Why the neo-Nazis salute Iran’s President

Wednesday, 31st May 2006

Would-be appeasers of Iran ignore its religious intolerance

In the past 14 months 125 Baha’is across Iran have been arrested and held for up to a month, often incommunicado and in secret locations, as the authorities step up their campaign. Vile lies are propagated by the state-controlled media, with one article this year fabricating a tale of gatherings that the (in fact strictly teetotal and non-violent) Baha’is would hold on the eve of the solemn Shia mourning festival of Ashura, where they would supposedly drink alcohol, dance and sacrifice a Muslim child, in a despicable libel reminiscent of the anti-Semitic forgery, the Protocol of the Elders of Zion.

Ordinary Baha’is are also increasingly being sent hate-filled text messages and can no longer go to university. Typically, Roya Habibi, of Kermanshah, now out on bail, was charged with ‘teaching the Baha’ism sect and acting in an insulting manner towards all that is holy in Islam’. Six months ago Dhabihu’llah Mahrami, a Baha’i prisoner of conscience, died in his cell in Yazd in mysterious circumstances. Two months earlier a judge had warned him: ‘Even if you are released from prison, we will get rid of you in a [car] accident.’ When, in March, the UN special rapporteur of the Commission on Human Rights on Freedom of Religion or Belief released a secret letter from the Iranian high command ordering police and Revolutionary Guards to ‘identify’ and ‘monitor’ members of the Baha’i community, she said the existence of such a letter made her ‘highly concerned’.

Given the intensifying persecution of minorities in Iran, including Christians and Muslims, it beggars belief that Tehran retains so many apologists in the West who are prepared constantly to downplay its crimes. Comparisons with the 1930s can be overdone, but in the case of Iran, the regime is inviting them by its actions.

Allister Heath is associate editor of The Spectator and deputy editor of the Business.