IRAN

This morning I was watching CNN and the pictures of the British hostages with Persian subtitles reminded me what type of illness Iran is suffering from. Ah, yes! The illness has a name: The Iranian regime. With so many educated and supposedly open minded people do we really deserve to be represented by such people: Terrorists, murderers, thieves, and liars?!! I was browsing through the Iranian websites and blogs and it is incredibly ironic to read how some of these people are trying to excuse the terrorist regime of Iran by asking questions such as: How would it be if it was the Iranian ship that had sailed in their waters, etc. First of all these Brits have been in the international waters, secondly so what! And thirdly every single human is constantly endangered by the Iranian regime not only in Iran but elsewhere so please do enlighten me what is there to compare? The Brits have a government that despite its shortcomings is a democracy (based on my personal experiences in Europe I’d say most Europeans are racist but still this doesn't change the fact that they do have democracy and democratic governments and Iranians don't). What is comparable between the Iranian regime and the British government? The British government is by far a more civilized government where as the Iranian regime has victimized millions of Iranians and HAS committed crimes beyond imagination. Even I who sit in the U.S. and writes... receive several death threats because I write what I write.

  

 

Ex-Hostage versus Ex-Hostage Taker

Last night I was watching a program where Iran’s 1979 American hostage was discussing why and how Iran takes hostages again. Why don’t these media people bring an ex-hostage taker and one of the ex-hostages in to a debate?

  

 

Colored Plastic Makes Azadeh Forghani Kodak Ready


It is incredibly interesting how the Iranian regime bullies the world and everything and everyone is taken hostage because of this or such regimes and it is considered as a cultural difference! I don’t know to laugh or cry when hearing or reading these stuff. Now on a totally different matter I recently found this article on Iranian.com. There is this so called feminist whom I guess is either a Mullah Baaji (female mullah!) or has been given a sound chance to leave her Qajar grave and has written a funny letter to Farah Diba. I don’t really care for the previous regime and its king and queens and their line of god knows what blood but why shouldn’t Ms. Diba speak to Iranians? Who says her voice should go mute because this one in her playboy magazine cover wants to grant us her own! Colored plastic has made Azadeh Forghani feel Kodak ready. I guess in her there is a little dictator deciding who can and can’t talk! eh.

  

 

Why SOME Iranian Feminists SAY: Marry Me Mr. Green Card holder! Here I am! Here I am!

Last Saturday I was talking to one of the authors sitting next to me and he was asking why I don’t challenge Reza Aslan. I replied one because I am not a political activist and ... two what is there to talk about with this guy... he has never experienced living under the Iranian regime. He was raised here. He goes to Iran and has his Saffron rice with juicy Persian cousins, and over here he has his housie dollars. What does he know of politics? Since when writing a book about the history of Islam makes one a political analyst? The same goes for these Iranian so called feminist activists... one gets married the minute a green card holder visits Iran, the other one has a daddy who lives high on Rafsanjani dollars, the next one has taken her hubby’s last name because she is too ashamed of her own! These are feminist activists? Maybe we need new voices, pure souls who have something, and are honest, who live what they preach! That said here is an interesting way to see how ridiculous some of these god knows what songs are written in Persian. Good that someone has noticed and shows how incredibly idiotic the song is.

  

 

Last Saturday after two hours of driving and the little girl getting carsick and vomiting in the car and Mama Sheema cleaning the mess in full makeup… we finally arrived at the Virginia book event. I had a table ready for me and next to me there were other authors with their books displayed on their tables. There were also readings and speaking programs. I sat from nine in the morning to four in the afternoon feeling I am on display, as if it is an open house. I asked p to take the little girl for lunch and the movies while I was busy. An elderly gentleman came to me and after looking at my book told me… you don’t look like an exile. I replied how are they supposed to look? He said well I don’t know how they are supposed to look but you sure are the most beautiful Persian girl I have seen. I asked him how many Persian girls he knows… he says: just a few… and I laughed so hard that my nose touched my knees! Just a few! I guess what he meant was just one!! Anyway later I stood in the parking waiting for P and almost got robbed by this heavy weight tall man… it was scary. I forgot all about my self-defense trainings. I started running to get back to the hotel. Now I have a bad case of shoulder and neck pain from running with the heavy bag pack and on high hills. I don’t know why all these happy experiences happen to me… I don’t think Louise Glück goes through similar stuff.

