Forbidden Donut

Nunes

Link

QUOTE

Many Iranians came out on to their roofs to shout "down with the dictator".

It has become a challenge not just of an election result, not just to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, but to the supreme leader, Ayatollah Khamenei himself.

That means it is, in effect, a challenge to the whole basis of the Islamic Republic.

For two years I have watched as young, ambitious Iranians go about their lives with growing frustration.

They feel the system stifles their aspirations. Now they feel that their intelligence and their pride has been insulted by an election result many Iranians believe is blatantly fraudulent.

And President Ahmadinejad's almost casual dismissal of their complaints just adds to the anger.

Nunes

Moar, because Moar!

QUOTE

The BBC's Jon Leyne, in Tehran, says he understands plain-clothed militias have been authorised to use live ammunition for the first time.

Nunes

This is so awesome it's ridiculous. The main vehicle for revolution in Iran is twitter, and the international internet support of that effort is totally sweet.

Fark has had 12 threads, each topping out at a minimum 1400 posts about Iran this week, and a lot of it is useful. Tatsuma is the resident Israeli and though his opinions are all over the place, his information is usually reliable and his awareness of the sociopolitical situations in the ME is solid. He has put together a crapload of information from thread FAQ's and research.

Prepare for the copy-pasta:

QUOTE

Tatsuma
important: The Iranian government is looking for dissident twitterers, so if you have an account, change your location and timezone to tehran!

This seems to be helping quite a few people, so I'll go ahead and repost it in every threads with some adjustments. Sorry, this has reached the level of TL;DR but I really am trying to cram the most relevant information and speculation only. Everything is updated as events unfold, especially the timeline and what will happen in the future.

Suppression of Dissent - The Players

Currently, there are either two or three groups who are suppressing the students on the ground that you'll read about throughout this thread:

1. The Basij
2. Ansar Hizbullah (which I will refer to as Ansar)
3. Lebanese Hizbullah (Unconfirmed but highly probable. Der Spiegel, based on a Voice of America report, says that 5,000 Hizbullah fighters are currently in Iran masquerading as riot police, confirming the independent reports. Many different independent reports and video point that way. Even in the last hours other independent twitter feeds have declared witnessing thugs beating on people while shouting in Arabic; I will refer to them as Hizbullah)

- The Basij are your regular paramilitary organization. They are the armed hand of the clerics. The Basij are a legal group, officially a student union, and are legally under direct orders of the Revolutionary Guard. Their main raison d'être is to quell dissent. They are the ones who go and crack skulls, force people to participate in pro-regime demonstrations, and generally try to stop any demonstrations from even starting. They are located throughout the country, in every mosque, every university, every social club you can think of. They function in a way very similar to the brownshirts.

They were the ones who first started the crackdown after the election, but it wasn't enough. While they are violent and repressive, they are still Persian and attacking fellow citizens. A beating is one thing, mass killings another.

- Another group was working with them, whose members are even more extreme, is Ansar. There is a lot of cross-membership between the Basij and Ansar, though not all are members of the other group and vice-versa. The vast majority of Ansar are Persians (either Basij or ex-military), though a lot of Arab recruits come from Lebanon and train with them under supervision of the Revolutionary Guard. They are not functioning under a legal umbrella, they are considered a vigilante group, but they pledge loyalty directly to the Supreme Leader and most people believe that they are under his control. They are currently helping the Basij to control the riots, but due to the fact that they are Persians and in lower numbers than the Basij, they are not that active.

- The Lebanese Hizbullah is a direct offshoot (and under direct control) of the Iranian Hizbullah (itself under direct control of the Supreme Leader) and cooperates closely with Ansar though Ansar occupies itself only with Iran's domestic policies, while Hizbullah occupies itself only with Iran's foreign policy unless there is a crisis like right now. However, Hizbullah has been called to stop violent riots in Iran in the past.

(the following paragraph includes some speculation based on reports from ground zero) Hizbullah flew in a lot of their members in Iran, most likely a good deal even before the elections in case there were trouble. They are the ones who speak Arabs and are unleashing the biggest level of violence on the Persians so far. Another wave arrived recently and there is chatter that yet another wave of Hizbullah reinforcements are coming in from Lebanon as we speak. According to Iranians on the ground, they are the ones riding motorcycles, beating men women and children indiscriminately and firing live ammunitions at students.

What will happen

Unless the army decides to intervene in the favor of the Council and to stop the early beginnings of the new Revolution, Ansar & Hizbullah members will be the ones doing the brunt of the killing and repression with Basij as a support while also protecting government buildings and try to do crowd control. The police seems to have for the most part disbanded in centers like Tehran according to all reports, including international media. If the police decides to come back, they will focus less on protection and crowd control, so the Basij will start to crack more skulls).

Currently, this is what is happening.

Timeline in separate post. will be kept updated there.

Demands from the protesters

1. Dismissal of Khamenei for not being a fair leader
2. Dismissal of Ahmadinejad for his illegal acts
3. Temporary appointment of Ayatollah Montazeri as the Supreme Leader
4. Recognition of Mousavi as the President
5. Forming the Cabinet by Mousavi to prepare for revising the Constitution
6. unconditional and immediate release of all political prisoners
7. Dissolution of all organs of repression, public or secret.

