Amid the recent government shutdown of the internet and all electronic communications from Iran, and subsequent reports that the three-week-old uprising was subsiding, the leader of the largest Iranian exile group told Newsmax that the rebellion against the 47-year-old theocratic regime continues "unabated."
"Even now, clashes and running battles between the people and rebellious youth on one side, and the regime's repressive forces on the other continue," said Maryam Rajavi, president-elect of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI).
In an exclusive interview with Newsmax, Rajavi insisted, "Iranian society has entered an irreversible phase of its political life."
Of the regime's blackout of communications and its stepped-up repression of protesters in the streets throughout the nation, Rajavi said "[s]ocial uprisings never follow a linear or uniform trajectory, and a temporary decline in street demonstrations never signifies their end."
As a historical example, she cited the overthrow of the Shah of Iran by forces loyal to the Ayatollah Khomeini in 1979 that led to the present theocratic dictatorship.
"There were many ebbs and flows in the protests," she said. "The Shah even attempted to manufacture massive counter demonstrations by mobilizing his own agents to create the illusion that a majority of society supported the continuation of his [reign]—precisely the same tactic the current regime is employing today."
Citing figures showing the present regime has so far killed 3,000 protesters and arrested 50,000 people, Rajavi said "they have deployed repression forces en masse, and created an atmosphere of terror."
Yet, she added, "the roots of this uprising, embedded in absolute poverty, structural corruption, and the people's demand for the complete rejection of the entire system, remain intact."
Trusting the West and Europe
Throughout our interview, Rajavi emphasized that Iranian insurgents must "go it alone."
"From our perspective, the fundamental and immutable principle is that the overthrow of the regime must be carried out by the Iranian people themselves and their organized resistance," she said. "This is the only path to toppling this regime. Without a combat-capable, organized resistance, this brutal and medieval system will not fall."
She added that this has been the basis of what she called "our relentless struggle" for nearly five decades.
Regarding the West, Rajavi pointed out that "the expectation of the Iranian people is that democratic countries, including the United States, do not side with the Iranian regime in this unjust war, that they recognize the legitimacy of the struggle against this religious fascism and its Iran [Islamic] Revolutionary Guard Corps [IRGC], who are the [Nazi German] SS of our time, and that they hold the leaders of this regime and the architects and perpetrators of these mass killings accountable."
As for direct involvement from other countries on the side of the insurgents, she said, "We are not asking the U.S., or any other government, to overthrow this regime. That responsibility belongs to the Iranian people and their resistance.
"Historical experience clearly demonstrates that freedom is not an imported commodity; it can only be achieved through reliance on internal forces and the sacrifices of the sons and daughters of this land."
Agreeing that "it is natural that Western countries prioritize their own interests," Rajavi pointed out that "our message to them is this: this regime ultimately acts against your security and endangers peace. As long as it remains in power, it will not abandon repression and mass killing, nor will it cease terrorism and warmongering."
As to the worry of many in the U.S. and throughout European capitals that an Iran liberated from the order of its present regime would quickly devolve into a worse situation, such as in Iraq after Saddam Hussein and Libya after Muammar Gaddafi (which President Obama famously concluded was "the s---show"), Rajavi is not worried.
"What fundamentally distinguishes Iran's situation from that of other countries in the region, such as Iraq or Libya, which descended into chaos and sectarian violence, is the existence of a democratic alternative with a long track record and a clear, articulated program," she explained. "This alternative prevents a power vacuum and averts catastrophe in the aftermath of the regime's fall."
By "democratic alternative," Rajavi means the constitution sculpted by her organization that includes the NCRI's plan for the separation of religion and state, adopted forty years ago, which bans all forms of religious discrimination and ensures "no individual may enjoy privileges or suffer restrictions in political, civil, judicial, educational, or social rights on the basis of belief or non-belief."
In addition, the NCRI constitution guarantees a judiciary "entirely independent of religion or ideology, and only laws enacted by the legitimate [elected] legislative body carry legal validity."
"Neither Shah nor Sheikh"
Any discussion with Rajavi and the NCRI of an Iranian government when and if the Ayatollah Khamenei is overthrown inevitably turns to the opposition figure who has been highly visible in recent television and press interviews throughout the world: Reza Pahlavi, 67-year-old son of the deposed Shah of Iran, who died in exile in 1983.
"For 45 years, we have stated clearly and repeatedly that our policy is based on 'neither Shah nor Sheikh,'" Rajavi said. "The Iranian people do not want to return to the past or move from one dictatorship to another. They seek a secular, democratic republic founded on the vote of the people, and we extend a hand of friendship to all those who call for the complete rejection of this regime and the establishment of a republic based on the separation of religion and state.
"This is a principle we have consistently declared and will act upon."
Regarding Pahlavi's father, she recalled that "the Shah ruled the country through a one-party system, relying on the notorious SAVAK security apparatus, torture, and execution of dissidents. His true heir was Ayatollah Khomeini, who continued the same path under the guise of religion."
Of those who call for a return of the monarchy under the man they call Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi, Rajavi said, "They have not only failed to distance themselves from or condemn the crimes of the monarchy, but the plans they propose for the future represent a fusion of the Shah's system and clerical rule. They concentrate executive, legislative, judicial, and security power in the hands of a single individual, an ugly form of neo-fascism."
Insisting that under the previous Iranian monarchy, there were "deep wounds inflicted on Iran's nationalities, including Azeris, Kurds, Arabs, and Baluchis," Rajavi said this "left behind a legacy of ethnic cleansing and forced population transfers. For this reason, Iranian society will never accept a return to such tyranny."
Will there be defections from the Revolutionary Guards?
It has long been taken for granted that in order to guarantee the success of a revolution, there must be massive desertions from the regime's all-powerful (and brutal) Revolutionary Guards.
Rajavi sees it differently.
In her words, the Guards are the regime's "principal pillar of survival and are inseparably bound to the system of velayat-e faqih [Iranian system of governance] and to Khamenei himself. Neither can survive without the other. Any strategy based on attracting segments of the IRGC or reorienting it is a mirage and a trap deliberately laid by the regime for certain elements of the opposition.
"The defection of military forces will not occur through baseless calls issued from abroad. Iran's equation is a historical, political, social, and indeed military, one. Historically, politically, and socially, the conditions for change are ripe. What is needed is a fighting force on the ground that, in combination with an organized uprising, creates a balance that erodes the effectiveness of the regime's military machine.
"It is at that point that defections among the lower ranks and the rank-and-file of the regime's armed forces will assume broad dimensions."
John Gizzi is chief political columnist and White House correspondent for Newsmax. For more of his reports, Go Here Now.
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