Time heals all wounds, including the historical wounds of a nation. In 1979, Iranians allowed the establishment of an Islamic state. In doing so, they inflicted a deep wound on the heart of a nation. This marked the beginning of the rise of political Islam.
The Sunni counterpart of the ayatollahs left a trail of blood in New York, Madrid, Berlin, Paris, Amsterdam, Raqqa, Baghdad, Kabul, and elsewhere. Left-wing antisemitism and anti-Western sentiment went hand in hand with Islamism. The Shah called this monstrous alliance “red and black reactionaries.”
On January 11, Gen. Robert Huyser (president Jimmy Carter’s special envoy) asked the Shah if he was prepared to take tough action. The Shah’s response is still relevant today: “Well, you really don’t understand. Your commander-in-chief is different from me. I am a commander-in-chief who is actually in uniform, and as such, for me to give the orders that would have been necessary.”
He paused and asked a counterquestion: “Could you, as commander-in-chief, give the order to kill your own people?” Unlike Saddam Hussein, Bashar al-Assad, or Muammar Gaddafi, the Shah chose not to slaughter his people.
Effects of the Islamic Revolution
During the Islamic Revolution, which lasted almost 12 months, an estimated 532 to 2,000 people were killed. Most died during the armed uprising in the final days of the revolution. All these facts have long been public knowledge. That is why the current generation appreciates Shahanshah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. In the first 12 months after the victory of the Islamic Revolution, the Islamic Revolutionary Court executed at least 582 military personnel, politicians, and civil servants from the Shah era.
The ruling Democrats (Carter) began supporting Ruhollah Khomeini and his future regime de facto during the revolution. Former president Barack Obama did the same during the demonstrations in 2009. Iranians in Tehran chanted: “Obama, are you with us or with them” (the ayatollahs). Obama chose the ayatollahs and a deal with them.
President Donald Trump seems to be choosing the Iranian people. That is why the demonstrators have already named a street after him. Since the establishment of the Islamic Republic, the CIA has refused to promote regime change. The CIA has consistently downplayed the demonstrations. Civil servants from the Dutch Foreign Affairs Ministry did the same.
Now history is taking its revenge from an unexpected angle: The man (Trump) who is hated by politically correct Western top officials is becoming the hero of the Iranians – at least if he continues his policy.
No one expected Trump to offer protection to the protesters. That is precisely what the Democrats always claim to do: stand up for human rights. But in the case of Iran, Trump is leading America into an unpredictable arena in order to protect protesters (human rights). Even the EU member states did not and do not want to do anything for the Iranian protesters, except condemnation and a few sanctions.
Reclaiming Iranian dignity
On January 16, 1979, the Shah left Iran, and Iran and Iranians lost their dignity. Shortly thereafter, their lives and their fate would also be put at risk. It reminds us of the Germans who, on January 30, 1933, allowed the Nazis to seize state power.
Like the Nazi regime, the Islamic Republic of Iran created a separate military force to protect the regime and spread its ideology throughout the world: the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). They committed massacres. The Basij militia (Iranian Sturmabteilung) had the entire society in its grip: factories, government offices, neighborhoods, schools, and universities. They wanted a society of snitches. The Iranian regime, a unique product of Islamo-Gauchisme, ultimately created the most sophisticated antisemitic state in the world after Nazi Germany.
Iran’s left wing has gone bankrupt and collapsed under the ayatollahs. The historical wound that pierced the hearts of Iranians encompasses not only their own individual tragedies but also the injustice that Iranians have done to the Shah. Secular, powerful Iran certainly had its flaws, but it absolutely did not deserve to be destroyed.
The Weimar Republic (1918-1933) also had many flaws. None of these states were given a chance to improve. Now, after almost 47 years (February 12, 1979), Iranians want to heal the wound and honor the Shah by chanting: “Javid Shah, long live the king.” Where? In their hearts, in Iran, and especially in the Persian language.
Javid Shah now represents a return to secular times, to equality between men and women, and to economic development. Shah, influenced by sociologists (also a left-wing hobby at the time), believed that economic development took precedence over political and administrative reforms.
Now his son, Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi, wants political and administrative reform in Iran first: a powerful secular constitution, the protection of human rights, democracy, and economic development. Disgraced Iran is demanding its dignity back: from Ummah (religious Islamic community) to nation, from terrorism to friendship with the West, from antisemitism to friendship with Israel and Jews.
Now the final battle to realize the Iranian dream is beginning. That is why Iranians say, “This is the final battle, Pahlavi is coming back.” Iran has been healed.
As you read this, thousands of Iranians have already been killed by ayatollahs. The Jews were once liberated by King Cyrus the Great, and now the Jewish state is going to help liberate Iranians from the yoke of Islamist tyranny by urging Trump to side with the protesters.
Ultimately, it is the brave protesters who must help send the ayatollahs to the underworld. The Iranian Berlin Wall of fear has fallen, and with it the Berlin Wall of Islamists. Yes, it will be Javid Shah.
The writer is a Dutch-Iranian philosopher and law professor.