Who is Grand Ayatollah Montazeri?

Ayatollah Montazeri is a pro-Democracy, pro-Human Rights Ayatollah who was at one point on the short list of possible successors of Khomeini, but became marginalized as he adopted what was seen as a too pro-Western, pro-Democracy stance.

Since the beginning of the Revolution, he has been one of the fiercest critics of the Regime, and one of the biggest proponents of women and civil rights for ALL Iranians, including much-maligned minorities like the Baha'is. In fact he goes further than the protections afforded to them under Sharia.

He is also a big critic of Ahmadinejad and has been seen for years as the best hope for Iran if he ever was to come to power, something that was unthinkable a mere week ago.

Edit for additional "players" information:

QUOTE

Other Players

Decided to create this section in order to give a wider range of explanations for people who might not be too familiar with Iran's internal politics and structure.

1. The Police

Iran's police is not dissimilar to your run-of-the-mill law enforcement in other dictatorships, with the difference that they are not generally as brutal and repressive. This is because the Basij are generally in charge of these activities, meaning that Iranian policemen generally concentrate more on the law and order aspect of Iranian daily life.

Today, it is thought that the Iranian police numbers close to 60,000 members, in contrast with up to a million Basij members. This is one of the reasons why we hear much more about the plainclothes militia than we do about the police right now, the other being that the Basij and Ansar are much more willing to violently assault their fellow citizens than even the regular police force. This is not as much a testament to the decency of your average police officers as much as a damning report of what the Basij and Ansar thugs are like.

There are also subdivisions and extra-legal forces attached to the police force. The major subdivision would be the riot police (So-called Unit 110) who are actually much more violent than regular police officers, but also in much, much smaller numbers. There is also VEVAK, the secret police. Very little is known and confirmed about them, except their extreme tactics include murder, kidnapping and torture.

2. The Army

In Iran, there are actually two armies. They are divided between Artesh and Pasdaran.

Artesh is the regular Military apparatus of the Republic. Their numbers, including reservists, go up to a million members, but only half of them have received anything more than very basic training. As it is often the case in police states, there is very little known and confirmed about the structure of the Army itself.

They were created prior to the Iranian Revolution, in fact this army has existed in one form or another, and is a continuation, for more than 2,500 years. This is not as impressive as it sounds, however, as they often underwent drastic changes, there is no real links between the current incarnations, and the top echelons were most often purged when new rulers took power. In fact, in the last 100 years, those purges happened between two or three times, depending on the count, the last time centered around the time of the Islamic revolution, when most generals were forced to flee, killed, or killed while in exile.

Artesh took the brunt of the military casualties during the Iran-Iraq war, the army is considered to very nationalist and not extremely religious, which explains why they have declared their neutrality and refusal to repress the situation, as they see their purpose to defend the Iranian population.

Everyone agrees they will be the ultimate key to this Revolution when they finally decide to take a side, or alternatively force the Pasdaran to stay on the sidelines with them.

Pasdaran, also known as Iranian Revolutionary Guard

The Iranian Ground forces (I will focus on them, as the Navy and Airforce are currently irrelevant, will update if the situation changes) have been estimated between 100,000 and 130,000 units total. As always, truth most likely resides somewhere in the middle. They are, much like the Basij and Ansar, subservient directly to the Supreme Leader, and ideologically created in the spirit of defending the Islamic Revolution ideals and Republic, not Iran per se. They also control the Basij.

They are a child of the revolution, and they are more geared toward guerilla warfare than they are for military engagements. They are also the force responsible for training the various terrorist groups financed and supported by the Iranian government. They are fanatically devoted to the Republic through intense indoctrination.

The elite troops are called Quds. They are considered the elite of the elite, but they only number between 2000-6000, although rumours say that they are twice or three time as big. They are, however, rumours and quite unlikely.

Ultimately, the Revolutionary Council and the Supreme Leader will call on them if they think they are on the verge of losing power, however it is unlikely that the army will just stay on the sidelines if this happens.

3. The Revolutionary Council

The Revolutionary Council was created by Ayatollah Khomeini shortly before the Iranian Revolution. Since then, they have sat as the real authority of Iran. The council is made up of Ayatollahs, and they are the ones who dictate every little facet of Iranian life, making the position of President mostly irrelevant, as they do not take any major decisions without first asking permission from Khameini and his cronies. They do not have any qualms about hiding this, as the head of the Council is called "Supreme Leader".

The very goal of this revolution has become not only to elect Moussavi as President, but also elect Grand Ayatollah Montazeri as Supreme Leader. GA Montazeri has been calling for a separation of Mosque and State, and transferring most powers of the Supreme Leader to the President, including control of the Armed Forces.

4. The Grand Ayatollahs

The Grand Ayatollahs are Shiite clerics who first attained the position of Ayatollahs and then, through their knowledge of Islamic Jurisprudence, attained a supreme position and are regarded as the most important voice in Shia Islam today. They center around the holy Shiite city of Qom, though some live outside Iran.