  

 

رامین احمدی: خمینی اما برای کارزاری (کمپین) که علیه تساوی حقوق زنان با مردان براه انداخته بود به مشارکت فعال همه وعاظ و گویندگان دینی احتیاج داشت. همه جا مراکز مذهبی می بایست تبدیل به تریبونی برای ابراز مخالفت با تساوی حقوق زن و مرد می شد. در همان سال در پیامی خطاب به وعاظ نوشت:
"از تساوی حقوق اظهار تنفر کنید و از دخالت زنها در اجتماع که مستلزم مفاسد بیشمار است، ابراز انزجار و دین خدا را یاری کنید و بدانید "ان تنصر و الله ینصرکم و یثبت اقدامکم."
(28/2/42)

  

 

The opposite of love is not hatred; it's indifference

WATCH it here.

  

 

What Laleh Bakhtiar is trying to do with Quran is incredibly important. I hope Women scholars who know Arabic come forth to be part of this great contribution. If I recall correctly Ms. Bakhtiar practices Islamic sufism. I studied sufism for over five years but I couldn't accept what they taught about the Bahaies (they may very well refuse to comment on it but the Islamic sufism doesn't respect the Bahai faith and this doesn't go with my belief system.) My only concern with Ms. Bakhtiar's work is that because she doesn’t know Arabic her important work will not be taken seriously by the Islamic world. It is a known fact in the Islamic world that a Shia (Sufi) Muslim doesn't have the same weight as a Sunni Arab Muslim. That is why I hope Islmaic scholars (of Arabic background or with the full knowledge in Arabic) will either be part of this project or work on providing the world with new interpretations, translations of Quran.

  

 

Happy Birthday to my little girl and happy fourth year of blogging to mama Sheema.

  

 

IRAN: 57 EXECUTIONS IN 90 DAYS

  

 

A 17 year old to be executed in Iran.

  

 

Akhbarrooz: More teachers have been arrested.

معلمین معترض در برابر مجلس و وزارت آموزش و پرورش به سختی سرکوب شدند. گزارش های اولیه حاکی از بازداشت های گسترده و از جمله بازداشت نمایندگان معلمین و رهبران کانون های صنفی معلمین است.

  

 

اخبار روز: طی چند روز گذشته نیروهای امنیتی و انتظامی تعداد زیادی از روستائیان حومه شهرهای ارومیه، سلماس و خوی را دستگیر کرده اند.

  

 

Last year when I first blogged about Zahra Kamalfar I was hoping to see her get a refugee status somewhere in the West. Today she is saved from the Moscow Airport! Zahra and her children will fly to Canada tomorrow!

پارسال وقتی برای اولین بار از زهرا کمال فر نوشتم دلم میخواست یک جایی توی غرب به خودش و فرزنداش پناه بده. فردا زهرا و بچه هایش از فرودگاه مسکو خلاصی پیدا می کنند و به کانادا خواهند رفت.

  

 

The little girl goes ice skating now (I am soon to start taking her to Taekwondo again now that we are almost settled down over here.) Ice skating has replaced ballet for her and since we took her to her first lesson last week p has become affectionate with the ring too. I can see him soon to do half loops, flips, and jumping wally, split, and waltz. I don’t know why both he and my dad insisted that because I am good in skiing I am a definite skater! God No! I couldn’t take one foot from another. In fact when the little girl needed to stand up and her instructor didn't help her… it was p who bravely walked on the ice to save our little girl.

  

 

Echoes in Exile

Thanks to my beautiful freind my book's website finally seems to be where it should have been long ago. Hurrrrray!

