Array ( [type] => 8192 [message] => Using ${var} in strings is deprecated, use {$var} instead [file] => /home3/albnoomy/public_html/wp-content/plugins/elementor-pro/core/editor/editor.php [line] => 129 ) {"id":133,"date":"2017-06-08T00:47:20","date_gmt":"2017-06-08T00:47:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/alb.noo.mybluehost.me\/?p=133"},"modified":"2017-06-27T00:49:48","modified_gmt":"2017-06-27T00:49:48","slug":"us-congress-resolution-condemns-iran-atrocities-and-calls-for-actions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/iac-va.org\/us-congress-resolution-condemns-iran-atrocities-and-calls-for-actions\/","title":{"rendered":"US Congress Resolution Condemns Iran Atrocities and Calls for Actions"},"content":{"rendered":"
HUFFPOST<\/strong> HUFFPOST – A\u00a0resolution<\/a>\u00a0was recently introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives, condemning an atrocity that most Americans, and indeed most westerners, have never heard of: the\u00a01988<\/a>\u00a0killings of\u00a0approximately<\/a>\u00a030,000 political prisoners in Iran.<\/p>\n Lawmakers led by Congressman Michael McCaul (R-TX), Ed Royce (R-CA), Eliot Engel (D-NY), and Pete Sessions (R-TX), and 42 of their colleagues from both sides of the aisle, chose to try to right that wrong, introducing legislation, H. Res. 188,\u00a0deploring<\/a>\u00a0the murder of victims who \u201cincluded thousands of people, including teenagers and pregnant women, imprisoned merely for participating in peaceful street protests and for possessing political reading material, many of whom had already served or were currently serving prison sentences.\u201d<\/p>\n The cruelty was extreme as the\u00a0resolution<\/a>\u00a0noted, \u201cthe families of the executed were denied information about their loved ones and were prohibited from mourning them in public\u201d. But the outside world was kept pretty much in the dark. Or, when confronted with flashes of reality, many chose to close their eyes.<\/p>\n According to\u00a0Amnesty International<\/a>, the vast majority of the executed were affiliated with the main opposition\u00a0People\u2019s Mojahehin of Iran<\/a>\u00a0(PMOI\/MEK).\u00a0Prisoners<\/a>\u00a0were \u201cbrought before the commissions and briefly questioned about their political affiliation, and any prisoner who refused to renounce his or her affiliation with groups perceived as enemies by the regime was then taken away for execution,\u201d the House resolution\u00a0noted<\/a>. The lawmakers were\u00a0incensed<\/a>\u00a0to act in part by the audacity of the government of recently re-elected president Hassan Rouhani, who\u00a0appointed<\/a>\u00a0as his Justice Minister one of the detested members of Tehran\u2019s \u201cdeath commission,\u201d Mostafa Pourmohammadi. Many\u00a0argue<\/a>\u00a0that like most instances of brutal carnage by\u00a0autocratic<\/a>, dictatorial or theocratic governments, the\u00a0massacre<\/a>\u00a0was carried out in such a way that word of the executions spread to all corners of the country,\u00a0terrorizing<\/a>\u00a0the populace and paralyzing thousands of families, neighborhoods, and communities with grief.<\/p>\n Many believe that what is even more galling is that the Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei\u2019s pick to succeed Rouhani in last month\u2019s presidential elections, Ebrahimi Raisi, had already been\u00a0rewarded<\/a>\u00a0for his long years of allegiance by being named\u00a0custodian<\/a>\u00a0of the Astan Buds Razavi foundation, the wealthiest\u00a0charity<\/a>\u00a0in the Muslim world. Charity here is a relative term. In Iran under the mullahs and ruling clerics, it is believed that that the mega-millions all end up in the coffers of Iran\u2019s Supreme Leader, to fund the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps and its fundamentalist agenda. Some argue that now Khamenei sought to manipulate the election, and thereby\u00a0shore<\/a>\u00a0up his political establishment, by imposing\u00a0Raisi<\/a>\u00a0on Iran\u2019s unwilling people as their president. He most likely did not calculate that the campaign rivalry between the self-described \u201cmoderate\u201d incumbent and his \u201chardliner\u201d rival would bring the 1988 massacre to the surface, prompting public outrage so extreme that even powerful mullahs within Khamenei\u2019s faction distained to\u00a0support<\/a>\u00a0Raisi. Khamenei more likely backed down, which appears to be a big loss for him, but not a big change in the outcome for Iran\u2019s people. In addition, many believe that Rouhani, also a veteran of this political establishment of the Islamic Republic, got another term likely to differ little from his first four years, which witnessed according to\u00a0Amnesty<\/a>\u00a0International thousands of executions, an intense\u00a0crackdown<\/a>, rampant\u00a0poverty<\/a>\u00a0and domestic injustice; parallel to escalating foreign\u00a0meddling<\/a>, skyrocketing\u00a0military<\/a>\/security budgets, and the drive to advance the\u00a0ballistic<\/a>\u00a0missile project. It was, however, another awakening to the ruling clerics of how past crimes against\u00a0humanity<\/a>\u00a0can\u00a0come<\/a>\u00a0back to haunt. In light of how deeply Iran\u2019s nation\u00a0reacted<\/a>\u00a0to this re-emergence<\/a>\u00a0of the 1988 massacre, more likely overturning efforts at the highest level to engineer the \u201celection,\u201d\u00a0H. RES. 188<\/a>\u00a0\u201cCondemning the Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran for the 1988 massacre of political prisoners and calling for justice for the victims\u201d is timely and righteous.<\/p>\n According to\u00a0Amnesty International<\/a>, the authorities have begun\u00a0desecrating<\/a>\u00a0the unmarked mass graves of those executed in different cities including in Mashhad northeast Iran and in Ahwaz in the south of the country, fearful of the spread of the call for justice campaign regarding the victims of the 1988 massacre,<\/p>\n Bottom of Form<\/p>\n
\n06\/08\/2017 \u2013 Dr. Majid Rafizadeh<\/p>\n