Shirin Ebadi Supports Obama Approach on Iran
Objectively pro-Ahmadenijad? So says Bob Kagan. (Wikimedia)
As conservatives continue to criticize Barack Obama’s rhetoric on the Iranian political crisis, Iranian dissidents and human rights leaders continue to support Obama. Shirin Ebadi, for example, won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2003 for her efforts as a human rights lawyer and advocate in Iran. For her trouble she’s been persecuted in the press, threatened with physical violence, etc. And as Spencer Ackerman points out she thinks Obama’s doing the right thing:
Shirin Ebadi, an Iranian human rights activist who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2003, said she has no complaints about Obama’s rhetoric. “What happens in Iran regards the people themselves, and it is up to them to make their voices heard,” she said in a telephone interview from Geneva. “I respect his comments on all the events in Iran, but I think it is sufficient.”
There’s been an effort made to fit this into some grand tableau about “idealism” in foreign policy, but the simple fact of the matter is that the time for the United States to do something on behalf of the Iranian opposition would be when Iranian opposition leaders ask us to. Simply inserting ourselves more directly into the situation in order to feel more self-righteous about it would be horrible. The people protesting on the streets in Iran are running very real risks to their lives and their families. We owe them more than thoughtless rhetoric.
38 Responses to “Shirin Ebadi Supports Obama Approach on Iran”
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June 18th, 2009 at 11:00 am
Actually, the liberal hawks who wanted the U.S. to invade and overthrow Saddam also thought their cause was just whether or not the local peoples and opposition thought differently; in fact they always think their moral impulses are superior to whatever the consequences or views of their policies will be on the ground — why would the case of Iran be any different?
If you’re convinced that you’re a pro-liberation revolutionary, why do you care what any local people think or may have to live with or suffer as a result of your actions?
You’re leading a glorious, glorious struggle, and your only task is to retain greater will and dedication to the revolutionary purpose than anyone else.
June 18th, 2009 at 11:09 am
On one side is the populist, ascetic, blunt foe of zionism.
On the other is the corrupt, oligarchic foe of zionism – but he is more discreet about it.
So the friends of Israel pick the discreet oligarch, more to discredit Iran than for anything tangible.
June 18th, 2009 at 11:18 am
Over at the Daily Beast – I know I know – “Lipstick Jihad author Azadeh Moaveni says protesters in Tehran have a surprising view on Obama’s silence: Keep it up.”
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-06-17/iranians-to-obama-hush/?cid=hp:blogunit1
Actually, the liberal hawks who wanted the U.S. to invade and overthrow Saddam also thought their cause was just whether or not the local peoples and opposition thought differently; in fact they always think their moral impulses are superior to whatever the consequences or views of their policies will be on the ground — why would the case of Iran be any different?
The difference with Iran is that they never invaded anyone. They just support Hamas (who won an election) and Hezbollah (who were in negotiations with the IMF).
I’m not going to go through the differences between Saddam and Iran for the millionth time. You guys don’t care. But since I don’t want to bomb Iran does that still make me a liberal hawk?
As bad as the Iraq war went, anti-war people still have a vested interest to believe that the removal of a neighboring regime hostile to Iran next and its replacement with a friendly one couldn’t have had a beneficial effect on Iran and be partly responsible for some good news from the Middle East. They can’t admit anything good came form the removal of Saddam.
Who’s being ideological now? Why can’t one be idealistic and interested in the opposition in these countries, anti-war people certainly were never interested in Shirin Ebadi, except to use her name as Matt does here as stick to be critics with.
June 18th, 2009 at 11:19 am
No doubt the author of Lipstick Jihad wears Calvin Kleins and listens to rock and roll.
June 18th, 2009 at 11:28 am
It’s not that it couldn’t be so, it’s that it isn’t so. You fail to entertain the possibility that you are the one with the irrational emotional attachment to a previous stance. Your argument in the previous thread was eviscerated logically, but you persisted with your contentions that ignored facts, confused cause and effect and made completely unsustainable leaps of logic.
