Football Fans Boo Islamic Republic’s Propaganda Song In Stadium
Spectators of a football match in Tehran’s Azadi stadium booed while a choir was performing ‘Hello Commander’, a pop genre religious and ideological propaganda song.
Spectators of a football match in Tehran’s Azadi stadium booed while a choir was performing ‘Hello Commander’, a pop genre religious and ideological propaganda song.
Videos circulating on social media showed people booing a performance of the heavily-promoted song at the stadium before a match of Iran’s premier league on Friday.
The football fans also chanted the name of Voria Ghafouri, a popular former captain of Esteghlal football club who was fired from his team for criticizing the government. Ghafouri’s criticism of government’s regional policies and downplaying the impact of US sanctions on ordinary Iranians, had met with an angry response from Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.
State organizations and the ministry of education have been promoting ‘Hello Commander’ in schools and during numerous cultural and sport events since it was broadcast from state television for the first time this year after Khamenei’s speech for the Iranian New Year on March 20.
‘Hello Commander’ is a song dedicated to Mahdi, the 12th Imam, who Shiite believers say has been in occultation since the 9th century. The song and its promotion are unusual as the its pop genre has no place on Iran’s state media.
Many social media users have seen the song as propaganda for Khamenei as the “hidden Imam’s representative on earth”, and commander-in-chief of Iran’s Armed Forces. Some draw a parallel between him and Hitler by sharing a video of Nazi Youth gatherings with the original audio replaced with ‘Hello Commander’.
Social media users have widely interpreted Rasa News Agency’s attempt to promote the supreme leader's son as an ayatollah as confirmation that he's being groomed for leadership. The Supreme Leader being also the highest religious authority must be at least recognized as an ayatollah by Grand Ayatollahs.
The news agency used the title in an announcement for registration of Mojtaba Khamenei’s theology course, (kharej fiqh), at Qom seminary where he has been studying and teaching for a few years now.
Kharej fiqh is the highest level of Shia seminaries and ayatollah is an honorific title for high-ranking Twelver Shia clergy. Unlike academic titles that one gains automatically after completion of a degree, Shia scholars are usually confirmed as ayatollahs only when their teachers, and peers, address them as such.
The 53-year-old Mojtaba Khamenei, the second eldest of Khamenei’s four sons, has until now only been recognized as a hojjat ol-eslam, a much lower rank in the Shiite clerical hierarchy.
Rasa, established in 2003 andknown as the news agency of Qom seminaries,is in the city of Qom where most Iranian Shiite seminaries are located. Rasa Publishers in Persian, English, Arabic, and Urdu.
The news agency calls itself a private media outlet established by seminary scholars and researchers but some Iranian media affiliated with reformists such as the Jamaran news website have claimed that Rasa is funded and run bythe IRGC and criticized it for “meddling in politics”.
Earlier in August, Mir Hossein Mousavi who has been under house arrest since February 2011, warned the nation over the introduction of hereditary leadership, referring to Khamenei’s son Mojtaba. Mousavi’s warning revived rumors about Mojtaba’s activities and his alleged ambition to succeed his father.
Hardliners have fiercely attacked Mousavi, Iran’s Prime Minister from 1981 to 1989, for implicitly taking a shot at Khamenei.
Rumors about Mojtaba Khamenei’s ambitions have been circulating in Iran since 2005 when he was first accused of rigging the presidential election in a bid to bring like-minded politicians to power.
Mousavi who served as the Islamic Republic's first prime minister from October 1981 to August 1989, under then President Ali Khamenei, was put under house arrest nearly two years after the disputed 2009 presidential elections, when the incumbent Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was announced the winner in suspicious circumstances at Mousavi’s expense.
During the protests that followed, protesters often chanted against Mojtaba Khamenei who they held responsible for meddling with the election result, bringing Ahmadinejad to power and the crackdown on protesters. “Die, Mojtaba, may you never achieve leadership,” they chanted.
During the past years there have also been rumors about Mojtaba’s involvement in financial corruption cases involving the IRGC. The rumors also charged that he supervised the IRGC Intelligence when Hossein Ta’eb, who was recently fired by Khamenei, headed the organization.
Mojtaba Khamenei is an enigmatic figure who holds no public office in the government and is rarely seen in public but reportedly wields much more influence than the leader’s other sons in powerful organizations such as his father’s office and the IRGC Intelligence Organization (SAS).
Mojtaba Khamenei also has great influence in the country’s propaganda machine including the state-broadcaster (IRIB), and behind-the-scenes political dealings.
The article tried to give credit to hardliner President Ebrahim Raisi for making more inroads in Central and South America, particularly drawing attention to the election of a leftist president in Columbia.
IRNA publishes several articles daily to praise the accomplishments of the president who is under fire even by some hardliners for having failed to deliver any of his promises when he got elected last year.
The article about Latin America published on August 25 is no exception, presenting as a victory a trip by one of Raisi’s aides to Columbia in early August to take part in the inauguration of Gustavo Petro, a former anti-American leftist guerrilla fighter. IRNA said that Petro had condemned the targeted killing of Qasem Soleimani in January 2020 on the orders of former US President Donald Trump, saying, “America always empowers the worst in the Middle East.”
The article mainly speaks about Latin America’s economic and diplomatic potential and makes no mention of Iran’s long-running overt and covert operations to build influence and networks in the region, together with its proxy, the Lebanese Hezbollah.
“Experts believe areas of cooperation with Latin American countries can include energy, particularly oil, food production industries, chemical industries, infrastructure, dam construction, electricity generation and hydroelectric power…,” IRNA said, adding a few other options.
Iran already closely cooperates with Venezuela in fossil fuels and security matters.
However, since 2005 when Iran’s attempts to expand its foothold in Latin America gained more momentum, Tehran has made plenty of economic promises to the region’s countries, but few have materialized because the period since has been marked by crippling international and US sanctions on Tehran.
With a possible nuclear deal on the horizon, these sanctions will be lifted, and Iran will get hold of tens of billions of dollars it can spend in Latin America. The IRNA article seems to be oriented toward making investments in countries friendly with the Islamic Republic.
But some countries are a bit careful about Iranian activities. In early June, Argentina grounded a Boeing 747 that Iran provided to Venezuela to launch an air cargo company. The plane was carrying at least five Iranians all with IRGC (Revolutionary Guard) ties.
Gerardo Milman, an Argentine lawmaker, told Iran International on June 23 that Iranians aboard the Venezuelan plane planned “attacks on human targets.” The aircraft itself had belonged to an Iranian airline with ties to the IRGC and had been sanctioned by the United States.
Secret Iranian and Hezbollah networks are involved in illicit activities, allegedly including the drug trade for generating funds.
Iran also converts locals to Shiite Islam and sends some to its seminaries in the religious city of Qom to be trained and indoctrinated.
US Senators Bob Menendez and Marco Rubio were concerned over Iranian activities as far back as in 2012 and held hearings to assess the threat of Tehran launching anti-US operations from its backyard.
Two experts in 2020 offered a grim prospect on Iran’s influence in the region. “Iran has penetrated the governmental structure of many Latin American nations, especially the nations of the already left-leaning Bolivarian Alliance (Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia, Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Nicaragua, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and Grenadines, Saint Kitts, and Nevis), and this is not only unconventional but also very dangerous.”