I have always been fascinated by the idea that there is a masterpiece film that no-one has ever heard of... or that no-one has ever heard of or seen some of the best films ever made. To support this idea, there are really good films (well known in Iran, for example) that are not in the Internet Movie Database at all. One of them is showing only in Iran and Japan right now. It is a fantastic film about cultural clash and exchange called "Wind Carpet". It has an official Japanese site. It won the audience award at the 2003 Fajr Film Festival and also won an award at the 2002 Tokyo Film Festival. If you are visiting Japan or Iran you should go and see it! I feel privileged that I can. (In general I don't like Hollywood movies much - there is absolutely no reason why lots of money should result in good films - it's far more likely that "the money turns everything to crap".)

Mortazavi to investigate Kazemi's death. It's much more and much less than a joke, it's a crime. She was interrogated by him, he apparently tried to cover up her death with the stroke story, and now he is the investigator? And what are the "reformists" going to do? As usual, nothing! As Ladysun might say, no-one seems to give a shit. "They" commit crimes, then investigate and exonerate "themselves", while reformists stand around and bitch about it. I hope other countries start backing Canada up right now.

Of course Khatami has no intention of resigning. He wants to stay until "the end" - just to clarify, that means June 2005! I know this is not hard to see, but emotions always get in the way of clear vision, which is why I love Economist/ICG so much.

Mr Asefi thinks Iran is a "free society".

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Apache/1.3.27 Server at www.yaasnow.com Port 80

(7:11pm Tehran time) Hmmmm, Yas-e-no is a reformist paper. One of two things has happened - the host is very popular, or the victim of a denial-of-service attack. Does it happen often?

(I was looking at a new English blog Free thoughts on Iran and tried to go to the Sharif petition link.) It's important not to be silent, like the writer said.

Mortazavi is not fit to be a judge says MP Mohsen Armin; his boss Shahroudi (the Iraqi) is investigating Ms Kazemi's death!!! Unbelievable. You can see nothing is going to happen, with the judiciary investigating itself. Still, if the hardliners can somehow engineer another crisis, that will be good for them.

Canada travel warning.

However, she said Canadians are being cautioned to put their travel plans to Iran on hold because of the death in uncertain circumstances of photojournalist Zahra Kazemi.

Margaret Wente writes about ZK and the illusion of reform in Iran; Iranian Girl writes about Mr Mortazavi's shoe.

"I don't think it's very bad. If they filter porno sites I don't think it's going to kill anyone."

But it might, you know, if men can't masturbate to porno sites, they could get cancer!! (see below) I think I need to start a petition about this, a la the other mind-bogglingly stupid Petition about another CNN story.

It's been stinking stinking hot lately. It took an hour for me to get from Vanak to Tajrish by taxi because the police had closed part of Vali-Asr St, there must have been too many people in Park Mellat. Even at 11pm everyone is still having picnics on any piece of grass available. The taxi went by Jam-e-Jam Food Court trying to get back to Vali-Asr St. These days girls' manteaus are like the corsets of Victorian England, if they were any tighter, they would choke or get deformed bones. And balancing your hijab on the topknot of your head is de rigeur around there. The taxi driver was playing a song called "I Like Girls" which was stupid, but it wasn't as stupid as some Tehrangelian "rapper"'s ripoff of "I Will Survive".

Mr Abu "Hot Potato" Ghaith who was issuing threats to the US a few days ago is in Iranian ``custody''...

Kharrazi says: "Journalist may have fallen." Just like all those students who tripped and fell out of second-floor windows on 18 Tir! Next thing you know, they'll be saying she killed herself by throwing herself down the stairs!!

With the authorities telling so many lies, life in Iran would become impossible without jokes, or satirists like Ebrahim Nabavi. An example translation of Nabavi's work, also concerning a mysterious death.

I like it when I can say good things about Iran. In the International Mathematics Olympiad, Iran didn't do as well as in the past (3rd in 1997, 1st in 1998) but at least the Iranian news is the first place on the web any kind of result for this year is reported.

Masturbation may prevent cancer!

Government admits death from beating. Let's see where the buck stops.

You know why they call the university security "harasat"? It is because they harass people. I have discovered how they are selected for their jobs. They are working somewhere and their boss says "My goodness you are stupid. I have just the right job for you - you can stand at the gate of Sharif University and every day harass our society's best and brightest."

What is the definition of a male chauvinist? Someone who thinks "harass" is two words!

Someone emailed me and said that she hoped "brain strokes" were not so common in Iran (the context was about the death of Zahra Kazemi.) Unfortunately, you see the entry on July 10? The guy who owned the Kawasaki ZZR 400 (the one which cost 4,000,000 tomans, or about $US5000) died of a stroke the very morning I wrote that! He was 23. I had only met him once, at the end of May. So when I read about the son of ZK saying "To die of a stroke at her age [54] is so funny," I know it can happen at any age. Of course I don't mean to defend this government!!

The Dialogue Project presents an account of a trip to Iran by two women three years ago... with some twists! Eventually they found themselves censoring themselves and limiting their actions :-( If you're interested in the subject of gender in IRI you should read it.

Iranian TV explained.

Put body of evidence in ground, sweep all under carpet; find new oil.

Mamad jan! Ebrahim Nabavi writes a very funny letter to Khatami. Someone MUST translate that to English.

First he says Khatami says he will resign if the people don't like him. He asks how are people supposed to tell Khatami to resign? Protests, hunger strike? The government said only 300 people attended the protests and then they arrested 4000 and released 500! There are three groups in Iran who want Khatami to resign, and he parodies Khatami's wife saying to him, you have to resign otherwise I won't let you come home!!

Cover-up underway in Canadian journalist's death.

"As I told them, 'Cut the bullshit — don't send condolences when your government killed my mother, tortured her, and still doesn't respond to my demands.'"

End of road for EU talks (the carrot approach never works because the IRI government is dogmatic, not logical). "There won't be any trade agreement."

BBC Monitoring quotes from four Tehran newspapers about 18 Tir. Only, three of them (Kehyan, Resalat, Jomhouri Islami) are psycho newspapers no-one I know reads. These are the only newspapers allowed to express their point of view on 18 Tir, so the spectrum of expression was really limited.

Today my officemate told me he visited the education ministry and there were long lines of people wanting a teaching job. Guess what the salary is? You teach 24 hours a week for about 60000 tomans a month ($US75)!! I found it really hard to believe, but I don't think he'd lie. So if you think you have it bad, someone here always has it worse. This blog is not representative at all of the general Iranian population, in fact I always wonder if a person just having net access at all makes him/her unrepresentative.

Canadian journalist dies, apparently of injuries inflicted by Iranian police. (I read it first at hoder.) Remember all the stories about how it's Arab mercenaries who are beating up Iranians, not Iranians themselves? Usually when terrible things happen they can be blamed on the "other" be it Ansar or Arabs (or before the revolution, Israelis). (The police sometimes join in, as on 18 Tir.) The third-person plural pronoun is always used: they will beat you up if you go to the protests, they have arrested the student leaders. It's often used as a way of deflecting any sort of responsibility for what happens, or feeling better about oneself - it's "them" who did it, not me or us. Self-criticism entails that Iranians accept some sort of collective responsibility for the things this awful government does.

Student leaders arrested.

"In the presence of foreign journalists, the students were grabbed, pistols put to their temples, their arms twisted behind their backs. Other attackers waved weapons in the air and ordered the journalists to stand back."

