Iran International
The Iranian regime had some luck on its side as a series of coincidences reduced the likelihood of larger protests on the anniversary of Mahsa Amini last weekend.
The scary Mahsa anniversary coincided with the 4th day of a long weekend many Iranians spent either at the Caspian seaside, or at other scenic places around Iran as the last opportunity for families to have a good time before the schools re-open on September 23.
Some social media users argued that activists and foreign-based opposition figures could have chosen and advertised another date closer to the actual anniversary. Some said that a September 23 event could have created havoc as the entire country usually turns into a big traffic jam.
Furthermore, the anniversary coincided with an embarrassing setback for Iran's national wrestling team during an international championship competition in Bulgaria. The Iranian team, historically one of the world's best since the 1950s, suffered a blow when its captain, Hassan Yazdani, lost to US Champion David Taylor. The outcome was filled with anger and tears within the Iranian team's camp.
Interestingly, in Iran, people celebrated the defeat. It was evident that they had little affection for Yazdani and his coach, both of whom were regime insiders who never supported the 2022 protests. The Islamic Republic undoubtedly appreciated the distraction.
On Monday, a bigger distraction came from Saudi Arabia. Al-Nassr Football Club arrived in Iran for the Asian Football Clubs (AFC) Champions League competitions to face Iran's hugely popular leading football team Persepolis.
Thousands of Iranians were running around to follow the Saudi team and its internationally acclaimed star Cristiano Ronaldo across Tehran and almost occupied his hotel on the slopes of Mount Alborz. The hotel is located on top of a hill and fans climbed rocks to reach the hotel before the bus could drive around the winding road around the hill to make it to the top.
People came as far away as Isfahan. An elderly lady of Isfahan told reporters she travelled the long distance only to be able to judge Ronaldo's character, otherwise she knew very well that he was a good player. Her daughter told reporters what a staunch supporter her mother was.
A young boy was filmed crying outside the hotel because the crowed did not allow him to get as close to Ronaldo as he wished. Later, thanks to Al-Nassr's avid social media team, the boy and his grandfather were taken to Ronaldo's room. The athlete signed the jersey the boy was wearing as well as a new jersey. The boy is now thousands of dollars richer. His grandfather spent millions of rials to get a room for himself and his grandson at the same hotel with the Al-Nassr team.
A video surfaced on social media showing Ronaldo hugging a disabled woman who took the trouble to go and see him. A good publicity stunt, and again another victory for Al-Nassr, and its social media team.
Again, the distraction was a blessing for the Islamic Republic. Many Iranians lived in a parallel world for two days that did not care about insignificant news including the release of US hostages, the freeing of Iran's blocked assets, President Ebrahim Raisi's visit to New York where none of his entourage had an umbrella in the rainy afternoon and they had to borrow one for Raisi while tens of aides walked wet and tired under the afternoon shower.
The worst embarrassment, however, came at the airport, where Persepolis's manager presented two silk carpets to Ronaldo as gifts. The manager was harshly criticized by the press for the event as he has been hiding from the team members for weeks as he was unable to pay them. Later, he explained that the team had not paid for the carpets and that they were a gift from a major carpet seller. But no one in Iran believes such comments by officials.
The match on Tuesday, evening, if anyone is interested, ended two-nil for Saudi Arabia's Al-Nassr. Both goals were scored by Saudi players, not Ronaldo.
He avoided the topic of the 2022 anti-regime protests almost entirely and referred to it only indirectly as the West’s worst media assault in history.
Raisi was speaking only a few days after the first anniversary of the killing of Mahsa Amini, which sparked widespread protests across Iran beginning in September 2022.
More than 500 were killed, 22 thousand arrested and at least 7 executed in the brutal crackdown that followed.
“The previous year was a year of victory for the Iranian people,” Raisi claimed brazenly, spinning last year’s events in Iran in the most spectacular fashion.
Images coming out of Iran last week, told a very different story: thousands of armed security forces and plain-clothes thugs had been stationed all over the capital Tehran, in anticipation of protests on the anniversary, intimidating passersby and preventing any gatherings in the streets.
Raisi also lambasted the United States for ‘breaking a promise’ and leaving the JCPOA. He repeated the claim that Iran’s nuclear program is purely peaceful, despite accumulating well over 100 kilograms of uranium enriched to 60 percent.
"The Iranian nation prides itself on playing, thanks to the Islamic Revolution, the biggest role in unmasking the imperialists in the East and West," Raisi said, while the regime has supplied hundreds of kamikaze drones to Russia and exports more than million barrels of oil to China daily at discounted prices.