... a lot of this info is common knowledge, but it's a pretty solid breakdown of some of the politics of Iran. I'm lazy, so it's another Tatsuma Copy-paste

Evestay

very cool information, thank you ANunes!

I heard foreign reporters were allowed in Tehran for a 7 day period to cover the elections so they will be kicked out soon and the putdown can then become even more violent. The Ayatollah is even trying to kick out the foreign reporters a bit early.

Nunes

5 known twitterers have been outed and arrested. There are reports of teams going around bugging phone lines, both public and private, and anybody caught sending video out of the country is being tossed in jail, probably for at least the duration of this situation.

A recount has been announced.

Nunes

TIMELINE POST

Timeline (Now in reverse order to keep current news on top!)
note: I built this through both articles and twitter feeds, so I do not claim that this is a 100% factually correct representation of reality, but this is the general narrative.
Now with election results goodness! (see bottom of post)

---------------------NEW-------------------------

24th of June
- Khamenei went on State Television to declare that he insists on implementing the law on the election issue and that they will not yield to pressure at any cost. The Supreme Court has declared today that they would in fact implement the results of the election and that Ahmadinejad is going to stay on as President. Conservative candidate Rezaei has buckled under pressure and no longer claims that the elections were rigged.

- Today, there was a protest at Baharestan Square near the Parliament, which turned into one of the worst scenes of violence witnessed so far. Hidden in a mosque, hundreds of security forces stormed out and savagely beat everyone with clubs and even throwing people off a bridge. Mousavi denied having anything to do with the protests that were organized. The security forces also used live rounds, but it is unclear if they used them only as warning shots or on protesters. Thousands of other security forces joined in to violently attack the protesters.

- The Iranian government is going on the offensive, claiming that the killer of Neda was in fact killed by anti-Government forces, the terrorist group MEK, which serves as a convenient boogeyman as they are widely hated by a majority of the Iranian population.

23rd of June
- Today is a day of national strike. The massive security forces presence makes it much harder for protesters to join up each others, as the security forces beat up people and force them to separate everywhere in Tehran, including in metro stations.

- The Guardian Council has declared that they will not nullify the results of the Election, and that Ahmadinejad is still the winner. Ahmadinejad will be sworned in as President between July 26 and August 19.

- On the International Front, the Government is getting angry with the international reaction. The Iranian Government issued a formal condemnation of the Secretary General of the UN for involving himself. They also declared that the French riots a couple of years ago were much more violent, yet they were never referred to as a crisis. Finally, they have expulsed two British diplomats from Iran and decided to recall their ambassador from Britain, while Britain has ordered the expulsion of two Iranian diplomats in return.

- The UN has declared it is dismayed by the post-election violence. Journalists are still being rounded up, now the focus seems to be on Iranian journalist who serve as correspondents for foreign newspapers.

- The split now seems to reach ever higher in the Conservative movement as Ali Larijani, speaker of the Majlis, is attacked by Ahmadinejad's supporters for staying neutral and even unofficially supporting the protesters. He is the one yesterday who called for a revision of the Iran-UK ties in light of recent events.

22nd of June.
- Mousavi announced today that there would be a day of mourning for the martyrs killed since the protests began this Thursday, in sync with the demands of Grand Ayatollah Montazeri. Tomorrow, a national strike will take place. Karroubi for himself released a statement calling on the Iranian government to provide care to those injured during the violence, release journalists and other political prisoners and return the bodies of those killed to their families.

- Members of the Parliament have commented that they are getting ready to hold Mousavi legally responsible for the protests and ensuing riots. They have also called for a possible ending of relationship with the United Kingdom. In response to Mousavi's calls for a general strike, they have also declared that anyone not going to work tomorrow will be fired. An Interior Ministry official followed-up the declaration that the votes were tampered with in 50 ballots, saying the results of each box will be published in the near future.

- Protesters have tried to protest peacefully and hold vigils, but were attacked by security and basij forces the second they were more than a couple of people together. Thousands of them have been roaming Tehran in order to block any protests from happening. IRIB is claiming that the government has quelled the protests and they are now things of the past.

- Basij and security forces have stormed one of the biggest newspapers in Iran, arresting members of the Staff. The British Embassy has evacuated all non-essential personal, fearing that the increasingly anti-British rhetoric will lead to another hostage situation at an embassy.

21st of June.
- Grand Ayatollah Montazeri went directly against Ayatollah Khamenei's wishes and declared a 3-day mourning period in Iran, while Khamenei had ordered mosques to avoid making ceremonies in the memory of the fallen victims of governmental violence.

- The Guardian Council admitted that in 50 cities, there were in fact more vote recorded than there are registered voters and said they were looking into the situation. Seeing as the GC is under direct control of Khamenei, this is very likely an attempt at damage control from people who have yet to grasp how deep the schism in Iran is. This could be an attempt to ultimately blame Ahmadinejad for the irregularities and throw him under the bus in order to save their skin, which would be a sign they don't fully realize yet what is happening.