Remember, people call for a boycott of Myanmar's tourism, because they've rearrested Aung San Suu Kyi, the Nobel peace prize winner, but they have only 1500 political prisoners whereas the IRI government arrested 8000 in the last few weeks. I guess that's because Burma has no oil??

I've been linking too much to English news.

How you can buy anything in Iran

Gun - It's not possible to buy it in Tehran, I don't think, but go to border areas with Afghanistan. It will cost at least 2,000,000 tomans ($US2500).
Motorcycle - It's illegal to have a bike over 250cc, and most people only have 125cc bikes. (Unless you have mullah friends or are from another country.) But I know people with 400cc and 900cc bikes. The 400cc bike for example was smuggled from Dubai (4,000,000 tomans).
Stolen Western Passport/Forged Visa - This will cost A LOT but where there is DEMAND, there is a WAY. That is, for those who don't want to claim they are homosexuals or communists or have the government call them that...
Virginity Restoration - Hymenorraphy (or hymenoplasty) is a simple operation, although a pathetic idea! In the movie "khanei ruye ab" the male gynecologist suggests 800,000 tomans to a prospective patient, but I think it's way too much (see US price - $5000-$10000! or Turkish price). It must cost less than LASIK or a nose job (rhinoplasty), and those are cheaper but far more complicated operations. So if I'm wrong about anything please comment.

If in your resume you mention Iran you might be a potential terrorist! Also if your name is "Muhammad Ali" that's bad too (I found that a bit hard to believe.)

Businesses in Tehran warned of earthquake risk. It talks about all the terrible disasters that could occur, and then says: "Mr. Danesh called on the local authorities in the area to further examine the twenty crisis mitigation proposals that his Center has drawn up."

First, bus in lots of people from the countryside to stand around weeping and hitting their chests, then Mr Khamenei can come on the TV and say "My heart is broken." Oh I have to stop now, I've become too cynical.

Nojavan is a great blog which moved from Persian to English. What can people do if they don't want to be "served" by mullahs??

What is going to happen to this country? I don't think it's possible to remove 2500 years of estebdad (arbitary rule) in just a few years. I feel ambivalent. That's why this song is so meaningful to me. Almost every line applies to Iran. Nothing really changed. Who are the mullahs grooming to replace Khatami? Larijani? Mohajerani?

I was going to put pictures to go with the words but I'm sick and I should work.

Won't Get Fooled Again by Pete Townshend

We'll be fighting in the streets
With our children at our feet
And the morals that they worship will be gone
And the men who spurred us on
Sit in judgement of all wrong
They decide and the shotgun sings the song

I'll tip my hat to the new constitution
Take a bow for the new revolution
Smile and grin at the change all around
Pick up my guitar and play
Just like yesterday
Then I'll get on my knees and pray
We don't get fooled again

The change, it had to come
We knew it all along
We were liberated from the fold, that's all
And the world looks just the same
And history ain't changed
'Cause the banners, they are flown in the next war

I'll tip my hat to the new constitution
Take a bow for the new revolution
Smile and grin at the change all around
Pick up my guitar and play
Just like yesterday
Then I'll get on my knees and pray
We don't get fooled again
No, no!

I'll move myself and my family aside
If we happen to be left half alive
I'll get all my papers and smile at the sky
Though I know that the hypnotized never lie
Do ya?

There's nothing in the streets
Looks any different to me
And the slogans are replaced, by-the-bye
And the parting on the left
Are now parting on the right
And the beards have all grown longer overnight

I'll tip my hat to the new constitution
Take a bow for the new revolution
Smile and grin at the change all around
Pick up my guitar and play
Just like yesterday
Then I'll get on my knees and pray
We don't get fooled again
Don't get fooled again
No, no!

Yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!

Meet the new boss
Same as the old boss

Oh No! I'd heard of Tehrangeles, now there is Tehranto. (Persian blog.)

British journalist killed in Iraq. This Guardian article and Scotsman article examine some of the possible reasons for his death and give a biography.

"I don’t think he really appreciated the dangers of anything," his father said.

It's not the right time for anyone to visit Iraq.

Millionaire Mullahs.

"They were not rich people, so they worked hard and always tried to help their relatives get ahead," remembers Reza, a historian who declines to use his last name and who studied with one of Rafsanjani's brothers at Tehran University in the early 1970s. "When they were in university, two brothers earned money on the side tutoring theological students and preparing their exam papers."

Michael Corleone: Fredo, you're my older brother and I love you, but don't ever take sides with anyone against the family again. Ever.

"Many small businessmen complain that as soon as you start to make some money, the leading mullah will come to you and ask for a contribution to his local charity," says an opposition economist, who declines to give his name. "If you refuse, you will be accused of not being a good Muslim. Some witnesses will turn up to testify that they heard you insult the Prophet Mohammad, and you will be thrown in jail." The Cosa Nostra meets fundamentalism.

[After being asked how he will arrange to buy a hotel from Moe Greene]

Michael Corleone: I'll make him an offer he can't refuse.

"I am just a normal person, with normal wealth," [Rafiqdoost] says.

Hyman Roth: I am just a retired investor on a pension.

Both Iranian twins die in operation. RIP, it was a courageous decision for them to try to undertake it in the first place. As you can imagine everyone at my work is unhappy about this.

"This war on terror will continue until every enemy who plots against the American people is confronted and defeated." Sometimes I think Bush (in this case Cheney) just has to grow a beard and it would be very difficult to tell him from Khamenei. It just sounds sooo familiar, because this phrase: "enemy plot" is used in Iran ad infinitum ad nauseum. Americans haven't been inoculated against this idea through leaders who have no idea how to govern except by blaming other people... I'm trying to think if in the history of the US, this phrase has been used before - I don't think even McCarthy used it, so maybe Cheney did get it from the mullahs? I hope the American people's self-criticism will help them to see through their political leaders' acts. (I found the quote by typing "enemy plots" into news.google.com - once, all you would get was Iran results, now all you see is US results!)

I've returned to Iran. I have some vignettes to share...

One day I was talking with Brendan McKay who is visiting Iran in August. Professor McKay has done much work explaining the "Bible Code" phenomenon to people in lectures and over the Internet. He's given many lectures in Israel explaining that the phenomenon can be found in any large text, for example "Moby Dick". Now, he suggested that he could talk about "Koran Codes" in Iran - how the number 19 occurs in strange ways, for example. But he was joking and I didn't realise it! It is unfortunately completely impossible and absolutely verboten to talk about things like that in Iran and leave alive - just look at Aghajari for example. It is not possible to say things like "the Koran changed over time" or to investigate it scientifically or properly. It's much worse than the New York Times article from last year describing the situation in the USA...

"Between fear and political correctness,
it's not possible to say anything other than sugary
nonsense about Islam," said one scholar at an American
university who asked not to be named, referring to the
threatened violence as well as the widespread reluctance on
United States college campuses to criticize other cultures.

"The Muslims have the benefit of hindsight of the
European experience, and they know very well that once you
start questioning the holy scriptures, you don't know where
it will stop," the scholar explained.

You can talk about how the Torah changed in Israel, but not how the Koran changed in Iran. It's a religious development issue, and when it's possible to discuss everything freely Iran will be a stronger society. Just look at the societies where these issues can be discussed.

Christopher de Bellaigue is writing a book about Iran! He is the Economist correspondent in Iran and is quite level-headed, unlike the (cough, cough) so-called American "correspondents" I fulminate regularly against.