"The world is transitioning into a novel international order, and the project to Americanize the world has failed," he claimed.
Despite Iran's 12-year involvement in Syria's civil war and supply of weapons to Houthi forces in Yemen, Raisi said, “Our unambiguous position as the Islamic Republic: We do not stand nor support any war anywhere, not in Europe nor anywhere,”
On Monday, the UN nuclear chief said he had asked to meet Raisi on the sidelines of the General Assembly to try to reverse Iran’s decision to remove monitoring devices set up by IAEA and expel “a very sizable chunk” of the agency’s inspectors.
Rafael Grossi, Director of UN's International Atomic Energy Agency, warned that such measures make it impossible for IAEA to verify the nature of Iran's nuclear program.
Earlier on Tuesday, Iranian Americans opposed to the Islamic Republic held a rally ahead of Raisi’s appearance outside the UN headquarters in New York City.
The protesters had banners and posters portraying the Islamic regime's crimes in its 45-year history – including messages targeting Raisi and his role in those crimes.
Raisi was a member of the infamous Death Committee which oversaw summary execution of at least two thousand Iranian political prisoners in 1988.
The family of retired FBI agent Bob Levinson, who disappeared in Iran in 2007, and the daughter of Jamshid Sharmahd, who is on death row in Iran, issued separate statements after the regime freed five American citizens in exchange for $6 billion and five Iranians detained in the US. The other American resident that was not included in the deal was Shahb Dalili, an Iranian citizen with permanent residence status in the United States who remains imprisoned in Iran.
Dalili, a former captain of Iran Shipping Company and a US resident, was arrested during a trip to Tehran in 2016 for his father's funeral, after which he was apprehended by Iranian security forces. His family held several rounds of sit-ins outside the White House, the latest of which was in August. Darin Dalili, Shahab Dalili's son, has repeatedly pointed out the apparent contradiction with the Robert Levinson Law, which addresses the return of hostages, including US permanent residents. Highlighting a discrepancy between policy and practice, he underlined that despite this law, a green card holder remains imprisoned in Iran without clear resolution or intervention from US authorities.
Levinson, a former FBI agent, was taken prisoner by Iran’s intelligence apparatus while conducting an unauthorized freelance investigation on Kish Island, off Iran’s southern coast. Iranian officials have never explicitly acknowledged detaining Levinson, while US officials believe he was held as a possible bargaining chip.
During an interview with CBS in 2012, former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad did not deny that Levinson was being held and implied there had been talks of a prisoner exchange. His family announced that he was presumed dead in March 2020, on the advice of US officials.
The Levinsons said in their statement, “We will never stop demanding that Iranian leaders answer for what happened to Robert Levinson, the greatest man we have ever known. His abduction on Iranian soil in March 2007, his years of imprisonment with a total lack of any human rights or decency, and ultimately his murder, are on their hands.”
They described the release of the Americans as part of the new deal as “good news,” saying, “Today is a great day because American hostages unjustly held by the government of Iran have been returned to their families... But make no mistake: Today’s good news does not end our family’s nightmare and ongoing pain. Nor does it mask or excuse the shameful cruelty and unending lies of the Iranian regime.”
They also expressed gratitude to the Biden Administration for sanctioning former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence (MOIS) "for their involvement in the constant promotion of lies about Robert Levinson’s whereabouts that still persist to this day.”
Immediately after the release of the hostages – at least three of whom are Iranian-Americans -- President Joe Biden announced fresh sanctions on the hardline former Iranian president and the country’s notorious intelligence ministry over the still undetermined fate of Levinson.
Sharmahd, who holds German and Iranian citizenship and is a US permanent resident, was abducted by Iranian agents in Dubai in 2020, smuggled to Iran, and sentenced to death in February. He was convicted of heading a pro-monarchist group named Tondar accused of a deadly bombing incident that occurred in 2008 at a religious center in Shiraz, killing 14 and injuring 215 more.
Having actively sought US officials' attention through sit-in protests outside the State Department to advocate for her father's case to no avail, Sharmahd's daughter, Gazelle, urged Biden – and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz -- to explain how they are going to ensure her father "will be safe and alive and not murdered."
"The last American patriot left behind in a hostage release in 2015 was Bob Levinson, and we all know that cost him his life,” she stated. “At this point, President Biden and Chancellor Scholz owe our family an explanation of how they will redouble their efforts to make sure this horrific hostage-abandonment deal will not cost my dad his life and get him out of the torture chamber to rejoin our family, and what do they plan to do about this in weeks, not months or years."
Referring to her father’s death sentence, Gazelle said her father “was left behind to die.”