Iranians Protest In The Streets

The courage of these protesters is admirable even if some of their politics (their positions on the Palestinians and on Lebanon) is less than savoury. (Remember that Iran executed many who protested back in 2009)

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Author: Idrees Ahmad

I am a Lecturer in Digital Journalism at the University of Stirling and a former research fellow at the University of Denver’s Center for Middle East Studies. I am the author of The Road to Iraq: The Making of a Neoconservative War (Edinburgh University Press, 2014). I write for The Observer, The Nation, The Daily Beast, Los Angeles Review of Books, The Atlantic, The New Republic, Al Jazeera, Dissent, The National, VICE News, Huffington Post, In These Times, Le Monde Diplomatique, Die Tageszeitung (TAZ), Adbusters, Guernica, London Review of Books (Blog), The New Arab, Bella Caledonia, Asia Times, IPS News, Medium, Political Insight, The Drouth, Canadian Dimension, Tanqeed, Variant, etc. I have appeared as an on-air analyst on Al Jazeera, the BBC, TRT World, RAI TV, Radio Open Source with Christopher Lydon, Alternative Radio with David Barsamian and several Pacifica Radio channels.

3 thoughts on “Iranians Protest In The Streets”

  1. Idrees, with all due respect, this is pure crap. The video of crowds on the street in this MSNBC broadcast is from Friday. Those were pro-revolution crowds from the anniversary celebrations of the 1979 Islamic revolution.

    Please be careful about the videos you post on events in Iran. Already, a number of the videos today have been debunked, and have been identified as footage from the 2009 post-elections demos. PBS’ Tehran Bureau blog elaborates on this: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/tehranbureau/2011/02/iran-live-blog-25-bahman-14-february.html

    I understand the euphoria of people wanting to see change throughout the region, but I caution that there are external forces stirring this up in some nations. Even faking footage or misrepresenting visuals and events.

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    1. It is quite obvious that MSNBC is presenting footage from a different time. While it should be identified as such, the point remains that the Iranian gov’t is doing its damnedest to prevent ANY footage of the protests from getting out. The report from the interviewee is still true and verifiable.

      Don’t fool yourself with the external forces stirring up bit. Iranians are protesting for real civil and human rights. The government needs to stop being so repressive. It doesn’t allow even an ounce of internal criticism. It’s getting to the point of reform or lose all support.

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    2. Thanks for the correction Sandboxer. It is indeed pretty disgraceful for MSNBC to misidntity the protests (I’ve replaced the video with one from AJE). And no doubt there are external forces who are keen to stir up anti-state activity (we have written frequently about the neocon campaign to precipitate military aggression against Iran). But are you suggesting that Iranians have no reason to object to the ruling theocracy absent an external spur? Also, my tribute is to protesters who are braving state violence to demand greater freedoms regardless of whether they appear in ths particular footage or not.

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