Hoder asked how people could learn more about Iran and its people. I have a good suggestion - I've mentioned it here before. There's a book I bought in the UK called Persepolis about a girl born in 1969 growing up in Tehran. It's a magnificently illustrated cartoon book and has both hilarious and poignant dialogue. If you want to know more about Iran go out and buy it. Now.

Now it's time to go and answer all that email!

42 degrees on Wednesday is too hot for protesting, or even observing it.

I always criticise Dr Ledeen when he overestimates or exaggerates, so it's only fair to point out reputable sources that say he has understated the crackdown on students (though this is a first).

Ledeen: ... the actual number could be upwards of 6-7,000.

Asharq Al-Awsat: Over the past two weeks, more than 8,000 students have been arrested during demonstrations against the regime and religious clerics. (plus the inevitable Khatami I-will-resign threat).

What Howard Dean thinks about Iran.

Islam says everything and Islam does not say anything.

10 appalling lies about Iraq (high on Blogdex but not daypop or popdex).

Menas Associates wrote their monthly Iran report: part 1 and part 2. There were some interesting eyewitness reports of the protests.

Most interesting of all was the frontpage symposium (via iranvajahan). I have so much to say about it, but I'll sit on my hands for now.

I should have talked about Ledeen again. He
wrote "...Western reporters there are on a tight leash — the regime has banned all journalists and photographers from the sites of demonstrations, so the "reports" are almost always based on second-hand information". Now that isn't true. The reporters who I know are too busy reporting to waste time correcting such statements. I don't want to waste time either. But I felt I had to write because other influential bloggers write rubbish like "Mr. Ledeen is the best informed Western journalist on the situation in Iran." Does FOX News have a correspondent here yet??

What is a good idiomatic way to translate "ghofl-e-kar kojast?"

I'm going to the UK for 9 days, so I want to relax and not think about politics. Sorry if I haven't replied to your email yet.

Here's a simple chess challenge for you from a fun game of mine yesterday. What is my (White's) best move? (diagram thanks to epd2diag)

1. e4 e5 2. f4 d5 3. ed Qd5 4. Nc3 Qd4? 5. Nf3 Qf4 6. d4 Qf5 7. de Bb4 8. Bd3 Bc3 9. bc Qh5 10. Bg5 Bg4?

In this surreal world, Americans and Australians get to see Jafar Panahi's latest film Crimson Gold before Iranians (if it's ever shown here). On the same site, Deep Breath (another Iranian film) is reviewed, and the film Paradise is somewhere else is showing at the Karlovy Vary festival. Kiarostami is visiting the Melbourne festival:

"One of the reasons we pursued quite vigorously to have Kiarostami to come to Australia is because our view of the Middle East is completely 'media-tised'," [the director] said.

"It's important to bring him in here to say, if nothing else, there is a rich cultural life in Iran."

The last sentence has two interpretations: I could twist it to mean "even if there is no other kind of life in Iran, a rich cultural life exists"!

Yesterday I saw A house built on water which I thought was pretentious. It pushes the boundaries of acceptability, so a heavily censored version was shown.

I can kill two birds with one stone. I wanted to discuss safety at work in Iran. If you come to Iran, you will see taxis with no seatbelts, people working on jackhammers without ear protection, people welding without masks, people riding girders at construction sites to the tops of buildings, and definitely no hard hats. Perhaps you will also see some graffiti about 18 Tir (July 9) which the construction workers partially erased out of fear. They are afraid of the government, but not bricks falling on their heads. They are also boiling tar in barrels with an open flame...

I am drooling over the G5. But how will I afford the dual 2Ghz G5, a new laptop with wireless, and do all the travel I want to do?

So I'm being quoted by Mark Steyn, (who has become an editor for The Spectator) after the mention by Michael Ledeen. My humorous comment concerns whether Muslims are praying less regularly in Tehran, and I can't interview everyone and find out. I just rely on what I see and statistics. (By the way it's easy to find "The Economist" in Tehran but I've never seen "The Spectator".)

There's a bad pun at the end too... "Ayatollah, Don't Khomeini Closer". I am moved to quote Bob Monkhouse as his pun hasn't appeared on the Net yet - "to make a pun about an Israeli, Israeli impossible!"

Oh I don't know what to write about today! I'll just give links. ML Kotru writes about his experiences in Iran in 1979. He calls Khamenei a "high priest" which makes me think of Judaism.

An American is visiting Iran. One of the people with him/her has delusions of uniqueness about that: "A said that I might be the first American to visit Arak. Somehow I doubt that.", cool analogies to American phrases: "The Koran Belt" and observations about banks: "Life in Iran will break you one way or another." I say the main problem is a lack of self-criticism, but he/she says there's a culture of victimhood: "Unfortunately a lot of Iranians like to be victims and are still waiting for god, in the form of Uncle Sam, to come and free them." Also, traffic is like Tetris! Ah, I wish I could come up with these kinds of analogies and comparisons, but it takes effort. I'd rather type and not think. I have a book called How to be more interesting which my sister gave me which should help, if I ever got around to reading it.

There are many Americans in Iran, but they keep a lower profile than this. The bad old days of being arrested for being American are long gone. Any American considering visiting, do come, if you have visa problems, ask at Thorn Tree, because some Americans are reporting success in obtaining visas. Even if you're female and travelling alone.

An "intelligence official" working for Hekmatyar? He must have described himself as that. Would the Associated Press have described someone working for bin Laden like that? Until February 2002, Hekmatyar used to live in Niavaran, an exclusive suburb of north Tehran, and was once expelled from the military academy in Kabul for homosexuality. (Read the book Afghanistan Behind the Smoke Screen for more dirt on him.)

Azam wrote about people from the MKO burning themselves. In April 2003, a suicide specialist in Iran wrote about the reasons for this happening in Iran. In fact he found that 70% of suicides in Ilam province were women. As far as I know, Iran (just Ilam?) and Afghanistan are the only countries where women commit suicide more than men; in all other countries men far outnumber women in this regard. It is no surprise that both are very patriarchal cultures. Also, Bemani is a movie which has self-immolation as part of its theme.

Lady Sun suggests some people think right-wing pressure groups (like Ansar-e-Hizbollah) are being paid by Americans! I could become angry and say "what a retarded concept!". However their beliefs are up to them. People having such beliefs only condemn Iran to more backwardness. Conspiracy theories are linked to blaming others for your problems, which is why many people say that it is "Afghan Arabs", and not fellow Iranians, who are beating up the protesters. Blaming outsiders cannot possibly solve Iran's problems. You can imagine what uneducated Iranians believe! E.g. "the world's economy is controlled by Jews", Ayatollah Mesbah-Yazdi talking about the former head of the CIA visiting Iran etc. I've even talked to a top student at the School of International Relations (who should know better) who was prepared to give credence to the belief that the CIA planned September 11. My friend from SIR understands English well, and got the idea from Patrick Martin. The cure for this kind of warped, crazy belief is world travel and an end to Iran's international isolation.

Elaine Sciolino has a great quote from the Shah about nuclear weapons. I read the Shah's "Answer to History" where he wrote about his huge nuclear power ambitions, but I didn't know that he publicly spoke of his weapons ambitions before now.

Analysts considers implications of Bush's statement on Iran.

The argument that the United States was engaging in selective enforcement of a strict standard against Iran while other countries have developed nuclear weapons without such U.S. threats left Clawson unmoved. Those other countries do not organize public demonstrations around the theme of "death to America" and are not on the U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism, he said.