- Aside from that, as expected there were clashes all over Iran, but subsided since the 20th. The Iranian Government went on the offensive, kicking out a BBC correspondent and attacking Western countries for what they see as meddling in Iranian internal affairs. Tomorrow Mousavi has called for a general strike all over Iran. It seems that business activity that the already paralyzed country will be stopped completely.

From the 19th to the 20th of June. post-Khamenei speech.
If anyone doubted this is a Revolution and that this was bigger than the election, there is no such doubt anymore. While Khameini directly called for them to stop, the population took the street more numerous than ever. This is direct defiance to the Supreme Leader. Here are the major events that happened between the end of Khamenei's speech and midnight on Saturday.

- Before the protest even began, heavily armed men were waiting for the dissidents, planning to prevent them from reaching the rally point. It didn't take long for the peaceful protests to turn into full-fledged riots. Security forces had also closed off the Tehran university to prevent students from leaving to protest or entering to take shelter. Basij, some security forces and what is suspected to be members of the Revolutionary Guard assaulted the protesters. The protesters fought back while chanting "Death to Khamenei" and "Down with Khamenei". The security forces used water cannons and tear gas to try and disperse the protesters. While the tear gas was partly successful, the water cannons were mostly useless, as they were quickly over ran by the protesters.

- A lot of eyewitnesses report that the Basij now fighting appear to be barely older than teenagers, most of them between 16 and 20, taking a real pleasure in the violence. Others report that up to hundreds of both security forces and Basij were injured in the last series of clashes. The Basij forces are using pvc tubes filled with concretes, bats, even knives and are assaulting people everywhere, down to metro stations.

- A bomb exploded at the Khomeini Shrine, killing one and injuring at least two. Most believe that the government is in fact behind it. Khamenei was a major figure of the previous Revolution, and they used a similar tactics then, destroying buildings and blaming it on the Shah in order to turn the population against him. The State television is of course blaming Mousavi for it and calling for a harsher treatment of the protesters. This is also very convenient for the Regime, has Mousavi said he would take refuge there if he feared for his safety, but now all access is blocked.

- In return, the harsher the treatment of protesters by the security forces, the harsher the rhetoric and reaction of the protesters. They are calling for the death of the regime, the death of Khamenei, the death of their oppressors and that they will avenge them. Once the gun shots started, the protesters went wild, beating down security forces and basij forces they caught to a pulp, while the Basij and security forces are showing absolutely no restraint, even less than they previously had.

- There are many reports that the security forces and Basij still ever present in hospitals and clinics. Basij are kidnapping some of those injured, while the security forces is identifying those participating in the protest. In order to arrest protesters, security forces raided the Khomeini Hospital in order to arrest injured protesters. There are rumours that Basij forces have hijacked ambulances and use them as a trap to brutally assault already injured protesters seeking help, or shoot at them. Iranian journalists, Reformist intellectuals and feminists are still being arrested and rounded up to prevent from reporting the news or reaching out.

- As the protests grew, extreme measures started to used by those trying to repress the Iranians asking for freedom. Gun shots were first fired in the air, but it did not take long for them to be fired at the protesters. A liquid was dropped from helicopters, creating severe skin burns on protesters. We are unsure what the liquid was. They are also openly opening fire on the crowds, 40 to 60 people at least were killed in a single day, and scores more injured according to protesters. There are also reports that Revolutionary Guard Helicopters dropped firearms crates to 500 Basij fighters, as they are more willing than government forces to use them on civilians.

- The protesters are fighting back, taking over anti-riot trucks and burning them, attacking Basij bases and burning another one to the ground. There are report that a security forces truck was actually blown up by the protesters. In many instances, government forces have been force to fled under the constant assault of the people. Another report mentioned a security forces post was burning as well.

- The Iran Fatemiyeh Hospital in Tehran has confirmed at least 40 dead as well as 200 injured. Other sources report that hundreds of security forces and hundreds of basij fighters were injured as well.

- At night the protesters joined each others on the roofs in Tehran, shouting "Allah-u Ackbar", "Margh Bar Khamenei" and chanting "I will welcome death, I will welcome death, but no subjugation, but no subjugation". None of the rhetoric is addressed to Ahmadinejad anymore, all of it is directed to Khamenei and the regime. Many of the popular chants throughout the day were "I will kill those who killed my brother/sister", "Death to the Government", "Death to Khamenei" and "Seyed Ali Pinoshe, Iran won't be Chile".

- China has been censoring all news coming from Iran. Obama's restraint has been useless, as the Iranian government has shown a video of him with a false translation where Obama declared his support for the protesters, and that they should keep on protesting.

- Mousavi gave a speech and declared that if he is arrested, then the whole nation should strike. He also told the people that he is ready for martyrdom.

- There are unconfirmed reports that the Army is now refusing to follow orders and will not attack the protesters. The newest strategy from the government seems to be arming the Basij, dressing them in riot gear, team them up with IRG soldiers, and try to prevent massive rallies and keep them localized instead, as they are easier to stop spreading.

