all able to think and make decisions about their own destiny. They Kurdish people decided to participate seriously in the victory of the revolution and in the solidarity of the Islamic homeland.

[Off-screen narrator, field bakery footage]: The sight of commanders baking might be unusual, but it is very beautiful, because performing service is more difficult than anything. One must walk for a day to please God, fight again the next day, and on the third day one must often bake. For me there is no doubt that this bakery is the price of war before God.

Tomorrow the soldiers will be going into operations. As Mehdi has predicted, Iranians have taken up the flag of resistance.

[Researcher Dr. Yadollah Havas, seated in a studio decorated with "bunker" paraphernalia]: A sign of the bravery of the Kurdish Muslims who have supported the Islamic revolution and the Islamic government in this region is the martyrs the Muslim Kurdish people have presented to the revolution. If we go to Sanandaj, to Paveh, to Divandarreh, to Mahavat and to any of the cities in the Kurdish areas and see the graveyards of these martyrs, we will see that as in other parts of the country, the Kurds also have presented many martyrs to the revolution. In Kordestan many of these martyrs died fighting the plots of counterrevolutionary groups.

Of course in the sacred defense and in the fight against the foreign invasion the Muslim Kurdish forces played a great role and some of these forces were martyred fighting the Ba'th Party and the Iraqi army. Overall one can say that in Kordestan the Muslim Kurdish people, the revolutionary people and those who believe in the revolution were fighting on two fronts. One was on the domestic front against the forces of the counterrevolution who were seeking in some way to separate Kordestan from Iran and were paid from abroad, and the second was the fight against the foreign invasion by Iraq's Ba'th Party and the Iraqi army, and they played this role along with Iran's other combatants.

[Off-screen announcer]: There is no doubt that Kurdisn resistance throughout the period of the sacred defense was a golden page in their epic struggle in the history of Iran's Islamic revolution.

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This Iranian government propaganda piece is an element of its internal battle for legitimacy. It is obviously intended as a response to a long history of violent conflict between Iran's central government and the Iranian Kurdish opposition, which has been prominent and particularly intense since the first days of the Islamic revolution in 1979.

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Broadcast 18 January on Iranian state satellite TV (IRINN)

Saeed Jalili, Iran's chief nuclear negotiator, is also chairman of Iran's Supreme National Security Council. He succeeds Ali Ardeshir Larijani, who resigned last October. Jalili is much more in the mold of President Mahmoud Ahmadinezhad as a religious hard-liner. He is the author of a 1996 book in Persian on the Prophet Muhammad's foreign policy, in which he described in detail and with much approval the prophet's political tactics and strategies, and his stated objective of attaining eventual Muslim world domination.

Broadcast from Tehran on 10 January by Iran's Arabic Satellite news service, Al-Alam.

In a New York Post article yesterday, after briefly reviewing the history since Ottoman times of efforts to promote Muslim governments, Amir Taheri describes the differences between the models being offered today by resurgent movements in Turkey and Iran. Read the article here.

Broadcast 23 November on Iranian state satellite TV (IRINN)

[on-screen announcer] In a racist measure, the Zionist regime has implemented the first phase of the project to divide the streets of Jerusalem between Israelis and Palestinians. This measure has cut geographical connections between the north and south of the Gaza Strip and facilitates the Israeli plan to build settlements.

[off-screen announcer] Based on this racist project, the streets of Jerusalem have been divided between the Israelis and the Palestinians and two separate roads are to be allocated, one for the Israelis and one for the Palestinians. These roads are to be separated by a 5-meter wall.

Donnie Zeigman, expert on the Zionist regime's mapping affairs, said this road has been named the Jerusalem Beltway; he said it creates conditions for the creation of a new region in Ma'ali and will cut the geographical connections between the north and south of the Gaza Strip.

According to this mapping expert this project will facilitate connections between existing Israeli settlements in Jerusalem; it will separate Palestinian families from one another and will lead to their transfer to Ramallah and Bethlehem, in such a way that the Palestinians will no longer have a way to go to Jerusalem.

Likewise the Zionist regime's deputy defense minister said concerning this project that the government will complete this road before it connects to the high wall surrounding Jerusalem, and this route will separate the Palestinians and the Israelis by means of a wall.

HAMAS Spokesman Fawzi Barhoum condemned this measure by the Zionist regime. He said: [voice of interpreter] This project is the continuation of the Isreali regime's racist policies to surround Jerusalem and to facilitate continuation of the projects to build settlements, especially in the Israeli settlement of Ma'ali Adomim.

[announcer] These measures are being taken at a time when not much time remains before the Annapolis Conference and the Zionist regime has claimed that it is willing to recognize officially the rights of the Palestinians and concede to their demands that the construction of settlements be stopped, the Palestinians be granted the right of free return and that Israel stop building walls.

On the other hand the last meeting before the Annapolis Conference between Abu Mazen, the President of the Palestinian Authority and Ehud Olmert, the Zionist prime minister, failed and ended without the issuance of a joint statment. In this context America is trying in the framework of this meeting to persuade the Arab nations, and especially the president of the Palestinian Authority, to grant more concessions to the Zionist regime. Yet the existing indications show the emergence of new disagreements among the Arab and Israeli groups invited to this conference.

Saudi Arabia has set as a condition of its attendance an Israeli withdrawal behind its 1967 borders, and the Egyptians have also said that the Annapolis meeting will not get anywhere under current Israeli policies.

[on-screen announcer] In view of the current situation in the Palestinian areas it is clear that the Annapolis Conference will not accomplish anything to solve the Palestine Crisis, because the disagreements over this meeting are quite sharp, and America knows this.

