Hijab Issue Can Revive Uprising In Iran– Reformist Politician

Mohsen Mirdamadi said in an interview with Etemad newspaper that revolutions and revolutionaries generally know what they don't want, but they do not have a clear idea about what they really want. Many revolutionaries typically find out after several years that many of their ideas and ideals cannot materialize. This is what happened in Iran after the 1979 revolution.

Mirdamadi said that two major shifts happened in Iran after the Islamic revolution. First, a school of thought that did not believe in the people's vote got the upper hand and tried to limit the power of votes and elections. Many of those in the Iranian government belong to this current.

The second shift occurred in the point of the regime's reliance. Gradually the regime began to rely on its military forces rather than on the support of the people.

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Elsewhere in the interview, Mirdamadi criticized the Iranian rulers' approach to enforcing hijab. He said that hardliners made hijab a security issue rather than a social issue about lifestyle. These changes, said Mirdamadi, led to the protests in the autumn of 2022 and plunged the country into its most important crisis in four decades.

Mirdamadi added that currently it is the military that makes most decisions in the economy, as well as domestic and foreign policies. The result is an unhappy population.

Like many other commentators, Mirdamadi also believes that recent protests were not simply the result of Mahsa Amini's death in custody. The protests were the outcome of accrued unhappiness and dissatisfaction. He added that the apparent lull in the street protests does not mean the movement has ended. This is a point also shared by others including leading conservative figure and regime insider Mohammad Reza Bahonar, who is a member of the Expediency Council.

Meanwhile, another conservative figure, lawmaker Mostafa Mirsalim in an interview with Khabar Online warned that the next parliamentary elections in less than a year is likely to be adversely affected by political corruption and political factions whose interests can be served only based on lack of transparency in the system and winning illegitimate concessions from the center of power.

In unprecedented comments, the hard-line conservative lawmaker acknowledged that most Iranians lost their hope in the system as a result of regime’s behavior and the only thing that can restore hope in the system is introducing social justice. However, he did not say how social justice can work in a political atmosphere overwhelmed by corruption and concessions for the privileged few and the progeny of men of power.

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Meanwhile, international relations analyst Ali Bigdeli said in an interview with ILNA that hardliners who boasted about belittling the United States and turning the White House into a Mausoleum have brought about misery for Iran and made it a backward country.

Bigdeli advised that Iranian rulers should change their attitude toward the world and do away with emotionally charged statements against other country. He said reaching agreement with Saudi Arabia to restore ties is a good example of how flexible Iran needs to be in its foreign policy.

Nonetheless, Bigdeli slammed the Foreign Ministry for making ad hoc decisions rather than following a pre-defined strategic vision. He charged that the Foreign Ministry certainly lacks a roadmap about how to further Iran's relations with what he called "imperialist" countries, presumably the United States, China and Russia, and even the Persian Gulf littoral states. Lack of such a defined policy will do harm to Iran's interests, Bigdeli said.

A news website in Tehran quoted Moghaddam, a member of several key government bodies, as saying, “Our economic conditions are unfortunately under the influence of increasing American sanctions and pressures, especially on our currency, leading to its depreciation.”

Iran’s currency has halved in value since mid-2022 reaching unprecedented lows in the past six months, fueling more inflation that can lead to more antigovernment protests. On Sunday the rial was trading at 535,000 to the US dollar, while before the United States imposed sanctions in 2018, it was trading at around 35,000.

Moghaddam is one of the few clerics who studied economics said that in addition to sanctions, psychological factors also hurt the value of the rial. He argued that with nuclear negotiations with the West at a standstill and recent unrest in Iran, confidence in the economy and the currency have weakened.

The latest point-to-point inflation rate has reached 64 percent, and some experts are warning of hyper-inflation.

The influential cleric tried to sound optimistic by praising some recent government measures adopted to help the rial, but the currency has a downward trajectory as long as Iran is unable to export sufficient oil and balance its budget.

Despite the economic crisis, Iran’s foreign and nuclear policies that are controlled by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei have not changed so far to ease tensions with the West.

The rallies were held on Islamic Republic Day, a public holiday in Iran marking the anniversary of the beginning of the Islamic Republic, with hundreds of Iranians coming out to demonstrate.

According to the regime, the results of a public referendum in 1979 were a resounding 98.2% vote for the establishment of an Islamic state, but today, the picture looks very different.

Iranians held rallies in US and Canadian cities while videos from Sweden, Oslo and Denmark show the opponents of the Islamic Republic going to symbolic ballot boxes to say "NO" to the regime.

Similar events were also held in Brisbane, Leeds, Karlsruhe, Berlin and Barcelona.

In 2021, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Iran published statistics, which showed that 4,037,258 Iranians are living abroad, an increase from previous years. It is believed those numbers are growing, the largest population found in the US.

In an April 1 report, Khabar Online website has interviewed 8 social scientists and commentators about Generation Z's role in Iran's new revolution. Mostafa Mehraeen, a sociologist told the website that "This generation has a thorough understanding of life and human beings and wishes to spread peace on earth." Mehraeein further described Generation Z as "a generation that is an expert on philosophy without having studied it."

Referring to views that this generation is cut off from the past, Mehraeein said that various generations are not separate from each other. In fact, we live in the past, present and future at the same time. "We are facing a generation that has been educated by the previous generation," he said.

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Demographer Shahla Kazemipour also pointed out that the Generation Z is not a separate entity far from the mainstream society. But they do not need to be in the streets to see embezzlements and financial corruption by officials. They can see everything on social media from behind their computer monitors.

