June 8,2008:
When the Mahdi Army began
attacking British troops more frequently two years ago, the British conducted
an intelligence effort to find out why. They discovered that Iran was paying
members of the Mahdi Army up to $300 a month to make these attacks (which
caused over a hundred British casualties). The Iranian connection was kept
secret by the British until recently, since the recent defeat of the Mahdi Army
is likely to bring the Iranian "cash for blood" campaign to light anyway.
Iranians
are concerned with more mundane matters. The inflation and unemployment,
despite constantly rising oil prices (from $11 a barrel a decade ago, to 12
times that today), has turned popular opinion against the government. This has
been helped along by the new government campaign to eliminate "un-Islamic
behavior" (this includes satellite TV, public displays of affection by men and
women, fashionable clothing for women, having fun in general), and disillusionment
with the government campaign to build nuclear weapons (which is now seen more
as another government stunt to divert peoples attention from all the government
screw-ups.) The activities of the religious police are all the more annoying in
the face of rising drug addiction and more mundane crimes (like robbery, rape
and murder). The American success in Iraq and Afghanistan has also been noted, and
there're more jokes hear in the streets about arranging an American invasion.
Fighting in
the north, against Kurdish separatists, heats up. In the last two weeks, at
least eight Revolutionary Guards were killed fighting the PKK. In the same
area, two border police were killed by landmines laid by the PKK, and another
four died in gun battles with PKK fighters crossing the border from camps in
Iraq. This is a source of friction between Iran and Iraq, because the Iraqi
government cannot force the Kurdish government in the north to shut down the
PKK camps. Iran is reluctant to, like Turkey, send troops into Iraq to deal
with the PKK camps. Iran fears this sort of thing would give the Americans an
excuse to strike back, and do serious damage to the Iranian armed forces. This
is particularly scary in light of recent Israeli comments about how "inevitable"
it is that Iran will have to be attacked to destroy the nuclear weapons
development sites. Israel believes that the West is willing to tolerate Iran
having nuclear weapons, secure in the knowledge that, historically, Iran has
not done anything big and stupid. Lots of lesser crimes, like supporting
terrorism in Lebanon, Gaza, Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia, Yemen and so forth. But
nothing like nuking anyone. Israel is not as trusting, given the constant
threats Iranian leaders make to "destroy Israel."
June 1,
2008: Despite keeping a low profile, the
growing number of Christian converts are being hunted down and arrested. The
religious police try to persuade the converts to return to the Islamic fold,
reminding them that apostasy (converting from Islam to another religion) is
forbidden by the Koran and punishable by death. However, the Iranian
constitution allows apostasy, so the government shows some restraint. But since
the Islamic clerics took control of the government three decades ago, several
hundred non-Moslems have been executed, and thousands more imprisoned or
harassed. Most Iranians are willing to tolerate other religions (and there are
over a dozen such minorities in Iran, including several that pre-date Islam,
and one that was developed in the 19th century.)
May 28,
2008: Three Kurds were condemned to
death for terrorist activities.
May 27,
2008: In the United States, an Iranian-American
nuclear engineer is being prosecuted for stealing control software from a
nuclear power plant where he worked for 17 years, and taking the software to
Iran.
May 26,
2008: Israel has arrested an Israeli Jew
of Iranian ancestry, and charged him with espionage. Israel warns Israelis with
kin in Iran that the Iranian secret police may pressure them to spy on Israel,
using threats against Jews living in Iran to coerce such cooperation.