June 18th, 2009 at 11:29 am
the simple fact of the matter is that the time for the United States to do something on behalf of the Iranian opposition would be when Iranian opposition leaders ask us to.
No, the time for the United States to do something on behalf of the Iranian opposition would be never. America has a long and bloody history of imposing its will on Iran and the Mideast in general, and American aid to opposition groups – even if those groups ask us for it – will be correctly seen by Iranians as an attempt by the American empire to exert control over their country through domestic proxies. Let’s not forget that this country was lead into a still-ongoing invasion, war, and occupation of Iraq in part by Iraqi exiles and opposition groups who demanded we overthrow their government.
If a better, more moderate faction of the Iranian establishment manages to get control of the government and establish a less repressive regime, good for them. (Although I’m pretty damn skeptical about this happening under Mousavi, given his bloodstained record.) But they should do so without any meddling from the United States.
June 18th, 2009 at 11:31 am
This is a false and pretty chickenshit point.
This may not be the space in which to debate the Iraq scenario, but there could be an entire range of consequences to destroying a state by military invasion and attack, some of which could be ‘positive’ from the point of view of the grassroots citizenry, and some of which could involve (and, in fact, did involve) a greater degree of death and suffering than was actually being suffered under the murderous tyrant.
Those who were honest about their aims, such as the Hitchens type, openly admitted they didn’t much care, and justified it by their liberatory and revolutionary aims. That’s the point I made, and it sticks. Things would be better after the revolution, so do it.
The point still stands. Those who view themselves as heroic liberationists support their liberatory policies based on factors other than what appear to be either the consequences on the ground or the direct desires of the local population.
June 18th, 2009 at 11:37 am
It’s not that it couldn’t be so, it’s that it isn’t so. You fail to entertain the possibility that you are the one with the irrational emotional attachment to a previous stance. Your argument in the previous thread was eviscerated logically, but you persisted with your contentions that ignored facts, confused cause and effect and made completely unsustainable leaps of logic.
Nah all you guys do is insult, insult, insult, ad hominem, etc. There is no argument or debate. You know that you are right and won’t even consider contrary facts. You just ignore them.
June 18th, 2009 at 11:39 am
Poptarts, I agree with you that Iran is very different from Iraq, and that some good things have come from the removal of Saddam (although I think those are very clearly outweighed by the bad things that have resulted). But where is your evidence that regime change in Iraq is influencing the protests in Iran? Has any Iranian opposition leader mentioned Iraq as an inspiration for the demonstrations?
June 18th, 2009 at 11:42 am
Who knows, but I did meet a guy in Esfahan who loved Eminem and hated Fifty Cent. Unfortunately he hadn’t the slightest idea what Public Enemy and NWA were.
June 18th, 2009 at 11:50 am
Due to Operation Ajax and the ousting of Mossadegh in 1953, it would be detrimental to any political cause if the United States endorsed it. The last thing we want to put into the minds of the populous is that there current political climate was somehow orchestrated by the same government that helped put the Shah into power.
June 18th, 2009 at 11:50 am
But where is your evidence that regime change in Iraq is influencing the protests in Iran? Has any Iranian opposition leader mentioned Iraq as an inspiration for the demonstrations?
There isn’t much and not that I’ve heard. It is logical though in that Saddam was a hated dangerous enemy and with him gone they might have relaxed. Especially now that the US is pulling out of Iraq. Iranian reformists were first elected after Saddam was kicked from Kuwait.
I’d recommend reading the Daily Beast piece. Spencer Ackerman wants to ventriloquize the Iranians “street” to support his views but as the author – who is Iranian and had lived in Iran for a long time – writes, it is complicated.
There are probably a lot of causes for the mass protests. The economy and sanctions?
June 18th, 2009 at 11:56 am
ToasterPastries really is like a piss-poor version of Peter K., who is himself a piss-poor version of Christopher Hitchens.
June 18th, 2009 at 11:57 am
Well, the current Iraqi government is pro-Ahmadinejad, which probably wouldn’t have been the case under Saddam. So there’s that.