It's a very tiring slogan, and it's long past time to kill it.

A few days ago I said I haven't seen basij roadblocks for a while, but around the Ozgol junction at night I have been now, that's because it's on the way to Tehran Pars.

Donkey wedding staged to bring rain. I thought they only had donkey weddings in Tabriz. I guess I was wrong.

I'm obsessed with definitions of "soosool"!

"They (Iran's government) think that everything happening there is my fault and that the protesters are just sissies who want to dance," Atabay said referring to the clerics' bans on dancing and pop music.

You live in Shahrak-e-Gharb, 30, unmarried, unemployed, been to 11 countries, but you can't pay me 5000 tomans an hour ($US6) for English teaching? OK, there are plenty of other fish in the sea.

Pensive Persian arrives in Tehran and extrapolates from the traffic to the internal situation. He exaggerates about the pollution, but not the traffic. "When there is no respect for others and no indication of mutual concern and co-operation, a people will make themselves vulnerable to the Shahs and Ayatollahs of the world." (link via Steppenwolf).

I got impatient with International Crisis Group so I emailed them and asked them when their next Iran report was coming out. This was the reply:

My colleagues are working on an Iran report, but no date is yet set for publication. Do keep in touch, or keep an eye on or website, www.crisisweb.org.

Dar al Hayat from Saudi Arabia writes: "...unless the Iranian people start insulting Khomeini himself instead of Khamenei, the chances are slim for a second popular revolution that would compensate for the first one." My theory for improving Iran is like Whoman's, start with the easier, social issues like traffic. But if things were to really change, the omnipresent pictures should come down. However, the last thing to change in Iraq was the statues.

The BBC enlightens the outside world about the problems within the universities, if Mehdi's post below and ibelievethat Sharif students didn't explain it for you. "I pray for the day happiness shines on all women and men in Iran."

Time for reformers to resign by Ahmad Sadri. "A political system devoid of resignations must be viewed with suspicion." It was an excellent article.

Iranians write to the BBC. There are some people who are just like Khamenei living in a dream world: "I used to dream of living in the US. But under George W Bush it has become a police state, far worse than Iran and perhaps as bad as Nazi Germany." When I was in the US (March and April 2003) I saw many many peaceful protests about all sorts of issues (the Iraq war, sugar companies, the Everglades in Florida, even signs all through Americus, GA saying the mayor and police chief were part of an "axis of evil" and should be fired - "boot chief yates"!) and there were no thugs to beat anyone up. The worst that happened was Clear Channel (lots of radio stations are owned by them) sponsoring pro-war rallies. Obviously this Iranian guy has never been there. There's so much ignorance about other countries, all over the world, what can I do?

I got some email from an American in NYC with the subject "Reality Check" and body "are you really blogging from Iran?" and I said "yes, why do you doubt me?". Then she wrote back and said "Because isn't Iran a police state where they will drag you into jail for saying human things and beat you up or worse?". And I have been thinking about how to answer this. Initially I was quite angry, like Salam Pax was, thinking "why doesn't she believe I'm in Iran?" Then I got the reply and realised it was a good question, it's difficult to see into Iran from the USA.

I want to start by being positive. (Steppenwolf got in trouble with someone for saying you can't have a boyfriend/girlfriend in Iran, which is not really true.) You can speak freely in taxis, or with people you know well. It's not like Russia under Stalin or Iraq under Saddam. There's no "secret police" to turn you in for making subversive statements privately. It is partly democratic. Many newspapers have been closed, but there's lots of political debate within limits in those that are still open. An American professor from New Jersey visited here a while ago, and you should read his report. Unless you say something loudly and publicly and non-anonymously, nothing will happen. Signing petitions is not a problem unless the mullahs think you're part of an organised group.

Problems occur if someone famous "says" something publicly in opposition to the mullahs, like Ahmad Batebi, Montazeri, Aghajari, Abbas-Amir Entezam, Ali Afshari, or something the mullahs don't like, like Sina Motallebi, or lots of other political prisoners whose names I can't remember.

But if you're a nobody like me, and you write anonymously and in English, no-one will care. (I hope.)

Iraqi women forced to veil. Oh No, Not Again.

"It's an issue of people's rights - it's an issue not only of women's rights, but human rights - and people have a right to choose whether or not they wear the veil, what religion they practise, how they practise that religion," [UNICEF] chief told the BBC.

I walk past a UNICEF building in Abbasabad quite often. There's an armed guard outside, I always wonder why a children's fund needs an armed guard outside. Does UNICEF say anything about Iranian women who don't want to wear the veil?

And now I must write something positive! I'll think about it.

Christian Science Monitor gives one English translation of soosool:

"You define yourself by your enemies, and those were the superpowers back then," the analyst says. "But now they are fighting young people who put gel in their hair. That's the enemy. So it's demeaning, and not at all elevating for their self-image."

In news that's been completely ignored by international news agencies, Hashem Aghajari's sentence was reduced on appeal to four years in prison and a five-year ban from teaching. It's a good issue for the students to protest about, but maybe they have forgotten him. Also, Babak Payami, the director of "Secret Ballot" was arrested leaving the Russian embassy and is out on bail. Azam wrote about the 20 forbidden things on the Iranian internet and Ebrahim Nabavi's letter.

Mehdi lives in the Tehran University dormitory. He's been getting thousands of hits a day! Here is an English translation of the first part of his blog entry for June 14.

I left behind 3 days and 3 nights full of scandal. Only the first night of rioting was relatively quiet; it was about privatisation of the universities. But not the following nights. Even the people of Ansar savagely attacked the dormitories of Chamran. Take a look at these pictures. They are self-explanatory.




A group of people wanted to enter from the south-east door of Gisha; with military force they settled down there and there was heavy conflict. Groups and individuals and political wings with different purposes and intentions exacerbated the conflict and chaos, whether in the country or outside. I even heard satellite channels in some cases by broadcasting these scenes were encouraging the people to come into the streets. Among the students some people thought they were representatives of other students. In some cases they made unnecessary and mistaken decisions that mostly exacerbated the currents of chaos. From my point of view, I think the thuggish and illogical behaviour of the students, non-students, militia or Ansar was common to all. By the way, the number of students attending the conflict may not have reached 2000. I mean something between 1000 and 2000 people were involved, and the rest were unintentionally caught up in the incidents.

Graphic Gooya pictures. In the day of the internet, if anyone in the outside world cares, Iranians don't need someone like Ahmad Batebi to hold up t-shirts so much. Perhaps "The Economist" can get a good picture of this weeks' protests if the Israel/Palestine events don't overshadow it, and then the mullahs will be in severe difficulties.

Last night, the fourth night of the protests, I met a Reuters journalist, Jon. Jon has been in Iraq for a while, but has returned recently. I asked Jon how he estimated crowd sizes and he said it was just experience, and to think of a football stadium for example. A Manchester United match could be 50000 people. Before Jon left to go cover the protests (with his gas mask!), someone said to him to be careful because a Japanese reporter and his interpreter had been arrested. Any foreigners in the area would probably be treated with great suspicion. People were saying everywhere was crowded, the IR was going to end soon. Many soosools were protesting (can someone translate that term?).

I stayed behind and watched "Dr Strangelove". I hadn't seen it before, the video quality was bad and Dr S was difficult to understand. It was rather eerie. Of course I thought of what would happen if the mullahs got nukes. What would a regime whose ideology is centered around death and martyrdom understand of the notion of a nuclear deterrent?