19th of June
- Supreme Leader Khameini has called for Friday Prayers where he will be present. There are fears that the IRG has been called in support and that they will have a massive presence, which could possibly be a post-prayers trap. On the other hand, not attending makes the reformists enemies of Islam and worthy of the death penalty according to Khameini. Iranian prosecutors have also warned protesters that violence might be punished with the death penalty, according to Reuters. Supporters of Khameini are expected to flood Tehran from all corners of Iran on Friday, so big clashes are expected. Reformist leaders have called on their supporters to boycott the prayers led by Khameini. This is huge.

- As the Basij, they are cracking down on the population as ever, roaming the streets, vandalizing both pro and anti-Mousavi targets while pretending to be pro-Mousavi forces and trying to crack down on all dissenters.

18th of June
- The protests show no signs of slowing down, and the fact that the government has been less violent so far and concentrating on discrediting the protesters instead shows that they are losing grip and painfully aware of all the attention given to what is happening right now, CNN notwithstanding. It's also a worrying step, because the moment they start feeling they are losing grip even more is the moment where they might begin to unleash brutal waves of violence again, much worse than what we've seen so far.

- Iran Human Rights reports that today alone hundreds of members of the opposition and known Reformists have been arrested, some of them tortured in the basements of government buildings.

- There is a (so far) quiet march going on, where all the protesters are dressed in black and mourning those who have died so far. The crowds are estimated to be as big as they have been for the last few days, so that puts them between 1,000,000 and 2,000,000 in Tehran alone.

- Khameini has agreed to a recount of 600 out of the thousands of ballot boxes, but this has been rejected by the opposition, who says that these elections are to be declared null and void, and that new elections have to be rescheduled. Khameini in return rejected this. There are reports that Mousavi went as far as saying that Khameini does not have authority to preside over the state of Iran anymore.

- As a sign of growing tension in the governmental apparatus, fist-fights were said to have broken out in Parliament over who to support, but it seems that the Parliament will ultimately back Ahmadinejad and Khameini to the end. The Interior Ministry has ordered a police investigation into the massacre of 7 civilians by a Basij firing in a crowd. There are also reports of police officers deserting their posts and joining the protesters, while others use their position in the police force as a way to warn protesters from incoming arrests or crack downs. The army is still silent. There are reports that the man who leaked results of the election giving Khatami winner and Ahmadinejad as losing in third position has been killed in a car "accident".

- The State TV has been turned into a full-blown anti-Revolution machine, constantly hammering on how evil the "thugs" who are smashing around private property are. Problem is that those thugs are in fact Basij dressed in green, but IRIB is reporting it as pro-Moussavi supporters. They have also been showing documentaries about the evils of the internet and how the US, UK and Israel are behind the protests. State Radio is not much better, with talking heads calling for the death of those evil thugs destabilizing the country at the behest of external forces. They have also issued false reports that Moussavi was "condeming the rioters".

- The Government has closed Iran to all foreign communication and coverage, according to many reports. It would also seem that the Iranian government has opened an account in the name of Ayatollah Khameini on Twitter. There are reports that senior aides to all reformist candidates have been arrested, but it has yet to be corroborated and this is not the first time we hear such reports.

- According to Reuters, Iranian prosecutors have warned of the death penalty for the rioters who are involved in violence. Islamic cleric have warned that not going to Friday's prayer service makes you worthy of the death penalty. It is unclear yet what isn't worthy of death penalty at this point if you protest against the regime.

- All the violence reported over Iran is now exclusively done by the Basij, Ansar and, if the rumours are true, Hizbullah and Hamas. The police have completely stopped participating in the repression of the population, and both the Army and IRG are standing still and not doing anything. This is good news, but the Basij are sadly not reducing the level of violence they are unleashing on the population, beating up everyone they can get their hands on. It continued all throughout the night and during the day, but due to the mass of people involved it seems that they are restraining themselves when it comes to the mass rallies, preferring to pick isolated targets.

- Universities have cancelled all exams all over the country, and a long list of rebel students was given to all universities and they have to report the students, who are to be arrested on sight.

- There have been a few confirmed cases of people threatened inside the United States for providing proxies for the revolution. Their details were available on the internet so they were passed around pro-Government forces. If you are helping this revolution, be careful to do so as anonymously as you can. It doesn't mean you are risking your life, but it could potentially result in harrassment or vandalism.

17th of June
- With the end of the fourth wave of violence, we have been in a wait and see mode. As of right now, there are many rumors involving clerics and Ayatollahs meeting in the Holy Shiite city of Qom and planning to overthrow Khameini, as well as reports that some in the Army plotting to overthrow the government, semi-confirmations from credible twitterers, but nothing concrete or substantiated so far. These would be extremely big development, so it's better to treat them with caution.

- Nothing much has happened on this day aside of that. There was another mostly peaceful march, with around 500,000 protesters in the street. The Basij and others are still roaming around and beating on the population, as well as dressing in green, destroying buildings and trying to pin the blame on the protesters in order to make them look like a bunch of thugs.