June 18th, 2009 at 11:58 am
As with Cheney’s prayer (please let there be a terrorist attack under Obama), Krauthammer and co. are just hoping and praying that the students lose. A) because where will they be without the current Iranian regime and B) because they can blame Obama and c) because, frankly, the commie students give them the willies – if a bunch of commies take over, they will never have the pretext for bombing Iran and stealing Iran’s resources – and they won’t get the resources in any other way. That would be such a shame!
June 18th, 2009 at 11:59 am
Great post Matt. It continues to blow my mind that
reasonable people who believe America can do no wrongneoconservatives who have brought us such spectacular foreign policy failures such as the war in Iraq continue to beat their war drums (or at least their very tough, macho poses) without a moment’s pause. Its like they’re motivated by opportunities to really mess things up or something…June 18th, 2009 at 12:00 pm
Actually I think that the argument that the fall of Saddam has altered political factors within Iran is clearly arguable. This may very well be one of the factors at play here.
Of course, it is not so much the existence of Saddam in power but the likelihood of military and economic and diplomatic action with respect to Iran which would be among the factors at play in Iranian politics. Saddam was playing very little of such a role under U.S. border control, no-fly zones, and sanctions, so it’s difficult to set up a binary situation.
However, it’s surely important in Iranian politics the degree of influence they possess over the new post-Saddam Iraq.
It seems to me like you might have two counter-vailing influences in Iran based on a weak or non-existent Saddam (depending on the time period): semi-liberalizing forces might gain strength since the likelihood of hawks arguing for an Iraqi threat would not be believable (and they were not believable under the sanctioned- and no-fly-zoned Saddam either); yet hard-liners could also (post-Saddam) argue for the value of their ties to the Shi’a forces influencing the government of Iraq.
June 18th, 2009 at 12:52 pm
Poptarts,
You continue to argue in complete up is downism fashion. You say we haven’t provided evidence to support our view when it is exactly the opposite, your the one who is bringing no arguments.
In the other thread several of us pointed out these facts:
‘97 reformer wins Iranian election. ‘01 reformer wins Iranian election. ‘03 Bush invades Iraq. ‘05 hardline anti-american wins Iranian election.
That is our evidence. Your evidence is your gut feel and desire to justify the War Iraq war.
June 18th, 2009 at 1:22 pm
ToasterPastries really is like a piss-poor version of Peter K., who is himself a piss-poor version of Christopher Hitchens.
Um no. With this courageous uprising by regular people in Iran I’ve lost the last shred of respect I’ve had for anti-war fucks like pseudonymous in nc. It’s solipsistically all about them and they couldn’t give a shit about people half way across the world.
They’re stuck in Iraq war mode, I’m not arguing for bombing Iran. I’m not arguing for Obama “talking tough” or whatever.
America is occuping the countries on either side of Iran. Iraq for five years, Afghanistan longer. Ahmadinejad says there is no difference between Bush and Obama, that Iran will wipe American’s proxy, Israel, from the map, that there was no Holocaust etc. At the UN he would rail against Amerika. He is a global symbol of defiance.
And guess what? They Iranian people are risking their LIVES to kick this guy out. If they thought like that prick pseudonymous in nc, they wouldn’t want to kick him out so bad.
Seven Iranians at least have died so far. Protests unseen since 1979. And no doubt some Iranian asshole versions of pseudonymous are saying to the protesters, “all you are doing is helping the Americans and Neocons, they guys who invaded Iraq and support Israel”
And the protesters don’t give a shit. If Saddam was still in power the protesters would have alreadly been crushed. Too bad peaceniks like pseduonymous can’t get through their thick skulls.
And I think Obama is playing it right so don’t talk to me of McCain.
June 18th, 2009 at 1:34 pm
‘97 reformer wins Iranian election. ‘01 reformer wins Iranian election. ‘03 Bush invades Iraq. ‘05 hardline anti-american wins Iranian election.
The “reformist” Khatami didn’t do jack shit and never defied the Supreme Leader. He was extremely cautious and never achieved anything.