This morning I read Jon's report and I was glad I wasn't with him! The New York Times report wasn't so good, because they equated basij and ansar-e-hezbollah. Ansar are more extremist and there are many more basiji than ansars. Basij are morality police who set up checkpoints to see if unrelated men and women are together and look for Western music or alcohol. I haven't seen checkpoints for a while now. Ansar don't do anything except beat people up, as they go around on their 1000cc motorcycles (more than 250cc is illegal here, unless you have connections, as they obviously do). But they are both mindlessly obedient to the Leader.

I had a discussion recently about the Iranian price of a Nissan Maxima (~$US50-60000) whereas the actual cost is about half that. The same is true for Kia Prides; the Economist reported that in Syria better quality Kia Prides are sold for less than half of the $US8000 they cost in Iran. The difference goes to the government here, who are thieves. I also talked to a professor about the car accident death rate Hooman commented on below. We agreed that I was wrong because it should be deaths per passenger mile, which means that the Iranian death rate is more than 10 times as bad, because passenger miles are much higher in the US than in Iran. Certainly, there are severe social as well as political problems here.

Elsewhere in the Middle East, HAMAS gives travel advice for Israel, asking foreigners to leave. The prophet Isaiah said "my house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations" but it doesn't look like that's going to be true for a long time. Terrorists have other ideas... Another Haaretz article explained what Israel's actions look like to Palestinians, and what the consequences will be:

Therefore the PA has only one answer to the question why Israel decided to eliminate Rantisi now and not several months ago, when there was no dialogue with the PA and when there was no Israeli commitment to the road map - Israel wanted to stop the peace process. ...

Senior PA officials were already talking yesterday about how "thanks to Israel, the Hamas now has another national hero who at least in the near future will dictate the atmosphere."

In Tehran, more people know the direction to point their satellite dish than the direction to Mecca!

Iran denies UN nuclear team access to electric company. It won't go down well at next week's meeting. Yesterday Rumsfeld talked about Iranian nuclear ambitions.

Data on traffic accidents in Israel. I can learn some things about Iran from that... July and August are the most dangerous months, 5-7pm the most dangerous times. Death rate in Iran is >20000 per year and about 40000 per year in the USA. I used to think of it as number of people (USA = 290m, Iran=70m) but obviously there are many more cars in the USA. I read that in 2001 there were about 2.5 million cars in Iran, and 290m people in the USA, so approx. 145m cars in the USA. There are 5 million cars in Iran, half in Tehran, and 10m by 2008. so... death rate of 0.4% per car per year. Can that be right? (0.03% in USA).

Dormitory is looking worse for the wear.

One of the slogans of the students (same as four years ago): "Ansar jenayat mikonad, rahbar hemayat mikonad". (The followers (of Hizbollah) commit crimes and the Leader (Khamenei) supports them.)

Gooya reported that the students had arrested 3 ansars and wanted a prisoner swap :-)

Iranian Reformist Newspaper Promotes Democracy Without Americans. The things the yas-e-no editor says to foreign publications! Inshallah it's a sign of better times to come.

Thousands protest in Iran. I didn't hear about it until I read it on the net this morning. Which satellite TV channel was that?

Last night I went to a house in Darrus to meet a prospective new English student, and the family had four dogs: a pekinese, a daschund, a poodle, and a shih-tzu. My landlord has a dog and a cat, because he has space for them. But my apartment is too small.

Azam quotes the Iranian proverb that "a knife does not cut its own handle". But Mr Probitas suggests he will end it all soon.

Egypt bans "The Matrix Reloaded". "The first film was shown in Egypt, but was criticised by some Islamic newspapers, which claimed it espoused Zionism." Such nuttiness! They see Zionist plots everywhere, just like the leaders here.

NIGHTLIFE. Tehran's nightclubs are renowned throughout the Middle East, which doesn't mean that the visiting foreigner will find them to his taste. The most westernized of these are located in or around the large hotels: Arya Sheraton, Intercontinental, Hilton (Persian Room, dinner-dancing from 9 p.m. to 2 a.m.); International (tea dance on Fridays at 5 p.m.); Park, Marmar Tavern, etc...

Most of the discothèques are on Pahlavi Ave., Baccara, Casba, Cave d' Argent, Le Château, Miami; or on Kouroosh-e-Kabir Ave., Borsalino, Harlem, Bohème, Cheminée, Lane Kaboutar; Markis, opposite the Iran American Cultural Society, Vozara St. The Moulin Rouge at Ferdowsi, Sevome Esfand St., offers entertainment in the local style. Private boxes are available.

Tehran's best cabaret is the Shekoufeh Now, Simetri Ave. The Copacabana, Takht-e-Jamshid Ave., also presents a show.

BARS. Between Shah Reza and Takht-e-Jamshid Aves. there are a dozen establishments of very special character where you can have a drink in the company of charming hostesses. A glass of iced tea sipped in such surroundings will cost you 300 Rs, which is not exactly a bargain.

There are also bars in the international clubs and large hotels. The bar in the Hotel Marmar is very fashionable (once a week, caviar is served on the house; the barman is a great character). Also fashionable are the Xanadu bar (beer on tap; attractive setting) and the Tehran Club bar (open fireplace).

Added suggestions for touring grand-dukes: Boccacio, Roosevelt Ave.; Lido, Shahabad Ave.; Rainbow,Shah Reza Ave. and Forsat St. As a general rule, bars stay open very late.

"Fodor's Iran 1979", by Richard Moore and Peter Sheldon, David McKay Company, New York, pp131-2

Here is a book review of "Religious Minorities in Iran" which I mentioned here a while ago, having seen it at last year's Tehran International Book Fair. "Iranian secularists and the left have done themselves no favours in their own lack of sympathy for the Baha'is. This is not because they may or may not have legitimate grievances about the religion, but because it portrays a continuing inability to understand what human rights are about." What can I say other than "he is right"? I don't have a solution. The measure of the humanity of a society is in how it treats its most marginalized citizens. Admzad has similar criticisms, but again no answers. He thinks that hatred is one of the features of Iranian culture. If you know a prominent Iranian in Iran who's spoken against the treatment of Bahai's in Iran please comment.

I was mentioned by Michael Ledeen as "one of the other bloggers" in his article. He didn't address my criticisms of him. He doesn't admit his own mistakes.

I've been looking at the Lonely Planet Iran guidebook... "...wages are lamentable by Western standards..."

Is it possible to measure how curious and knowledgeable about the outside world Iranians are? A review of Amir Taheri's "The cauldron: the middle east behind the headlines" suggested:

"And,yet, it is remarkable how misunderstood the Middle East is in the West. ( The reverse is even more true: as the author of this book shows , Middle Easterners know even less about the West and much of what they know is fantasy!)"

I couldn't find that quote in the book when I looked at it in the US. I think it is true (I need to add many nuances though - later!), but quotes like this about a certain Californian at the Lonely Planet thorntree don't increase my confidence...

``An example of American decadence: Got a neighbor three houses away who has 3 SUVs! One for himself, one for his wife and one for his 16-year old daughter. Each SUV sports an American flag. He also has an American flag attached to his garage and one on a flag pole in his front lawn. He's constantly yelling at his wife and daughter, and he allows his two dogs (German shepherds) to run the neighborhood and shit on other people's lawns. He worships George W. Bush to the point of telling everyone that Bush's profile should be carved on Mt. Rushmore, and he thinks we should nuke Iran because "they're a bunch of commies!". Michael Moore would have a field day with this guy! ''

I saw a lot of SUVs and houses with large American flags and Republican stickers in the Deep South. I'll see if I can find a good picture.