- There have been more than a hundred people arrested in their hospital beds and taken to prison. The number of prisoners right now is estimated between 1,000 and 10,000; possibly more. The Basij are now laying traps into hospitals themselves, trying to snatch up protesters there. There are also reports that they are taking dead bodies before they are identified, stuffing them in vans and leaving to undisclosed locations. Doctors have been setting up outside clinics and fighting back in order to stop the Basij from doing what they do.

early 16th of June
- Supporters of Moussavi have a manifestation planned for 5pm, Tehran time. Roughly the same number or more is expected to attend. People are dressed in black and told to protest silently.

- The pro-Ahmadinejad crowd however are planning a counter-demonstration at the very same place the supporters are supposed to gather at 3pm. Most agree that basically they are simply going to gather for a confrontation. Rumours are that they are taking position in buildings next to the parade and in bunkers to attack. Basij from all over the country are moving to Tehran and supporters are being bused from all over the country. A major showdown is expected to unfold.

- The crackdown on people using telecommunication is as strong as ever. Anyone with a laptop, camera or cellphone is attacked in the street by plainclothes militias. Tehran hotels are under lockdown to prevent the members of the foreign press not yet expulsed from reporting what is happening.

- As for the Iranian Government and different branches, there are rumours that many Army Generals have been arrested for plotting a Coup d'État, but this is still speculation at this point. The Supreme Leader has also called for a 10-day inquiry into the claims of fraud, but it has been widely dismissed as cosmetic. Moussavi and his supporters have rejected this, claiming that they want new elections. Khameini is now using the armed Basij as his own bodyguards, hundreds of them are surround him and his residence to protect from attempted assassinations. Ahmadinejad himself is in Russia right now, for a planned visit, and tries to pretend that everything is good as usual.

- The fourth wave of violence has started, and it is expected to flare up very soon. Currently pro-Moussavi supporters are saying that there are even more people today protesting against the regime, though raw numbers are hard to get. If this is true, it means there are more than 2M protesters in the street right now. They are dressed in black and protesting silently and without violence so far. Other reports that only 250,000 are in the street right now, possibly scared by the Basij and propaganda.

- The Basij, surprisingly, are not attacking the march itself but rather they are assaulting dorms again. It looks like they are using the march as a diversion. In Tehran proper, 2000 Basij are waiting to storm the male dorm, and they are backed by IRG helicopters, which seems to send the message that the IRG has broken from their undeclared neutrality toward tacitely supporting the Regime.

- The crackdown on telecommunications is starting to suffocate all of Iran. As of now (6/16 2pm):

* Gmail and GTalk are shut down
* Yahoo is shut down
* AIM is most likely shut down
* Phone lines are down
* HTTPS and other such protocols are down
* Iranian ISPs have been shut down
* They are trying very hard to close down the Iranian connection to twitter and giving proxies they control in order to track down people
* Cellphones and SMS are shut down

People are also receiving phone calls from the government saying "We know you were in the protests".

Night has fallen on Iran, and the Basij are roaming, attacking passerbys at random. They have also surrounded dorms and waiting to storm them once again.

midday, 15th of June
- This brings us to the third wave, which just began around 12:30PM for those of us on the East Coast. Plainclothes militia opened fire on civilians protesting peacefully. Possibly up to 2 million protesters took the street. Chaos erupted in the streets, with reports of fighting all over Tehran and spreading over Iran as the news circulated. Pictures of people shot, some to death, finally surfaced and were published in the mainstream media. Violent and murderous repression has started. At least a twenty people had been killed at this by the end of the 15th of June.

- There is a major national crackdown on students, especially those with connections to the outside world going on right now. Students are fighting back in some areas. Telephones are being bugged and everyone twittering and sending videos outside of Iran are being rounded up. ISPs were shut down, government hackers are threatening people who twitter, and some of them have vanished in the last 24 hours.

- Eventually, the people started to fight back. First, they took over and burned down a Basij base, killing its commander. Later, a Basij shot a young man in the face in front of their HQ, at which point a policeman went to confront them. The Basij beat the policeman, at which point students stormed the compound, throwing molotov cocktails, burning it to the ground.

- During the night, the police entered certain neighbourhood to arrest public servants and force them to appear at tomorrow's pro-Ahmadinejad manifestation, but the people went out in the street and forced them out of their neighbourhoods. The Basij have kept on storming dorms. So far the reports are conflicting, but it appears that the death toll could be as high as 40 for the protesters, with two dead on the side of the repressive militias. This is the end of the third wave.

late 14th, early 15th of June
- This is the second wave of violent repression. At this point, violent riots had spread all over the main cities of Iran. The violence against citizens was not only the fruit of the Basij anymore, but also came from Ansar Hizbullah members. This is the point where firearms started being used. There were reports of a few murders but it was mostly fired in the air or on walls in order to scare away protesters in University dorms. It's also around the same time that the first reports and videos of an important number of non-Persian thugs shouting in Arabic and violently beating people with chains, clubs and electric batons (similar to cattle prods), which led to many speculating that lebanese Hizbullah members were now in Iran. Der Spiegel, through Voice of America, later claimed that 5000 Hizbullah fighters were passing off as Riot Police, validating the claims of many independent sources and twitter feeds.