  

 

Ode to Egypt from those afar

One of the poets I have co-authored with is Yahia Lababidi. His latest poem is breathtaking. It can be found on Ahram Weekly.

"perhaps tender or

a pale, becalmed cheek

a mouth tight with reproach or

lips pursed in a deathless smile

other times you are inscrutable

worse, is when I seem to lose you"

یکی از شعرایی که باهم شعر مشترک نوشته ایم یحیی لبعبیدی هست. دیروز برام این شعرش رو که اینجا چاپ شده فرستاد و به نظرم یکی از بهترین کارهاش هست.

  

 

Child executions violate international law

"[No] capital punishment... shall be imposed for offences committed by persons below eighteen years of age"


Article 37(a) of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child
In order not to have to save one life at a time, please sign the petition and join our campaign to STOP CHILD EXECUTIONS once and for all.

Sign the Petition

  

 

Twice Every Morning

"I wanted it to rain so that the feeling of being ashamed was washed away, that my father had hidden me under an umbrella or I would be in my dad's socks so that the woman had to talk to my father's shoes. After all that is part of the Islamic teaching that a woman doesn't look straight into a man's eyes. I felt defeated by her belief. I felt hopeless, helpless and the hair on my head started crawling over my skull. The Muslim woman had me feel my hair was Medusa's. She was one of those many self proclaimed Athenas who were outraged at their sacred temple of worships being violated and wanted to turn tresses into snakes."


continue here

  

 

Former Iranian Defense Official Talks to Western Intelligence yet all we hear is this woman who died last month! I am not sure if this Ali Reza Asgari is a double agent or not but if he is not then the information he provides is extremely crucial.

  

 

Islam WHAT?

I don't think Islam or any religion for that matter can be secular but those who believe in such... hey here (link!) maybe something for you!


I e-mail p the link... and what I've noted here and he writes back: "I agree with you with lots of remote kisses and hugs." That is what makes my woman's day.

  

 

Please go to my page on amazon.com and post your two lines review. For every dinner I have cooked you or not... for every kiss, every memory we have shared or not... by the way I don't think it has to be with your name...


Here is the link.

  

 

March 8th

when my feet burn to reach you yet the wounds on them aren't mending too fast, when the season denies the one day to the Iranian women who demonstrate on Women's Day, and are, therefore, behind bars for asking for their rights, the rights they seek with all their flexibility toward a regime that captures them like little hunts. In all these things I know I can find peace in your writings when everything seems too centralized to hope for a democracy in Iran. It is your delicate words that wash the pain off my body, and heal the scars on my feet. I know I can narrate my images with you. You are after all the one who holds me with all my nakedness, clear, without any shadow peering.

here

  

 

Five Women To Be Executed In Iran


Akhbar-e Rooz: Limou Ebrahimi, Tahmineh Danesh, Mohabbat Mahmoudi, Malekghorbani, and Mohamadzadeh are five Iranian women who are to be executed, and stoned to death.

  

 

The arrested women activists are on hunger strike.

Regardless of what I think of them as individuals because of how they cyber attacked an Iranian writer, their human rights matter to me and them going on hunger strike should matter to the world. Alas! The western media concentrates only on their own coffee break.

  

 

This was send to me earlier today. Iranian Teachers Protest in front of Iran's Parliament. WATCH here.

معلمان آزاده شعار می دادند: زندگی انسانی، حق مسلم ماست

  

 

Phil Hazlewood: Backed by the former chief UN weapons inspector in Iraq, Hans Blix, the Oxford Research Group said Iran could respond to an attack by launching a "crash programme" to develop a crude nuclear device within months.

  

 

Petition Demanding Immediate and Unconditional Release of Women’s Rights Defenders Arrested in Tehran on March 4, 2007
Please Sign

فراخوان براي در خواست آزادي بي قيد وشرط مدافعان حقوق زنان که در تاريخ 13 اسفند 1385 دستگير شدند. ما خواستار امنيت، سلامت و آزادي بي قيد و شرط همه افراد دستگير شده، در تجمع مسالمت آميز در مقابل دادگاه انقلاب اسلامي در تاريخ 13 اسفند 1385در تهران هستيم.