Mir Hussein Moussav has already proven to be a tougher, smarter leader who has already risked a lot more than Khatami ever did.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/18/world/middleeast/18moussavi.html?scp=5&sq=Khatami&st=cse
He decided to run for president earlier this year to save Iran from what he said were Mr. Ahmadinejad’s “destructive” policies. But it was not until a few weeks ago that a popular movement began to build behind him. As the campaign drew to a close, Mr. Moussavi began answering the president’s rhetorical broadsides with some strong language of his own.
…
When the president lies, nobody confronts him,” Mr. Moussavi said during his final debate appearance. “I’m a revolutionary and I’m speaking out against the situation he has created. He has filled the country with lies and hypocrisy. I’m not frightened to speak out. Remember that.”
June 18th, 2009 at 1:36 pm
Mr. Moussavi and his wife, who played a prominent role in his campaign, have been under enormous pressure to accept the election results, said a close relative who spoke on the condition of anonymity. The relative did not specify what kind of pressure.
“They are both being very courageous and are expecting the pressure to increase,” said the relative. “Mr. Moussavi says he has taken a path that has no return and he is ready to make sacrifices.”
June 18th, 2009 at 1:39 pm
I don’t have anything particularly against the commenter “Poptarts,” but I really see no evidence, none whatsoever, that what he is doing or thinking is in any way, even the most microscopic, more supportive of the actual struggles of people on the ground in Iran than my own contacts and efforts.
If the commenter is convinced that there is any real world evidence that his or her own ideological alignments and blog declarations have made life one tiny bit better than his “anti-war” opponents, now would be a time to offer it.
If not, then no one on Earth could respect declarations about for whom he or she has either retained or lost respect.
June 18th, 2009 at 1:46 pm
The “reformist” Khatami didn’t do jack shit and never defied the Supreme Leader. He was extremely cautious and never achieved anything.
Khatami never achieved anything because his policies were routinely overturned by Khamenei and the Guardian Council. He never “defied the Supreme Leader” because he had no power do so, any more than the Secretary of the Interior has the power to defy the policies of the president of the United States.
Meanwhile, Mousavi summarily executed thousands of political prisoners while he was prime minister, and shut down the university system for years. Some reformist you’ve got there.
June 18th, 2009 at 2:11 pm
One of the best criticisms I’ve heard of liberals is that we support programs for the poor without reference to whether or not they actually do help the poor—that we support government action in order to feel good about ourselves, and that we don’t notice if a scheme actually ends up hurting the situation.
I, of course, do not believe that to be the rule for people with whom I agree—although anyone confronted by a giant puppet has to admit that we’ve got idiots on our side as well—but I can see that as a very human error that we can make when we’re not careful.
I think this is precisely the same error on the part of interventionist conservatives…sometimes our motto should be:
Don’t just do something, stand there!
June 18th, 2009 at 2:43 pm
Poptarts,
I try to debate you with facts and all you do is insult us and presume you know what we think better than we do.
That is why we end up doing nothing but insulting you, it is all the respect you give us and all you deserve. So I’ll end how every debate with you ends and never waste my time attacking your nonsense again.
FUCK OFF YOU LYING SACK OF SHIT!
June 18th, 2009 at 2:50 pm
To do what the opposition asks, when they ask it, presuppposes enough knowledge and understanding of Iranian politicians’ identities, motivations and capabilities, to trust them.
The United States has a long, poor, bipartisan track record of manipulating other countries’ internal politics. We’re a country full of people who can’t even name our own state legislators, but we sure know which Iranian politician is better than whom.
This Mousavi fellow could be the next Chalabi for all we know, but the debate back home is whether to standby for Mousavi’s marching orders or just blaze ahead and snake some missiles down peoples’ chimneys pronto.
June 18th, 2009 at 3:46 pm
To do what the opposition asks, when they ask it, presuppposes enough knowledge and understanding of Iranian politicians’ identities, motivations and capabilities, to trust them.
