Tag: Legitimacy

Articles, Publications

The New Iranian Parliament Is Loyal to Khamenei but Advocating for Rouhani

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On Feb. 26, Iran held its 10th parliamentary election since the 1979 Islamic Revolution and fifth election for its Assembly of Experts, the clerical body that appoints the supreme leader. Members of parliament serve four-year terms, while members of the assembly serve 8-year terms. The elections were relatively competitive; nearly 5,000 candidates vied for 290 seats in parliament and 161 for 88 seats in the Assembly of Experts.

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“The New Iranian Parliament Is Loyal to Khamenei but Advocating for Rouhani,” Hossein Mousavian, The Huffington Post, March 2, 2016.

Articles, Publications

Why Iran Doesn’t Trust America — And What Can Be Done to Change That

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During his speech before the United Nations General Assembly, U.S. President Barack Obama accused Iran of using “violent proxies to advance its interests,” which he claimed served to “fuel sectarian conflict” in the region. Iranian President Hassan Rouhani shot back during his speech, decrying what he said were “baseless accusations” against Iran and calling for the United States to halt its “dangerous policies in defense of its regional allies who only cultivate the seeds of division and extremism.”

Obama and Rouhani’s comments highlight a broader issue underlying the troubled U.S.-Iran relationship. In the West, many commentators often portray Iran’s leaders as being unreasonably suspicious about the intentions of outside powers, particularly the United States. Often dovetailing with this mentality is that Iran is irrationally and innately aggressive. While President Obama’s remarks at the UNGA reflect this black-and-white thinking about Iran to a degree, other high-level U.S. officials have been far more brazen in their dishonest condemnations of Iran. For instance, the former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, remarkably proclaimed in a March 2015 interview that “Iran and radical Islamist extremists” have opposed the United States simply because they “do not like our way of life.”

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“Why Iran Doesn’t Trust America — And What Can Be Done to Change That,” Hossein Mousavian, The Huffington Post, October 5, 2015.

Articles, Publications

How do we solve the Iran talks’ verification dilemma?

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After Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, expressed his opposition to the inspection of Iranian military facilities and the interrogation of Iranian scientists as part of any would-be nuclear deal, the issue quickly became the most controversial aspect of the nuclear negotiations in Iran. It is only natural that allowing foreign inspectors access to Iranian military facilities and making Iranian scientists vulnerable to such questioning would damage Iranian national pride, as it would in any country. In fact, this is a matter that threatens to scuttle the entire negotiating process.

This unprecedentedly invasive type of inspections hearkens back to the issue of possible military dimensions (PMD) to the Iranian nuclear program. Western concerns over PMD go back to even before 2003, when the Iranian nuclear program first came under international spotlight. In his 2006 book “State of War: The Secret History of the CIA and the Bush Administration,” The New York Times journalist James Risen revealed that the CIA had attempted to plant evidence in Iran that would make it seem the country was pursuing nuclear weapons in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Such “evidence” could feasibly have been used as a pretext for military intervention against Iran. With that said, in 2011 the United States and its NATO allies released thousands of pages of documents and pictures to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) that allegedly revealed there had been military dimensions to Iran’s nuclear program.

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“How do we solve the Iran talks’ verification dilemma?” Hossein Mousavian, Al Monitor, June 6, 2015.

Essays, Publications

America’s Middle East Challenge

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The Middle East is in dire need of cooperation on issues of long-term interest to the stability and well-being of the whole region. The Arab Spring has resulted in political instability in many countries, while extremist and terrorist groups have wreaked havoc across the region. It is imperative for Middle Eastern countries to work collaboratively in order to tackle these region-wide challenges.

The United States faces lack of trust from Iran and suspicion from its Arab allies. America’s oil-centered involvement in the Middle East is becoming less strategically important as the United States moves toward becoming the leading exporter of oil and gas. As a result, the Arabs are losing their oil leverage with Washington and are resorting to suicidal strategies to destabilize the region, by funding various extremist groups, in hopes that it would compel America to stay involved.