She added, "While the previous generation came from families with up to 7 children, Generation Z comes from smaller families who can spend more on their children's education. At the same time, unlike the previous generation, they have access to communication tools such as the Internet. So, their world is bigger than Tehran or Iran. That is why they are socially more mature than the previous generation.

Mohammad Taghi Fallah, a teacher, said, "Generation Z is looking for its own independent identity. In their world, the individual is an active member of the society and his or her uniqueness is the most eye-catching characteristic element.

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Ahmad Bokharaei, a sociologist, said the members of Generation Z were in the forefront of the protests in Iran. They were brave and had very little to lose. Although protesters were from different age groups but Generation Z's presence was more visible.

He warned that if their voice is not heard, the chances are that they will be disillusioned and left with no more motivation. This can even lead them to commit suicide or try drugs.

Another sociologist, Mehdi Ghavamipour, told Khabar Online that although there is a generational gap in most other societies, the characteristics of Iran's ideological society has made the divide between Generation Z and previous generation wider. He added that the conflict between traditions and modernity has made Generation Z's interests, demands and prejudices different from those of other generations.

He added that some scholars see this as a gap between the official culture and the pop culture as well as the impact of the crisis of inefficiency in the government. This new generation, he said, stresses the significance of modern life and ignores or totally rejects traditional concepts. They follow a different lifestyle than the previous generations.

Mohammad Reza Niknejad, a teacher, said the main characteristic of this generation is its bravery and knowledge. They have proven that older individuals are not necessarily more knowledgeable than the youths. In fact, in many families, the elderly have realized this difference and adapted their lifestyle to what their children want.

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Iranian sociologist Mostafa Abroshen, on the other hand, says Generation Z is a manifestation of the post-modern approach in the Iranian society. This generation challenges and questions both traditions and modernity. They demand pluralism and oppose unilateralism. They also challenge the traditional society's sanctities. They look down at the kind of obedience that was prevalent in the traditional families.

Nearly all these characteristics have been observed during more than six months of protests in Iran when the new generation challenged the values propagated by Iran's traditional clerics and the regime during the past four decades.

Nargess Malekzadeh, a teacher, observed that "Generation Z was not born during the 2022 protests. They are the children of a silently protesting previous generation that nurtured the new generation."

There has been a torrent of comments by clerics and hardliners in recent days against women who ignore hijab rules, while thousands appear in public without a headscarf. As regime vigilantes are encouraged to stop women and admonish them, another serious conflict is brewing in the country.

A video from the CCTV of a convenience store in Shandiz near the religious city of Mashhad went viral on social media Friday that showed a man dumping a large tub of yogurt after an argument on the head of a ‘hijabless’ woman and her mother, who was wearing a headscarf.

The man, apparently a member of the Revolutionary Guards’ Basij militia, had been carrying out his Islamic duty of “calling to virtue and forbidding wrong”. Local authorities said Saturday the man was arrested for disturbing public peace and insulting the women. Officials said that carrying out the duty of hijab enforcement should remain limited to verbal warnings only.

Both women were also arrested for defying hijab rules and the owner of the business was given a warning for allowing violation of the hijab law on his premises.

Dr Mohsen Borhani, a professor of criminal law at Tehran university, who was recently sacked for criticizing the regime after the execution of four young protesters, argued in a tweet Friday that even according to Islamic Sharia and laws, carrying out the religious duty of calling to virtue and forbidding wrong should never go beyond a verbal warning.

Attacking people and their property or violating their dignity and rights are criminal acts and victims have the right to self-defense according to Article 156 of the Islamic Penal Code of Iran, Borhani, a well-known religious scholar, wrote.

Moderate Muslims, including some clerics, have also been critical of hardliners intimidating women to impose the hijab.

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“This was not a tub of yogurt that was thrown on a girl’s head. It was bigotry and a putrid sludge crammed into the head of the yogurt-thrower over the years,” reformist politician and cleric Mohammad Ali Abtahi who served as vice-president under Mohammad Khatami in late 1990s and early 2000s protested in a tweet.

‘Hijabless’ girl in Gonbad-e Kavous, a rather conservative city in northeastern Iran

In July 2022, after weeks of harsher measures on the streets, President Ebrahim Raisi ordered all government entities to strictly implement a “chastity and hijab” law approved by the Supreme Cultural Revolution Council under hardliner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2005. He insisted again today, Saturday, that women should abide by the hijab rules.

“Chastity and hijab are religious matters and all pious Muslims stress on its necessity. Hijab protects the individual and the society from all harms and deviations,” he said, adding that since there is a law, even those who say they do not believe in hijab must abide by the rules. “Women and girls have shown that they abide by the law and will continue to do so.”

In the past four decades women generally demonstrated their opposition to compulsory hijab by making their headscarves smaller and letting their hair cascade on their shoulders from under it or making their tunics tighter and trousers shorter, wearing colorful clothes and putting on make-up.

Authorities referred to these women’s hijab as ‘bad’ or ‘improper’ and called them ‘bad-hijab women’.

It was only in 2018 that some women in Tehran and other larger cities began to wear their headscarves on their shoulders rather than their heads wherever they could. Now many are not even carrying a headscarf in their bag to use if they get into trouble. They are referred to as ‘hijabless’.

Defiance of hijab rules as a form of civil disobedience has hugely grown across the country after the death the 22-year-old Mahsa (Jina) Amini in custody of morality police in mid-September. Many believe that there is no sign ‘hijabless’ women will allow to be bullied again into wearing the hijab.