I think Obama struck the right note. The universal thing we can judge the regime an opposition is opposing is how they respond to civil disobedience. With violence, with censorship, etc. With the Cold War over it’s not like every country is a fight between two sides in a larger to the death struggle.
When it comes to sanctions, it gets more tricky. IIRC Aung San Suu Kyi wants sanctions. Shirin Ebadi doesn’t. Did Mandela? I don’t know.
I’ve come to be against sanctions, which just harmed the population of Iraq while Saddam built palaces, even though it looks like maybe sanctions and isolation are party what’s driving the Uranian opposition.
This Mousavi fellow could be the next Chalabi for all we know, but the debate back home is whether to standby for Mousavi’s marching orders or just blaze ahead and snake some missiles down peoples’ chimneys pronto.
I doubt the Iraqi people would have protested an election rigged against Chalabi, even though I don’t think he was as bad as people proclaim. Did they have elections in Iraq before 2003?
June 18th, 2009 at 3:52 pm
If Saddam was still in power the protesters would have alreadly been crushed.
Non sequitur.
It’s solipsistically all about them and they couldn’t give a shit about people half way across the world.
Oh, ToasterPastries, that’s rich, given that librulhawks like you and your slightly less stupid chums are quite happy to let other people take bullets on your behalf while thinking that you’re taking an oh-so-brave stance. (Hitchens thought that he’d finally got himself a Spanish Civil War, without remembering what Orwell learned from fighting in the actual Spanish Civil War.) So stop tossing around silly strawmen and pulling empty suppositions out of your rear end.
(The librulhawk line on Iraq — good in principle, fucked up in the execution — is my line on Afghanistan. My line on Iraq? “C’est pire qu’un crime, c’est une faute.”)
June 18th, 2009 at 4:10 pm
pseudoonymou in nc:
(The librulhawk line on Iraq — good in principle, fucked up in the execution — is my line on Afghanistan.
My line on Iraq is that yeah maybe it was a mistake, but there is so much bullshit on the antiwar it’s not even funny. Most of the bullshit is promulgated by hypocritical prick like you who are okay with bombing wedding parties in Afghanistan, but feel Iraq is the worst disaster in human history b/c Bush and the Republicans presided over it.
If Saddam was still in power the protesters would have alreadly been crushed.
Non sequitur.
The bottom line is that the antiwar faction – some who are well meaning and well intentioned towards the Iraqis and America – feel Iraq made the Middle East worse, no question. Self righteous assholes like you rage against anyone who questions this propostion.
Well here are some positive developments in Iran. Iraq is getting better. Matt says, well, things would get better in the Middle East anyway. Maybe. Maybe not.
Single minded losers like you won’t even entertain the possibility that Iranian society eased up because a genocidal dictator next door was no longer around. Because they have eased up whether you want to admit it or not.
June 18th, 2009 at 4:28 pm
hypocritcal in nc:
Oh, ToasterPastries, that’s rich, given that librulhawks like you and your slightly less stupid chums are quite happy to let other people take bullets on your behalf
Like how you let people take bullets in Afghanistan for you, you hypocritcal shit.
June 18th, 2009 at 5:03 pm
by hypocritical prick like you who are okay with bombing wedding parties in Afghanistan
Assumes facts not in evidence. Fuckwit.
Single minded losers like you won’t even entertain the possibility that Iranian society eased up because a genocidal dictator next door was no longer around.
Uh huh. Whereas dumbfucks like ToasterPastries will believe and regurgitate any old tendentious shite if it washes the blood from their hands and gives them a bit of reflected glory.
Like how you let people take bullets in Afghanistan for you, you hypocritcal shit.
Again, assumes facts not in evidence. This really is ToasterPastries’ problem, along with the temper-tantrums. Go and have a scotch, Hitchling.
June 18th, 2009 at 5:18 pm
Again, assumes facts not in evidence.
Oh so you have shot bullets in Afghanistan, asshole? Because if not you come off as an even bigger douchebag than at first.
June 18th, 2009 at 5:18 pm
And why do you keep mentioning Hitchens, fucknut? You have an obsession with him or something?