America’s increased involvement in the Middle East is inevitable as a result of the expansion of ISIS and other terrorist groups. This heightened involvement could result in positive outcomes if it is calculated carefully. The United States should come to the realization that its military might is not capable of bringing about peace in the Middle East. As Chas W. Freeman Jr. argued in his bookAmerica’s Misadventures in the Middle East, “How do we propose to manage the contradiction between our desire to assure the stability of the Persian Gulf and the fact that our presence in it is inherently destabilizing?” However, U.S. military superiority could be applied positively and used to support regional governments to fight terrorism in the region. Washington’s efforts toward a regional cooperation system in the Persian Gulf (akin to that of the European Union) would fill the vacuum caused by an eventual U.S. departure and assuage Arab fears of a resurgent Iran. President Rouhani, in his 2014 address to the UN General Assembly, pointed out, “The right solution to this quandary comes from within the region and regionally provided solutions with international support and not from outside the region.”

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“America’s Middle East Challenge,” Cairo Review, Hossein Mousavian with Mehrdad Saberi. Published by the Cairo Review of Global Affairs, April 6 2014.

Articles, Publications

Why Ayatollah Khamenei is Pessimistic about Relations with the United States

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The text of this article has been selected from: “Iran and the United States; the Failed Past and the Road to Peace”, authored by Seyed Hossein Mousavian with Shahir Shahidsaless.

Part (1): Four major, interrelated elements shape Ayatollah Khamenei’s perception of the US

Page: 161

First, he wholeheartedly believes that regardless of all the ups and downs, pushes and pulls between Iran and the US, Washington’s ultimate intention is to topple Iran’s Islamic system and subordinate them within a Pax Americana, as it did during the Shah’s era after the 1953 coup. Ayatollah Khamenei maintains that the US, no matter which school of thought and party is in power or which president has taken office, intends to “wipe out the Islamic Republic”with all possible means at its disposal. The conclusion he draws from US rhetoric, policies, and behavior is that the US will not relent from its desire for regime change unless the current government surrenders its principles, religious beliefs, political structure, and independence. The United States’ tacit support for Saddam Hussein’s invasion and provision of material support, its covert operations, support for belligerent groups and the Islamic Republic’s opposition (including a budgetary provision), its denial of Iran’s right to peaceful enrichment under the NPT, and its intrusive and paralyzing economic sanctions are all viewed by Ayatollah Khamenei as indisputable attempts to bring about an end to the Islamic Republic. He maintains that the US’s primary objective is to undermine the Islamic government by fostering internal disorder and, ultimately, regime change.

The second element that shapes Ayatollah Khamenei’s disposition towards the US is his firm belief that US foreign policy in the Middle East, and specifically regarding Iran, is overwhelmingly dominated by the pro-Israel lobby. From his point of view, even the president of the United States does not have any authority over US foreign policy. He is surprised that year after year, the president or other high-level officials of the most powerful country on earth attend American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) gatherings and report what they have done to undermine the Iranian government and satisfy pro-Israel lobby demands. Although there is in general a consensus within the nezam about Israel’s influence on US Middle East policy, some argue that it is the Zionists who determine the US foreign policy, and not Americans.

The third element shaping the Supreme Leader’s perception of the US is his extreme mistrust of American politics. The documents confiscated by students after seizing the US Embassy seemed to justify such a stance by many high-echelon Iranian politicians, including Ayatollah Khamenei. According to those documents, the embassy was involved in espionage and the fostering of covert links to members of the new government and army.

Finally, Ayatollah Khamenei’s sees the American government and the system it represents as addicted to arrogance and hegemony. He feels that if a country is not seen as a “great power,” then a lord–serf relationship is the only kind of relationship that the US is prepared to accept.

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“Why Ayatollah Khamenei is Pessimistic about Relations with the United States,” Seyed Hossein Mousavian with Shahir Shahidsaless, Iran Review, June 1, 2014.