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The Arbaeen ceremony, marking the end of the 40-day mourning period following Ashura—the religious ritual commemorating the third Shia Imam, Hussain ibn Ali, grandson of Prophet Muhammad, who was killed in 680 AD—is one of the world's largest annual gatherings. Iranian officials say that around four million people travel to Iraq for the event.
Criticism was sparked by the announcement that the newly appointed Vice-President Mohammadreza Aref had ordered 4 trillion rials (around $650,000) to support the event which culminates with ceremonies in the Iraqi cities of Karbala and Najaf on August 25 this year.
The money will be spent to "prevent unforeseen incidents, contagious diseases, and heat strokes at border points and along the pilgrimage path.”
“Why? Arbaeen was not this government’s promised concern. Leave Arbaeen to the people,” Mohammad-Taghi Fazel-Meybodi, a reformist cleric, posted on X, arguing that the “justice” promised by Pezeshkian and his government would be allocating the budget for the education of children in Sistan and Baluchestan province where many children are deprived of an education.
In a tweet Sunday, Iranian journalist Fateme Karimkhan contended that the negative reactions to the expenditure were unfounded. “More than four million Iranians will participate in the Arbaeen Walk and the government would have been responsible to make plans for their protection even if they were to take a domestic route,” she argued.
Most Iranian pilgrims travel to the border, where free parking facilities are provided, and take the walk to the cities of Najaf and Karbala from there while some others fly directly to these cities.
The Islamic Republic has made extensive plans and allocated huge sums in the past decade to encourage and fund the annual event as a show of Shia political power and influence.
Hossein Tayebifar, Acting Representative of Supreme Ali Khamenei in the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC), said on July 28 that the event was “the biggest deterrent operation in the world against the conspiracies of the enemies of Islam.” Some officials and clerics say the Arbaeen gathering is one of the manifestations of the Shia “soft power’.
The cost to the public includes massive budgets for infrastructure works such as building and maintenance of roads and service stations as well as provision food, water and field and mobile hospitals along the main routes and in Iraq, and mobilization of the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC), the regular army and other bodies to provide the security of the event, and state propaganda.
The government also allocates Iraqi currency at cheaper rates and no-interest loans to pilgrims to encourage more people to participate. As in the past few years, the government will sell 200,000 Iraqi dinars (around $120 at open market rates) to pilgrims at the discounted rate of 370 rials to the dinar against 450 rials in the open market.
Many government organizations, municipalities, and city councils separately allocate special budgets for the event. The City Council of Mashhad, for instance, approved a budget of 150 billion rials ($5 million) for services in the Iraqi holy city of Najaf in 2023 and dispatched over 500 city cleaners and 350 bus drivers there.
Other perks include ‘pilgrimage leave’ for civil servants and free internet and roaming mobile services during the event.
If four million or more participate in the event as predicted, the discount in foreign currency rates and the loans could cost the government hundreds of millions of dollars or more depending on the number of participants.
It was also revealed last week that the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs had ordered various government agencies as well as the government retirement fund to contribute to the costs of holding the procession.
“I declare it here that I’m not happy with using the assets of the retirement fund, even as much of as one rial, for anything other than what the funds were established for,” a retired teacher posted on X. Others have pointed out that those who benefit from the perks of Arbaeen should be mindful that any money taken from the fund without their consent will be ‘haram’ - or religiously forbidden.
President Pezeshkian has also ordered all government bodies involved in the matter to abide by their commitments but has also suggested that his government wants to minimize its own role in holding the event.
“We can increase people’s participation [in supporting the event] and the government will withdraw as much as possible ... Where people cannot help, the government should assist and support them. There is no reason for the government to get involved and create more problems where people can help,” he said Saturday at a meeting of the ‘Arbaeen Taskforce’ formed a few years ago of which the vice president and several ministers are members.
While many Iranian officials and politicians call for a strong retaliation against Israel for Haniyeh’s brazen killing by an explosive projectile while he was sleeping, a few insiders insist that the priority should be to understand how such an operation was possible.
One of these voices is an influential commentator and former senior lawmaker Heshmatollah Falahatpisheh who spoke to Etemad newspaper.
"The most important scenario to consider regarding the assassination of Haniyeh is the scenario of infiltration. This issue needs to be carefully analyzed and evaluated. I hope that the scenarios being presented by some experts on state television and in certain radical media outlets are not being used as an excuse to avoid accountability," Falahatpisheh said.
He is one of a dozen or so commentators allowed to often speak out on government-controlled media about sensitive issues. He often voices opinions critical of some government policies, including its foreign policy.
Iranian security and intelligence officials remained largely silent in the first three days after the assassination about the exact circumstances and what kind of weapon was used. This led to plenty of speculation both in the Iranian and foreign media. The New York Times went as far as claiming that a bomb placed in the guesthouse two month earlier killed Haniyeh, not any projectile fired from the air or the ground.
Finally, on Saturday, the Revolutionary Guard issued a statement rejecting this scenario and announcing that Haniyeh was killed by a small and short range projectile fired from the vicinity of the compound.
However, criticism of security and intelligence agencies continue. Javad Emam, a politician from the Reform Front in a tweet asked President Pezeshkian to act. "The assassination and martyrdom of Ismail Haniyeh on Iranian soil was a warning about the incompetence and inefficiency of certain parts of the country's intelligence and security apparatus."
Emam urged Pezeshkian to make personnel and other changes.
"First, take action to reorganize the intelligence and security forces, and if necessary, reselect them.
Second, where possible, and not in a rushed manner, work towards merging parallel intelligence agencies to prevent further costs to the country due to lack of coordination and the actions of inexperienced personnel.
Third, by establishing truth-finding committees and punishing those at fault, and following the example of several important national cases, work to restore a sense of security in society,” he argued.
Falahatpisheh, in turn, mocked statements by officials who periodically claim they have demolished enemy networks within the country. One such statement by the intelligence minister was made just days before the Haniyeh incident.
"A while ago, one of the officials openly stated that they had uncovered and neutralized all areas of Zionist infiltration in the country. However, incidents like the assassination of Martyr Haniyeh show that there are still specific security vulnerabilities that need to be addressed urgently. Addressing these gaps and deficiencies should be one of the key priorities for the new administration," the former lawmaker stated.
Despite these calls for a serious investigation and holding security officials responsible for the failure to protect a high-level foreign guest, so far there is no sign of action. What occupies most headlines in Iran is the issue of a retaliatory attack against Israel.
