Iran: Anyone hoping for rapid change is likely to be disappointed

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File photo of Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei (L) with president Rouhani. According to Iran's Constitution, the Supreme Leader is responsible for supervision of "the general policies of the Islamic Republic of Iran," which means that he sets the tone and direction of Iran's domestic and foreign policies. The Supreme Leader also is commander-in-chief of the armed forces and controls the Islamic Republic's intelligence and security operations; he alone can declare war or peace. He is also the supreme commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
File photo of Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei (L) with president Rouhani. According to Iran’s Constitution, the Supreme Leader is responsible for supervision of “the general policies of the Islamic Republic of Iran,” which means that he sets the tone and direction of Iran’s domestic and foreign policies. The Supreme Leader also is commander-in-chief of the armed forces and controls the Islamic Republic’s intelligence and security operations; he alone can declare war or peace. He is also the supreme commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
The lifting of crippling international sanctions linked to Iran’s nuclear program and the flurry of diplomacy that led to the release of Americans held by Tehran suggests a new era could be dawning. But anyone hoping for rapid change is likely to be disappointed.

President Hassan Rouhani and his team have plenty to celebrate now that nuclear sanctions have been removed. The moderate leader promised to boost Iran’s struggling economy and improve its relations with the wider world during his 2013 campaign. The nuclear deal achieves both aims.

He hailed the deal Sunday as a way to open “new windows for engagement with the world,” and said fresh investments and newly freed overseas assets could kick-start the transformation of a country struggling with high unemployment and inflation. At the top of the shopping list are more than 100 planes from Europe’s Airbus.

It will take time for the economic benefits to trickle down to ordinary Iranians, but the goodwill from the deal could translate into electoral gains for moderate and reformist candidates in parliamentary elections late next month. Voters will also select members of the 88-seat Experts Assembly, an influential clerical body that picks a successor for the 76-year-old supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in the event of his death.

Rouhani may have pushed for the rapid implementation of Iran’s commitments under last summer’s nuclear deal, ensuring faster sanctions relief, with the electoral timetable in mind.

But he still faces intense domestic opposition from hard-liners who believe he has given away too much and fear Iran’s opening to the outside world leaves it exposed to corrupting foreign cultural influences.

In the months leading up this past weekend’s implementation of the nuclear deal, Iranian authorities pursued a renewed crackdown on free expression, jailing several writers and artists, including award-winning filmmaker Keywan Karimi.

The November anniversary of the 1979 takeover of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran drew thousands of demonstrators, who burned American flags and hoisted signs denouncing McDonald’s and Starbucks.

That hard-line pushback also helps explain paradoxes like the fact that officials, including Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, tout the deal’s benefits on Twitter even as Iranian censors block the site and other social media services at home.

Khamenei, Iran’s top decision-maker, has left little doubt where he stands on the question of whether the opening with the West should lead to a relaxing of conservative values. During a speech to prayer leaders this month, he warned that “one of the main objectives of the enemies of Islam and the Iranian nation is to change the culture and moralities of people, particularly their lifestyle.”

Those hoping for greater openness in Iran will face resistance from entrenched interests such as the powerful Revolutionary Guard, notes Cliff Kupchan, the chairman of the Eurasia Group. He predicts “a path of slow, non-linear political and economic liberalization” in the wake of the deal’s implementation.

“Khamenei has been intent on showing that the deal is a one-off, not a dΓ©tente,” Kupchan wrote. “And for some years the Leader will need the image of the ‘Great Satan’ to legitimize his rule in the eyes of key constituencies – the (Revolutionary Guard), conservative clerics and the pious poor.”

And for all the conversations U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and Zarif have had over the past few years, the fact remains that they represent countries that do not have formal diplomatic relations.

Official ties were severed after the 1979 Islamic Revolution and the storming of the U.S. Embassy. Wide-ranging U.S. sanctions imposed over the years and unrelated to Iran’s nuclear program remain in place. That will complicate American companies’ ability to do business in the Islamic Republic.

“Both sides would like to open a new chapter. This does not mean they see eye to eye,” said Fawaz Gerges, a Middle East expert at the London School of Economics. “This does not mean the end to mistrust. This does not mean the end to divergent interests in the region.”

Still, the two diplomats have forged a working relationship that can at times bear fruit.

Months of negotiations resulted in the release of four Iranian-Americans from prison, including Washington Post journalist Jason Rezaian, in exchange for seven Iranians held in the U.S., six of them also dual nationals. A fifth American held in Iran, student Matthew Trevithick, was also released.

