On 3rd day of anti-regime protests, Iran blames US, Israel for stirring unrest
TOI STAFF
As hardliners organize rallies in support of government, state media claims US, UK, Israel encouraging ‘dissidence’ after playing a ‘pivotal role’ in 2009 demos
Iranians chant slogans as they march in support of the government near the Imam Khomeini grand mosque in the capital Tehran on December 30, 2017. (AFP PHOTO / TASNIM NEWS / HAMED MALEKPOUR)
Iranian state-controlled media on Saturday characterized the worst anti-regime protests in eight years as masterminded by American, British, and Israeli spies seeking “to stir unrest” in the Islamic republic.
The regime on Saturday warned protesters against holding fresh demonstrations, and organized rallies by hardline supporters, after protests spread Thursday and Friday into several cities including Tehran. State news channel IRINN said it had been banned from covering the protests.
The semi-official Fars News Agency said pro-regime demonstrators, in “resolutions” issued at the end of counter-rallies on Saturday, had warned against “any kind of move masterminded by the anti-revolutionary forces and the US, British, and Israeli spy agencies to stir unrest and dissidence in Iran.”
It claimed Washington, London, and Jerusalem played “pivotal roles” in the 2009 Green Movement protests against the reelection of president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
Fars said pro-regime protesters had “further reiterated their everlasting allegiance to Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei.”
Media coverage inside Iran focused almost exclusively on the pro-regime rallies held on Saturday to mark the defeat of the last major protest movement in 2009, which hardliners call “the sedition.”
On Friday evening, video footage on social media showed hundreds marching through the holy city of Qom, with people chanting “Death to the dictator,” and “Free political prisoners.”
There were even chants in favor of the monarchy toppled by the Islamic revolution of 1979, while others criticized the regime for supporting the Palestinians and other regional movements rather than focusing on problems at home.
Footage showed thousands gathered in the cities of Rasht, Hamedan, Kermanshah, Qazvin, and elsewhere, with police responding with water cannons.
Fars said “millions of Iranians across the country” gathered in the streets Saturday “to show allegiance to the Islamic Republic one day after tens of people staged economic protests in a few towns.”
The timing was coincidental, since the rallies are held every year on this day, but offered a handy show of strength to the regime as huge crowds of black-clad supporters gathered across the country.
“The enemy wants once again to create a new plot and use social media and economic issues to foment a new sedition,” Ayatollah Mohsen Araki told a crowd in Tehran, according to the conservative Fars news agency.
At the same time, however, students protested in Tehran in a third day of demonstrations sparked by anger over Iran’s economic problems.
The pro-regime students shouted “Death to the seditionists” as they seized back control of the entrance of the University of Tehran, videos published by several local news agencies showed.
This followed a relatively small protest by several dozen students, with videos on social media showing scuffles with police and chants against the regime.
“The opportunists who wanted to benefit from the situation have been dispersed with the arrival of [the other] students,” the conservative-linked Tasnim news agency reported.
The numbers at the anti-regime protests on Saturday appeared to be smaller than in demonstrations seen across other major towns and cities on Thursday and Friday, which had been sparked by high living costs but quickly turned against the Islamic regime as a whole.
Fars said “harsh chants” were heard at the Tehran protests and that riot police had been dispatched to the scene.
“Unlike other protests in various cities which were against the economic situation and high prices, the one in front of the University of Tehran was political,” Fars said.
The students repeated a popular chant of “Not Gaza, not Lebanon, my life for Iran” — an expression of anger over claims the government is focusing more on regional issues than problems at home.
Meanwhile Iran said US President Donald Trump’s support for protests in the country was “deceitful and opportunist.”
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