June 18th, 2009 at 5:22 pm
You really do know how to grab the wrong end of the stick and beat yourself on the head with it, don’t you?
Now calm down and start thinking like an adult.
June 18th, 2009 at 5:23 pm
Once again, let’s go through it slowly:
Before Bush’s Iraq Policy: massive pro-democracy protests on the streets of Iran, reformist candidates winning elections
During Bush’s Iraq Policy: no pro-democracy protests in Iran, Ahemdinejad winning election
After Bush’s Iraq Policy: massive pro-democracy protests on the streets of Iran, Reformist candidate winning election.
We don’t “believe” your little Arab Spring theory, because it is thoroughly refuted by the evidence.
June 18th, 2009 at 6:09 pm
What do you mean by, “Iranian society eased up”?
The government certainly hasn’t.
While the populace is not as anti-American as they were 4 years ago, they are certainly more anti-American than they were 9 years ago.
June 18th, 2009 at 10:17 pm
Ask any Iraqi woman if she’s better off now that Saddam Hussein is gone. Why do people think Iraq was a Bedouin backwater and not the most secular and well educated Arab nation in the Mid-East? Fuck all you hawks. Iraq was a great deal more than Saddam Hussein, so why have a million Iraqis been murdered in his name by the U.S.? Oh yeah—because he’s demonized by killing-babies-in-incubator stories.
June 18th, 2009 at 11:04 pm
El Cid: “However, it’s surely important in Iranian politics the degree of influence they possess over the new post-Saddam Iraq.”
I disagree. The issues in internal Iranian politics have to do with the conflicts between hardliners and reformists. I don’t see any evidence that the situation in Iraq, particularly the relationship between Iran and the ruling Shia parties in Iraq, has anything to do with that.
I suspect, but cannot prove, that both sides in Iran are perfectly happy with the resulting situation in Iraq – once the US is fully kicked out, at least – and that both sides hated Saddam, so his removal is fine with both sides – except, again, for the presence of 160,000 US troops on their border (in addition to the presence of US troops in Afghanistan on their OTHER border).
But as far as their internal politics goes, I don’t think it makes a bit of difference. I suspect that it has far more to do with the sort of maneuvers Khamenei and Rafsanjani have been doing with regard to the various government offices they control. All the articles I’m reading about this proxy fight say that it has to do with Khamenei solidifying control over various government offices and building up his Basij militia, while Rafsanjani is maneuvering in his government offices. They don’t mention anything about the impact of Iraq on Iranian internal politics.
I think people are putting far too much emphasis on the public foreign policy statements of both Ahmadinejad and his opponents vis-a-vis the US and Israel and Iraq as being influential on the internal politic maneuvering. While such statements may be influencing the internal political support of each faction by the Iranian street, they aren’t controlling the internal factioning itself.
People need to remember, for instance, that Moursavi, currently the darling of the reformist Iranian street, was once a hardliner himself. By all accounts, especially considering how late he was in introducing himself into the election, this was a makeover intended to seize power from Ahmadinejad for the benefit of Rafsanjani – not a real conversion to reformism.
Given the polls showing Ahmadinejad significantly ahead prior to the election, it would seem highly likely that Rafsanjani sought to improve his position by introducing a new, more “radical reform” candidate in an attempt to change the power balance. And IF and when the hardliners responded by meddling with the election, as he might have predicted, then he has the justification to take to the streets and use pressure from the street to change his relative position in the power hierarchy.
All the articles I’ve read say there’s nothing simple in Iranian politics, although it’s not as baroque as say, Lebanese politics. So the West is in danger of oversimplifying things by suggesting that the outcome of Iran’s elections and the subsequent political maneuvering mean that Iran’s government is shaky.
Not to mention that there are some people questioning who is behind a lot of the “Twittering” going on, since it seems to be well organized by the same set of account names who have a lot of followers on Twitter. And some of those accounts may not even be Iranian. So far, this looks like conspiracy theory, so I can’t point to anything definitive.