And rapid-fire diplomacy managed to get 10 U.S. Navy sailors and their boats released from Iranian custody in less than 24 hours last week – an unthinkably quick turnaround compared to past cases where foreigners found themselves in Iranian territory.

But there are limits.

Iranian-American businessman Siamak Namazi, who is believed to be detained in Iran, was not part of this weekend’s prisoner swap. Also still missing is former FBI agent Robert Levinson, who disappeared in Iran in 2007 on an unauthorized CIA mission.

Meanwhile, Iran remains a staunch backer of Syrian President Bashar Assad, putting it at odds with the U.S. and Sunni Arab powers including Saudi Arabia, even as it shares the West’s interest in defeating the Islamic State group. In Yemen, a U.S.-supported, Saudi-led coalition is fighting to roll back gains by Iranian-backed Shiite rebels.

And mistrust runs deep on both sides.

Rouhani said Sunday that even with a deal in hand, Iranians will not easily trust the U.S. because “our people have suffered from plenty of promise-breaking,” the official IRNA news agency reported.

In Washington, President Barack Obama hailed the American prisoners’ release and the implementation of the nuclear accord as victories for “smart” diplomacy, declaring that “this is a good day.”

Not long before, his administration announced new sanctions against Iran – this time on 11 people and entities involved in the country’s ballistic missile program.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

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26 responses to “Iran: Anyone hoping for rapid change is likely to be disappointed”

  1. MekensehParty Avatar
    MekensehParty

    Anyone who doubts that change has come will not only be disappointed but is dead wrong. The 2009 green revolution successfully ended last weekend. The conservatives have lost and are now awaiting the coup de grace which is Khameneii’s death that would strip them of all powers. The new Iran is not a newborn, or a toddler, or even an infant, it is a teenager who will be an adult very soon.
    The Iranians are ready to take their place in the international community, not as religiously fanatic revolutionaries but as modern and civilized people.

    1. Hannibal Avatar

      Are you somehow related to Kissinger? lol

      1. MekensehParty Avatar
        MekensehParty

        I have the same big nose

        1. Hannibal Avatar

          are you circumcised as well?

          1. You prefer circumcised men? πŸ™‚

          2. Hannibal Avatar

            I do not swing this way… There is a lesbian trapped inside me… My logo: Lesbian Inside πŸ˜›

          3. “What’s not to like about lesbians?” πŸ™‚

          4. 5thDrawer Avatar

            Exactly.

          5. MekensehParty Avatar
            MekensehParty

            I wish they snipped part of my nose instead

          6. 5thDrawer Avatar

            You can get that in Iran … they seem to be experts in that one item. ;-))

          7. Hannibal Avatar

            lol witty

      2. 5thDrawer Avatar

        LOL …

    2. 5thDrawer Avatar

      Soon they will send a monkey into space on those ballistic missiles … and re-discover the universe. πŸ˜‰
      The Restaurant at the End will be ‘Halal’, of course. :-)))

      1. MekensehParty Avatar
        MekensehParty

        Aaah Zarkon will finally make his appearance πŸ˜‰

      2. Hind Abyad Avatar
        Hind Abyad

        Zabada will be there?

        1. 5thDrawer Avatar

          hehehe … Probably in the corner saying ‘WTF’??

          1. Hind Abyad Avatar
            Hind Abyad

            He said he will protect us

          2. 5thDrawer Avatar

            If I remember from ‘The Guide’ correctly, it’s at the point of ‘Space-Time Warpage’, and everything ‘resets’ for the next night’s crowd. Maybe he will explain a god can do that…
            No-one actually falls over the End.

          3. Hind Abyad Avatar
            Hind Abyad

            If i can remember correctly, he counted very much on his father..:))

          4. 5thDrawer Avatar

            Dad may have been a good shot …. but there, he may meet the same bullet he fired at a ball. :-))

    3. You sound strangely optimistic. Is that the same you? πŸ™‚

      1. 5thDrawer Avatar

        Nature. We get optimistic when the sun comes out … even when it’s -11C.

      2. MekensehParty Avatar
        MekensehParty

        they’re going to kill each other unfortunately
        the revolutionary guard and their fanatic supporters wont leave without a fight

  2. Hannibal Avatar

    I guess they need some coaching on change management. It will also help if they’d hire a fashion designer for a better couture and a barber for a cleaner look.

    1. I can forgive the crazy ayatollahs all their transgressions except one – their inordinate hatred of ties. I’m supported by the entire Italian silk industry on that one.

      1. Hannibal Avatar

        They spend a lot of dough on the head turbine though… That must count for something.

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