- Universities have been the hotbed of protests, serving as a hub of anti-government demonstrations and preparations. 120 teachers from the Sharid University resigned in protest over the election results. Perfectly away of this, the Basij, Ansar and possibly Hizbullah members concentrated their attacks on University Dorms all over the country, storming them and beating students, destroying everything, especially computers.

- The end of the second wave came right before the beginning of the current manifestation. Things were getting quieter with only sporadic reports of dissenters being assaulted. Important to note: at this time. the Supreme Leader authorized the plainclothes militias to use live ammunition against the crowd if things were to get out of hands. By the end of the first two waves of protests, hundreds of people had been arrested.

14th of June
- While the previous day had been witness to some protests, they were for the most part peaceful. However, as time grew the protests turned more and more violent. When the first spontaneous riots erupted, the first wave of violence was unleashed. The Iranian Riot Police was called in to support the regular police officers controlling the protests, and shortly after the Basij also took the scene, moving from a passive to active role of repression. The RP concentrated mostly around public buildings and streets while the Basij took position around student groups, especiallly universities.

- As things got more out of hand, more and more Basij troops were called in, as the police started dispersing. The riot police are less inclined (or, rather I should say the Basij are more inclined) to use violence so they retreated and leaving the place to the Basij. The repressive forces concentrated their assault mostly around the main Iranian universities, while the riot police were concentrating on protecting various government buildings such as the Interior Ministry. At least two people had been killed already.

- On the telecommunication front, this is when we started to hear more and more from twitters while videos were being freely updated to youtube (while youtube started to delete the more violent ones a few hours later). This is also the moment where the government realized what was happening, and ordered for the internet, phone lines and cellphones to be cut off, in order to avoid people communicating with the outside world.

ELECTION HELD JUNE 12th, 2009
12th and 13th of June - The election & irregularities.
Unlike the 2005 election, which was a low point of Iranian elections in term of participation, the 2009 election in fact produced a record turnout, the youth mobilized behind the two Reformist candidates. Polls in Iran are notoriously irrelevant and generally give the lead to whoever the pollsters support. All throughout the campaign, the Iranian media gave the lead to Ahmadinejad, while the polls from Reformists gave the lead The Iranian infrastructure was not ready to accommodate the number of voters, so the polling hours ended up being extended until midnight.

The ballots were supposedly counted, while the Interior Ministry building went into lockdown. The man currently in charge of the Interior Ministry was put in place by Ahmadinejad. More than 40 million votes were cast, yet they supposedly were all counted within three hours, and against all expectations not only did Ahmadinejad win, but won in a landslide. The official results given were:

Ahmadinejad - 62.63%
Mousavi - 33.75%
Rezaee - 1.73%
Karroubi - 0.85%

At this point, well into the night, spontaneous peaceful protests started to take place all over Tehran and major cities of Iran, contesting the results of the election. At first a few European countries congratulated Ahmadinejad, but quickly backtracked and expressed concerns over claims of irregularities.

As of the 21st of June, the only major countries who have officially and openly accepted the results are China, Russia, North Korea, Syria, Lebanon, Venezuela and Brazil.

Australian Witch

This is a serious clusterfuck right now...I really hope the US has something to say about this!!

I know we're trying to maintain diplomatic relations and not seem to be in support of either candidate, but seriously, wtf.

I had the opportunity to watch some of the coverage yesterday, but I was out of my usual office today and missed this seriously scary escalation...

Biden mentioned yesterday that they were reluctant to comment on the validity of the election, but I really hope that either the US or some sort of human rights group has woken up from diplomatic "maybe maybe not" to speak out about how totally screwed up this is.

Governor

Clusterfuck indeed, but I cannot express enough how much I hope the US does not get involved with this in any way, shape, or form. The Obama administration has already expressed their concern about the whole matter, and that is absolutely as far as I want them to take it.

Australian Witch

I don't mean go send in an army or anything, but perhaps a statement saying that the actions of the police and militant groups are reprehensible. No comment on the candidates or election collection methods, but we've got some serious human rights shit going on right now.

Evestay

How hard would it be for Obama to say he supports Iranians exercising their freedoms? Bush would've been all over this but Obama is weak as can be =\.

Governor

Absolutely nothing will be accomplished by Obama issuing a statement about how horrible he thinks murderers are, so I don't really care whether he does so. However, if anything he does say is misconstrued, it could prove to be a serious setback to any hopes of building a positive relationship between the US and Iran. If the people of Iran fail to bring about positive change, then the last thing anyone needs is for Iran's international relationships to deteriorate any further than they already have.

QUOTE

How hard would it be for Obama to say he supports Iranians exercising their freedoms? Bush would've been all over this but Obama is weak as can be =\.