Guardians' council rejects referendum bill. Khatami will stay on to 2005, read the EIU analysis while waiting for the ICG analysis. If you're staying in Iran only in the hope that things will improve, I say leave.

Australian police raid Iranian homes. "She talked to them and said if you want to get the terrorists, you've got to go to Iranian embassy, not here, you've got the wrong people."

The streets are covered with pictures of Khomeini for the 14th and 15th of Khordad holidays. I remember the book "Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television" well, it is one of my favourites and I refer to it all the time. In the book, the author Jerry Mander (his real name) quotes a Hopi Indian theory that whatever you look at the most or meditate upon, you become like. In fact the idea is present in many world cultures and religions. He uses this and other ideas about how light enters in the top of your head to argue against TV. If you see Khomeini's unsmiling face everywhere and keep seeing it all the time, it will probably have a bad effect on you. Another word to describe the Iranian government is "necrocracy", government in the name of the dead (I read this in some Khomeini biography). In every country there is a dictator, you see his picture everywhere... in Iran, you see the dead dictator everywhere. It might be the same in Syria, with Hafez and Bashar al-Assad pictures everywhere, but I don't know.

The most important point for me, however, is that if the government spent on traffic a fraction of the time they spend on signs, Iranians wouldn't be treated worse than Swiss dog shit. The rule of law would be enforced and many of the problems of Iranian society would disappear at once.

Some links on how the US helped Iran with their nuclear program before the revolution. Dilip Hiro probably has a good book about this.

Slashdot has an article advising you to buy a bad computer for US college, because you won't be able to play games and if you work it out you're probably spending $1 a minute on classes!

Russia 'halting Iran nuclear help'.

Persepolis a comic book about an Iranian childhood. (see news.google.com for links) Interview with the author.

Khatami stalls for time; Mullah's Manhattan Project from instapundit. The author suggests a pre-emptive strike on Iranian nuclear facilities... Let's not invade Iran based on weak "intelligence". Menas Associates has a page about Iran I found through some Reuters article.

Iran brain drain article on BBC. I am not sure that going to India is such a big improvement...
"Everyone wants to leave because of the economic problems, because of the social conditions facing young people," [he] said. It talks about English teaching here, but what it doesn't mention is how terrible the quality of teaching in Tehran is... people learn English grammar in school but not how to speak. I've met lots of people who have a degree in "English translation" from Azad Islamic University (four years!) that can't speak a word!! I wanted to talk about this: if you can speak English well, then you can leave, but if you can't, then you are out of luck because the main countries built on immigration (Canada, US, UK, Australia, NZ, South Africa even) are all English-speaking countries.

OK, some pictures from yesterday. I went to Darakeh again, arriving at 6:30am... walked for a few hours, had ash-reshteh, talked about mathematics problems... then I went to a gathering in a walled garden near Tajrish. Remember, "paradise" originally came from a Persian word meaning "walled garden". It was really great. In fact I went into the wrong place at first and it had to belong to a (dollar) millionaire... when I got to the actual place, it was even better and I could hardly believe I was in Tehran... of course, the area is full of magnificent houses no-one lives in... anyway, pictures tell the story best.

Eric Robert Rudolph arrested, I remember reading about this guy and thinking he would never be caught...

The Waldorf transcripts showing how Powell and Straw doubted the evidence... it reminds me of the joke about the preacher's notes... "argument weak here, shout loudly!"

Apathy in Iran. Finally, an article quoting people who live here. British Airways has 5 flights a week to Tehran now.

Iran holds Saif al-Adel. So what was he doing here?

A specialist on US-EU relations says: "U.S. hawks were privately pressing for pre-emptive strikes to destroy Iran's nuclear facilities, as Israel did with Iraq's nuclear reactor in 1981." Utilitarianism says: if everyone had the same pre-emptive policy as the US, what would the world look like? Would it be a safer place? I suppose looking at the big picture, it is Iran that needs to make concessions now, because the EU policy on Iran is going nowhere. Otherwise the EU policy will become closer to the US policy.

David Warren says Michael Ledeen is the best informed Western journalist on Iran? Is this really what people in the West think? I hope not.

I went through my nedstat links (see that graph over there?) and came to... Iranian or Canadian which has a horror story about a guy who was born in Iran but now has a Canadian passport travelling to the US. From there I went to where's my elephant which had a BBC link about Rumsfeld saying Iraq destroyed its WMD before the war. Does this make sense to you? I'm sure there's a big contradiction there somewhere, someone just needs to write a good web page about it, putting all the statements by Powell, Bush, Rumsfeld, Blix, Ritter etc together.

Disaffected Muslim is interesting. He/she is very articulate, self-aware and self-critical and I pretty much agree with everything he/she says. And I love dogs too! Little Green Footballs writes critically about the Muslim world, but I didn't like the guy's coverage of Rachel Corrie, for example. Just as it's possible for some to be anti-Israel in a kneejerk way, LGF is pro-Israel in the same way.

Wired News writes more about Iranian bloggers.

I patiently await the next International Crisis Group report about Iran. Possibly before June 16 (IAEA meeting), almost certainly before August 5 (one year since their last Iran report).

Chess in Kabul by Frans M. Hoynck van Papendrecht. Boys and girls get to play, and the article has good pictures too. Khomeini banned chess in Iran until 1988 and then Mullah Omar of the Taliban banned chess in Afghanistan. Note that Kabul is more liberal than the rest of the country.

"Prior to the Ayatollah, Iran, under the Shah, was the only Islamic country that organized chess and participated in chess tournaments, including the 22nd chess olympiad in Israel in 1976 (in Haifa)." (from the above link.)

I went to Kolakchal today and because it was Tuesday there were no people. That deserves pictures too!

Lieberman favours regime change in Iran:

"There's no nation in the world where the government is more anti-American and the people are more pro-American then Iran," he told FNS host Tony Snow. "And that's the equation we have to flip."

So, the USA should make the people anti-American and the government pro-American! Like the Arab countries, in other words...

Lots of other news in links: Iran Says It Holds No Senior Al Qaeda Members; two-faced Iran hiding Osama bomb goons; (what a classic tabloid headline) Iranian lawmakers protest to ayatollah; IIFM membership for Iran; Australian foreign minister's remarks in Iran; Azar Nafisi in The Atlantic; Ruzegar-ye-ma review; (sounds like the profiled presidential candidate would have been much more in touch than Khatami!) Lady Sun complains about having to wear socks.

Lastly, Cannes is going downhill... (switch to Venice)

"The poor quality of the pool this year -- a view shared by many -- raises questions about the French festival's traditional hegemony and festival director Gilles Jacob's unabashed reverence for directors based on their reputations rather than their most recent results."

SNSC bans publication of letter to Khamenei. (from ibelievethat). How ironic, to ban the publication of a letter which in part complains about the lack of press freedom! Khatami is the chairman of the SNSC.

Sen Robert Byrd writes "The Truth Will Emerge" concerning Iraq (from eyeranian)... the san francisco chronicle writes about regime change in Iran:

"Iran's hard-line government, accused by the Bush administration of harboring top al-Qaida members, poses a big problem for the United States and should be replaced, lawmakers said Sunday."

What would this sound like if we switched "Iran" and "the United States", then changed "Bush" to "Khamenei" and "al-Qaida" to "MKO"?