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Broadcast 19 November on Iranian state satellite TV (IRINN)

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad greets a member of an American Christian peace delegation in February

Last night I watched David Brancaccio's PBS "Now" program titled "Talking to Iran," about a visit to Iran in the third week of February by a 13-member American religious delegation. A link to a clip of the program is on this page:

http://www.pbs.org/now/shows/312/index.html

The trip had been organized by a coalition of Quakers and Mennonites. The program's thesis was that this group had gone to Iran in an effort by a non-government group to open dialogue with Iran and diffuse tensions. The "Now" website linked to a statement about the visit issued by the Mennonite Central Committee, which said in part:

"We believe it is possible for further dialogue and that there can be a new day in U.S.-Iranian relations. The Iranian government has already built a bridge toward the American people by inviting our delegation to come to Iran. We ask the U.S. government to welcome a similar delegation of Iranian religious leaders to the United States.

"As additional steps in building bridges between our nations, we call upon both the U.S. and Iranian governments to:

"* immediately engage in direct, face-to-face talks;

"* cease using language that defines the other using "enemy" images; and

"* promote more people-to-people exchanges including religious leaders, members of Parliament/Congress, and civil society.

"As people of faith, we are committed to working toward these and other confidence building measures, which we hope will move our two nations from the precipice of war to a more just and peaceful relationship."

In his 21 March New Year's address to a massive crowd in Mashhad, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei referred over and over to the United States as Iran's enemy, and as an accused party who must defend itself against accusations which he enumerated in detail. Evidently he was not moved by the Mennonite urging that he stop using "enemy" images.

"Talking To Iran" Producer Jamila Paksima

The delegation shown in the PBS video complied obediently with two key Iranian requirements of a Western peace mission:

(1) You must come to us as the apologetic supplicant. It will be more convincing if you actually do apologize for whatever we complain about. We ourselves don't have anything to apologize for of course, certainly not while you're a guest in our country.

(2) Don't bring up the fact that we consider ourselves your theological and moral superiors with a God-given right to govern you in all your worldly and religious affairs. Better yet, don't even think about it or be aware of it. We'll let you in on that later when you are powerless to object. You'll be dhimmis at that point, and we'll tell you exactly what's what at that time. Meanwhile, don't worry, be happy!

At one point the program's Iranian-American producer Jamila Paksima said to American Friends Service Committee Secretary-General Mary Ellen McNish: "Some people would say that your delegation is being hand fed the party line here and you guys are buying it hook, line and sinker."

American Friends Service Committee Secretary-General Mary Ellen McNish

McNish replied: "You can't say we're not asking the hard questions, we are! But we are understanding deeply the pain that the Iranian people have suffered at the hands of the American foreign policy."

I would like to say that the hard questions were not asked of the Iranians, at least not in the footage shown on the PBS presentation. Pain has been felt on both sides. It would be nice if the Quakers could empathize with a few injured Americans too, starting with the hostage crisis and continuing with hundreds of other incidents during last 28 years.

Regarding the nuclear issue, the only response we heard from the Iranian side on this program were the same things they've been feeding the world media for years: We aren't developing a bomb, there is a fatwa that prohibits it and it is against Islam. Was it necessary for 13 people to travel to Iran to hear this said yet another time?

As a climactic touch near the end, the program showed the group meeting with President Ahmadinejad, and in Paksima's narrative we were told that he was asked about his denial of the holocaust. The narrator said the president was annoyed by the question and merely said he wanted to do more research on what really happened. Again, what did they accomplish by flying 13 people to Iran? President Ahmadinejad has already been annoyed and given dismissive responses to this question on a number of other occasions. Why did these nice Christian people want to annoy the poor Iranian president again?

I do think this Christian group bought the party line in Iran, but I do not think Brancaccio's PBS presentation did anything to add critical depth to the experience.

The need for confidence-building and understanding with Iran is also felt by the Arabs of the Middle East, who have a much longer background of close familiarity and experience with Iran than do any American ecumencical groups. They also have a more practiced ability to ask hard questions and make tough stipulations.

The sense of this need for understanding between the Arabs and the Iranians was expressed from the Arab side in the abstract for a 22 March Al-Sharq al-Awsat article in Arabic by Manal Lutfi, available in its entirety only in the newspaper's paper edition, which I have not seen. The abstract merely notes that it is in Iran's interest to establish clear policies.

In a supplementary paragraph to this abstract, Khaled al-Jaser says the Arabs still suspect Iran of wanting to export their Shia revolution, of cultivating militias and running death squads for occasional dispatch to nations such as Iraq, of seeking influence in Arab nations such as Lebanon and of attempting to spread Shiism in Syria, the Sudan and in other parts of the Muslim world; the Arabs also suspect Iran of trying to foment revolt among Shia minorities in Arab countries. Jaser also expresses concern about the unwritten idea in the Khomeinist culture that the Arabs do not have a right to proseletyze Islam; he considers this an anti-Arab notion that the Iranians will have to reconsider if they want to have good relations with the Arabs.

Of course the Iranians haven't answered Al-Sharq al-Awsat either!

Iran has no need to enrich uranium for peaceful purposes. It won't have a power plant that can use it until Russia finishes the Bushehr plant, and that is postponed indefinitely. Amir Taheri lays out the details here. Domestically, this is more a matter of internal legitimacy for Iranians, with serious overtones for international security.

Broadcast 17 March on Iranian state satellite TV (IRINN)

This reminds me of the Pelosi plan. Neither Iran nor the Pelosi Democrats is saying what will happen in Iraq after the US leaves. I don't think the Democrats even have a clear idea, but I can't help thinking the Iranians do.