First of all, your assumption about Bush is entirely arbitrary and unfounded. Human rights violations happened every single day throughout Bush's entire tenure, and he rarely gave them the time of day. There is absolutely no precedent to make a statement like that. Plus, citing the Bush administration as an example of how to handle issues relating to Iran is nearly vomit-in-my-mouth worthy. The Iranian leadership is clearly pretty fragile, yet the best policy Bush could think of was to begin fear mongering in an attempt to lead to war that could kill a few hundred thousand of their citizens as well. He clearly did not understand that country or how to handle any sort of rational relationship with them.

Second, your analysis of Obama's cool-handed response to the situation is actually pretty telling. What do you define as strength? At the moment, given your analysis of Obama as well as your unwavering support of Bush, I can only assume you think jumping head first into a situation without giving it anywhere near enough thought is a virtue. It has only been three days since this whole mess began, and during that time information has only managed to trickle out of the country from sources that we cannot begin to validate. I dislike pretty much everything Obama has done since he began his tenure, but at the very least I'm rational enough to appreciate the careful deliberating he gives to every issue he's involved with.

Evestay

wow Gov I will need to address your post later, it is as unfounded as you say mine was !

Governor

I eagerly await.

Evestay

QUOTE (Governor @ Jun 16 2009, 05:27 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

If the people of Iran fail to bring about positive change, then the last thing anyone needs is for Iran's international relationships to deteriorate any further than they already have.

Who's fault is it that Iran's international relationships have deteriorated? Seems to me we have offered them nuclear power plenty of times but they still buy, test, and mess with missiles.

QUOTE

First of all, your assumption about Bush is entirely arbitrary and unfounded. Human rights violations happened every single day throughout Bush's entire tenure, and he rarely gave them the time of day. There is absolutely no precedent to make a statement like that. Plus, citing the Bush administration as an example of how to handle issues relating to Iran is nearly vomit-in-my-mouth worthy.

You are right, Bush could not speak out against every human rights violation in the world for political reasons, but I remember his constant refrain that we supported freedom loving people across the globe. He always said people naturally yearn for freedom and that is something America should nurture and encourage. It isn't speaking out against repressive regimes per se, but it is pointing out what we stand for and Obama isn't even close to bringing it up.

Why would it cause America to have worse relations with Iran if Obama said the people of the US are behind those in Iran who are peacefully protesting?

QUOTE

The Iranian leadership is clearly pretty fragile, yet the best policy Bush could think of was to begin fear mongering in an attempt to lead to war that could kill a few hundred thousand of their citizens as well. He clearly did not understand that country or how to handle any sort of rational relationship with them.

The fears were/are pretty justified in my opinion (tons of evidence that Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons) and Bush never went too far in goading Iran. What was a big step he took to piss Iran off? I definitely remember him saying the American people and Iranian people were very similar because young Iranians are very modernized.

QUOTE

Second, your analysis of Obama's cool-handed response to the situation is actually pretty telling. What do you define as strength?

I guess I don't mean strength because all I want him to say here is that he supports the Iranian citizens who are peacefully protesting and exercising their right to assemble. This is the biggest protest in Iran since 1979 and all he and Biden have to say about it is that it is troubling and needs to be looked into? He has no clue which way he wants to go on this matter because he has no clear foreign policy goal. He obviously wants a more moderate regime in place but he also thinks the hardliners will remain in power and he doesn't want to upset them. His policy of talking to the hardliners is going so well (I just choked) that he thinks it might be okay if they stay in power.

QUOTE

At the moment, given your analysis of Obama as well as your unwavering support of Bush, I can only assume you think jumping head first into a situation without giving it anywhere near enough thought is a virtue.

You totally assumed that out of nowhere. I said Obama should say he supports the peaceful demonstrations in Iran. That is not diving headfirst anywhere. I agree that Bush dived headfirst into the Iraq War and screwed a bitchload up and the fact that I support the Iraq War does not mean I wish we got into it in the exact fashion that we did.

QUOTE

It has only been three days since this whole mess began, and during that time information has only managed to trickle out of the country from sources that we cannot begin to validate. I dislike pretty much everything Obama has done since he began his tenure, but at the very least I'm rational enough to appreciate the careful deliberating he gives to every issue he's involved with.

Yes careful deliberation is a virtue but sitting around because you don't know which way you want the wind to blow is not a virtue. We knew as soon as the election results were announced that they were announced earlier than usual, that Ahmadinejad won a landslide contrary to expectations and Mousavi's own proclaimations, that Ahmadinejad won by pretty much the same margin of victory in all regions of the country (even Mousavi's home town), and that millions of Iranians were unhappy with the result. It would not be such a lengthy deliberation to see all that and decide to say that you support the democratic process in Iran, that you hope it was legitimate, and that you support the peaceful assembly of those who were unhappy with the results.

Evestay

example of a perfect response by Sarkozy:
http://www.africasia.com/services/news/new...26.y5h74nsr.php

QUOTE

"The extent of the fraud is proportional to the violent reaction," said the French leader.

"It is a tragedy, but it is not negative to have a real opinion movement that tries to break its chains," Sarkozy said.

Governor