"According to someone" is an article in which the ombudsman of the Washington Post claims that, despite the Jayson Blair scandal, all their quotes from anonymous intelligence officials about Iran will be real quotes. He acknowledges the problems with anonymous sources.

Finally the Australian foreign minister talks to Khatami and Kharrazi, and it's reported in Australia this way and Iran this way. (Of course Iran Daily plays up the "blame America" angle, can't they think of something new?)

Yesterday I went to Darakeh again. The mountains were full of basiji wearing keffiyehs, and women in chadors. Some had green, red and white headbands. People were giving out free saffron drinks, and later free zam-e-zam soft drinks. The reason behind all these strange events was the commemoration of 3rd Khordad 1361/24th May 1982, the victory at Khorramshahr. There are lots of cloth murals up again.

I played some chess there... there was one interesting position, which I should convert to a jpg file in keeping with the new graphic style here!

Iran denies accusations about al-Qaeda. The interesting point about the Guardian article was that it mentioned European diplomats also say al-Qaida is in Iran. Also an Arab newspaper is quoted saying Saad bin Laden is there.

The pictures below are of chelo-kebab at the ali baba restaurant. They are for Mr Plate but anyone else is welcome to look and salivate :-)

Khatami won't resign. I told you this was a "game", didn't I?

"The administration of Mr. Khatami is very hopeful about the future of economic, social and cultural progress and thus the issue of resignation is out of the question."

Yes, everyone I meet is just so full of optimism! They are skipping and bouncing along the street, as money flitters out from their pockets! But they are making so much, it isn't worth their time to stop and pick it up! Happy happy joy joy!

"The future of the regime is very bright." Good good good. The problems are all in your mind! Just keep being happy and everything will be OK!

I intended to write about Iran's forex rate, it seems artificial... here is the first article I found.

Roya on I Believe That wrote about how annoying it is to go to university and have your clothes examined every time you go in, and that Larijanivision had a documentary concluding the problem was with women. Let's look at today's news, and see if men are responsible for any problems in Iranian society.

"Dishonored" truck driver beheads niece in public. I need to step outside myself, and be as objective as possible - is this an "Islamic" or "Middle Eastern" problem? Because I haven't heard about this kind of thing happening outside of these two "cultures" - whereever in the world it happens, there always seems to be some kind of "Islamic" or "Middle Eastern" connection. And another thing - it's always the MALE who's doing it, I've never heard of a story where an aunt/mother cut off her son's head because he was dating or had sex. You can tell me I'm wrong in the comments, if you think I'm wrong. That is, you can say it's just a problem of patriarchy, and certain cultures are backward in these areas. I have been thinking along these lines for a while - when women become emancipated, they have fewer children, and so patriarchal cultures are invariably dominant. I haven't read this idea anywhere, but I'm sure it's been discussed.

After more searching... "Honor killing is an Islamic duty" says the Islamic Action Front of Jordan; what is the Islamic view of honor killing?; "honor killing does not exist in Islamic law"; Anakultur "...organizes 8th of March celebrations in the most remote parts of the region [southeast Turkey] during the minimum of 2 hours celebration programme we talk to both to fathers, husbands, brothers and to the local authorities individually. Trying to explain to them that this practice of honour killing has nothing to do with the religion." So while the murderers and their supporters use Islam to justify honor killings, the majority who are horrified by such killings say Islam has nothing to do with it.

Once, the New York Times interviewed Molla Hassani (an ultra-conservative from Orumiyeh in the NE of Iran) and the journalist noticed that he was obsessed with stoning as a punishment for WOMEN, but never mentioned it once as a punishment for MEN. How can this be? On the one hand, Khamenei condemns honor killings, but on the other hand, this is the land of virginity testing and stoning to death for adultery.

On Sunday night I went to Chelo Kebab Ali Baba, immediately north of Vali-Asr Square. If you want to get away from people, this is a good place to go, because it has been practically empty every time I have been there. Remember that Tehran is like New York with 60 million people. (So why isn't the restaurant popular with young people, and how do they make money with no customers?) On the wall instead of pictures of Khomeini and Khamenei there are pictures of Khomeini and Taleghani. The decor and the pictures have not changed since 1979; in the West it would be promoted as "retro".

Aghdasieh Restaurant is also good. You can buy bread there without standing in line... the reason I'm going to so many restaurants is that while I was in the US, the power failed in my flat (for two months) and everything in my fridge died. I'm still trying to get rid of the smell!

Last Thursday I went to Darabad with a professor and a student visiting from the Netherlands. Because we went the wrong way at first, the way became difficult and my companions became fearful of walking across a sheer dirt slope. I was wearing bad shoes, with smooth soles, but I got to the other side and took amusing pictures of them with my new digital camera! On the way back I talked to the professor about a conference he and I are going to in the UK next month. The professor said recently he was talking to a woman who said getting a visa was easy! He said, "What time did you arrive at the British embassy?" and she said 5am! This seems perfectly normal in Iran, some people had stayed overnight!

Complaining is quite usual of course, this post was inspired by recent stories on Face It about how humiliating it is to obtain a visa, and the sort of humiliation Tehran airport officials put Iranians through. OK. So, I said to the professor, "Let me tell you what it is like to be in the British Embassy. Many diplomats live inside the compound. One day, after Friday prayers, the ansar-e-hizbollah (thugs who Mr Janati pays) turn up and throw bricks at your house, breaking all the windows. Then, they start throwing Molotov cocktails, eggs, tomatos etcetera. This happens very often for a period of several weeks. Another day, someone drives a pick-up truck full of gas cylinders into the wall of your house, killing himself, and then people start handing out leaflets saying he was a shahid/suicide bomber. Remember, it is a diplomatic compound, this is like an attack on the UK itself. And now you are asking why they treat Iranians so badly???" And he said, "but what if you are a head of department at a famous university (like he was) and have been to this same conference four times before? I will ring them to get an appointment and if they don't give me a reasonable time for an appointment then I won't go!" He has obviously developed ways of dealing with the stress in Iran under IRI (and he doesn't have economic problems), but the people like the ones on the Face It blog are desperate to get out, what can they do?

In passing: Mr Zarif doesn't realise that attacks on embassies are attacks on the territory of that country either. (from smccdi).

``M. Javad Zarif, Iran's United Nations ambassador, says Iran "has not invaded any neighboring country" for two centuries.

Since it is international law that a foreign embassy is the sovereign soil of the country represented, the Iranian invasion and hostage-taking of American diplomats from November 1979 to January 1981 stands in stark contrast to Mr. Zarif's assertion.''

The real saving private Lynch (from Face It) it's old but really interesting, I had to link to it.

US claims al-Qaeda operations chief in Iran and that Riyadh attacks ordered from there. Jeddah, Nairobi, Kuala Lumpur, or London, where will the next suicide attack be?

I saw a film last night Deserted Station at Asr-e Jadid cinema. (You can buy tickets on the net there, though I didn't for this). It was a terrible film and at the end I wondered what it was about. It must have been one of those "festival" films.

Iran steps up gas and oil ties with India (note remarks about Gujarat below). Jews of Morocco link. The Register writes about how Lawrence Lessig says the Internet is dying...

Jeff Jarvis gave me a link (Hooman told me about it), so maybe I'll get some visitors. A few days ago I wrote about an article by William Beeman studying the influence of Michael Ledeen. I posted some comments, which I'll repost here, because the article has gone stale now.

My problem with Dr Ledeen is the inaccuracy of some of his reports on National Review Online. Here are two examples:

1. He has written many times that Montazeri issued a fatwa against suicide bombing in April 2002 (Jewish World Review and National Review Online) and was quoted by David Warren, former CIA director James Woolsey, iranian.com, Glenn Frazier, Andrew Sullivan and many others.

Whereas Bill Samii of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reported the same statement as:
"Montazeri backs suicide bombers" and Christopher de Bellaigue, the Economist correspondent for Iran, in the New York Review of Books simply
saw the statement as endorsing a two-state solution.

If you can read Persian, you can find the original statement here. There is no condemnation of suicide bombing. He is just saying the two peoples should move towards peace.

2. Along with SMCCDI, he's always writing about huge demonstrations which aren't happening! (The-regime-is-about-to-fall type writing.) Apathy characterises the situation here best. In one article he wrote about a demonstration where women burned their headscarves in public (after SMCCDI). Lots of Iranians reading the blog hoder.com had never heard about it.

I've always found "The Economist" to be the most objective English publication about the size of the demonstrations. The correspondent (who actually lives in Iran, unlike Ledeen) wrote in the New York Review of Books about the hype:

In the November 25 on-line edition of National Review, Michael Ledeen claimed that "something like half a million" Iranians had taken to the streets on November 22, "to demonstrate their disgust with the regime of the Islamic Republic." On December 6, in the same publication, he misrepresented events as follows: "The revolution is being led by students, workers, intellectuals, and military officers and soldiers."

So far as I know, Ledeen hasn't visited Iran since the days of Iran-contra —in which, acting as a consultant to Ronald Reagan's administration, he played a small and inglorious part.[*] His distorted analysis of events in Iran—which conflicts diametrically with my own experience—has unaccountably been given a platform by The Wall Street Journal and The Financial Times. It would be interesting to know the sources of the information he and other conservative American commentators have been circulating about Iran.

(The de Bellaigue article's criticism of Ledeen has previously been noted at Blog Left and Cobban. But it's supposed to be copyright, so hasn't been noticed much in the blogosphere.)
For someone who has such massive influence, these kinds of mistakes are disturbing. Apart from the language barrier and the closed nature of Iran increasing the likelihood of such mistakes, these errors are the kind of things Westerners would LIKE to believe, so they get propagated extensively in English language media.

It could be just that he is getting wrong information from his sources, of course, but the kind of incidents reported in the NY Review of Books article above really make it clear that on-the-ground sources have much higher credibility. However such sources don't always have the wide distribution that Ledeen does.

Unfortunately I don't get many visitors to this blog, so I told William Beeman about the above and I'll see what happens. (Once in some comments on I believe that I took Ledeen's word on the fatwa, but there's no evidence for it except for Ledeen himself.)

US State Department launches new Persian web site. So, if you're Iranian and you can't GO to the US, at least you can read about it...

Q & A on the Saudi terror attacks. "[The terrorists] want foreigners to leave and to eventually bring down the Saudi government and replace it with a government which adhers much more strictly to the Wahhabi interpretation of Islam." If they succeed, there goes the foreign direct investment, they can all watch as their society goes down the toilet! I wonder how they will make Arabia more "Islamic"? Isn't it already like the Taliban was in many ways? That's the problem with mixing religion and state, you can never have too much religion for some people.

(Muse to self: The Chechen bombing killed more people (>=54 versus >=29), but this gets more attention in the world media. In Chechnya, an order of magnitude more Muslims are dying than in Palestine, but this gets little attention in all media. The Iranian media pays no attention because they don't want to antagonise Russia (nuclear technology), because their state Khomeinist ideology focuses on Israel, and because the whole Israel/Palestine issue is such a wonderful distraction strategy from domestic problems in both the Arab world and Iran. The book "The Tragedy of the Middle East" explains the last point. Similar arguments apply for the 2000 Muslims killed in Gujarat, India in February and March 2002. And for the Arab world's silence on Hama.) Naturally, as I've said before, 5000 Kurds being gassed by Saddam in 1988 also gets less attention than 3000 international deaths on 9/11.

Last night I went to McMashallah. I had a "Double Cheeseburger" for 1800T. A "Happy Meal" was 2000T. Does this sound familiar to anybody?

Mr MRK says MPs won't resign. Why should they, they get a Land Rover, an apartment, and the press reports everything they say. It's all a kind of "head game" with the people.

The sickness at the heart of Iranian society is manifested in the traffic.

Stop at the red light, before changing the government.

Now we DO have internet censorship in Iran.

Umm, the I believe that young women have not written about this. I wonder if it is affecting them and how they feel about it? Mr Steppenwolf is pretty angry about it.

As for me, it is not affecting me at all. Reza Pahlavi, Emrooz, WomenInIran, Golshan, Molla Hassani. Yes, I can see them all. I'll let you know if this changes.

But Mr Steppenwolf, there is no need to get angry. There is something Iranians can learn from Arabs (!), because they have had to deal with this problem much longer than Iranians. Wayne's proxy avoidance will help, Peekabooty is simpler still. If you can't get it to work email me and I'll see if I can help.

Hopes for reform in Iran fading. Mr. MRK is about three years behind the general population... but this is not a democracy.

Stella Artois is called "horse piss" in at least 4 places on the internet, one, two, three, four.

Council's quashing of bill very unexpected to Khatami. Shakouri-Rad said that the bill would not be referred to the Expediency Council; Iran Press Service wrote about a resolution within two months. I predict the survival of the regime, despite the pressures.

Yesterday I went to the book fair again, and bought "Old New Zealand" by Maning, ($US90 on amazon.com, $US18 there); a critical edition of "Emma" by Jane Austen, History of the Twentieth Century, and "Fanny Hill" (Wordsworth)! I was rather surprised by the last one's availability. A wide range of uncensored material is available if you read English. At this rate, perhaps they'll be selling "The Satanic Verses" in a few years! On the way back I stopped by "Kabooky Fried Chicken", the taxi fare to Tajrish was 400T, but 100T yesterday!

State Department transcribes American Enterprise Institute conference. (What's happening there?) Other coverage at Payvand. Michael Ledeen is profiled by Brown University professor William Beeman (like his last article I linked to, quite informative).

Hoder talks about blocking of his site. From my perspective I have never seen any blocking of any site... of course I'll post if that changes.

Thursday, the first day of the weekend. The Tehran International Book Fair is on, and I had cards to buy books to the value of 100,000 tomans. The books are subsidised to the rate of about 300 tomans to 1 US dollar, whereas the usual exchange rate is 800 tomans to the dollar. Building 44 is where the new English books are, nothing older than 2001. Building 41A is older books.

So, I was feeling lazy, so I took a private taxi there (1600T).
All the stalls were full of people, except

"The Institute for the Compilation and Publication of Imam Khomeini's Works"...which was surrounded by Cambridge University Press, Phaidon, and Gale Group. Today, it ended up that I bought three books, all from Routledge. Iranian History and Politics, usually US$90 but today 31800 tomans ($US38.87); English-only Europe? (about $US10), and Religion Without God.

You see, we have freedom in Iran! You can buy books about atheism now, despite the regulations that say nothing contrary to Islam can be sold. There are two big reasons why: (1) it's not in Farsi, it's in English and (2) the TIBF is a unique event, many things change - taxi fares can be multiplied many times, for example.

On the way home I stopped by Tam Tam Pizza near Tajrish Square. This is where young couples go to intertwine hands and feet and flirt with each other. A disturbing number of Iranian young women smoke now. I don't find this attractive.