لطفا امضا کنید

  

 

Ramin Ahmadi: "The Iranian people are left alone to face their repressive regime because the left feels uncomfortable about siding with Washington. Reading Postel's book is timely since war or not, unless there is a strong show of solidarity with Iranian people and against the regime in Tehran, the repression will go on. In the absence of a global progressive coalition for a regime change in Iran, the left continues to focus on what is most comfortable, opposing the Empire and once again betraying the Iranian people in their struggle against tyranny."

  

 

The oppressive regime's State Security Forces have arrested more than 50 of the women's rights activists who had attended a peaceful demonstration in Tehran. The names of the women mentioned so far are: Rezavan Moghadam, Noushin Ahmadi Khorasani, Niloufar Golkar, Mahboubeh Abbasgholzadeh, Nahid Keshavarz, Mahboubeh Hosseinzadeh, Nahid Jafari, Minou Mortezaie, Fatemeh Govaraie, Parvin Ardalan, Shahla Entesari, Parastou Dokoohi, Maryam Mirza, Maryam Hosseinkhah, Shadi Sadr, Sosan Tahmasbi, Saghi Laghaie, Azadeh Forghnai, Zhila Baniyaghoub, Nahid Entesari, Asieh Amini, Zeinab Peyghambarzadeh, Nasrin Afzali, Elnaz Ansari, Sara Imanian, Farideh Entesari, Sara Loghmani, Samayeh Farid, Mahnaz Mohammadi.

  

 

kurdistanmedia: Five Iranian Khuzestani Arabs are sentenced 6 to 14 years in prison and exile to other cities (provinces) in Iran.

خبرگزاری دیده بان حقوق بشر کردستان: بنا به‌ گزارشات رسیده‌ 5 تن از زندانیان عرب به‌ نامهای " لفته‌ سرخه‌، منصور طیهری نسب، هانی باوی، قاسم کوروشاوی و حسین بولعذار " که‌ در اوایل مرداد 1384 به‌ اتهام اقدام علیه‌ امنیت ملی و شرکت در بمب گذاریهای اهواز دستگیر شده‌ بودند و به حبسهای طولانی و تبعید محکوم شدند.

  

 

امروز یه فنجون قهوه داغ، یه لیوان آب پرتقال، یه ساندویچ تخم مرغ و یه لیوان شیر موز رو توی یه سینی گذاشتم و بردم برای پ که توی تخت بشینه بخوره (گاهی صبحانه پ رو توی تخت براش می برم...) غافل از این که هووو کوچولو که پشت میز داره صبحانه می خوره هم می خواد اونجوری سرو بشه. دیدم اشک چشماش رو پر کرده که چرا صبحانه اونو مثل شازده خامونا براش تو سینی نگذاشتم و توی تخت ندادم. گفتم بره توی تختش بشینه تا صبحانه اونم توی تخت بهش بدم. دوست دارم از اینکه خواسته اش رو می گه. دوست دارم که غصه اش رو نشون می ده. که می گه من این رو می خوام. مثل من که تو رو می خوام. این هم دو تا آهنگی که اون موقع ها قبل از رفتن از ایران گوش می کردم...

اولی

دومی...

  

 

برسنگ میتراشم نقش ابر را

شایدروزی ببارد


احمد باطبی

  

 

Lost in the City
When moving from one state is not just moving from one state to another but it means getting lost... and feeling the hair is growing on your face!

A) After one and half hours of driving to find my place of peace (better to be known as the place of boxes) also known as the apartment we rent in the Washington D.C. area since we have moved down here... I am ready to collapse. It hasn't been my day. First I receive a bill for $1,007 from a university I attended few years ago -- which I had faxed --still have the print stating the fax is sent out to them to tell them I drop the class... but apparently they have lost the fax!!) then I have to drive round and round the city... and finally stopping in the middle of the street to ask an officer… how to get where I want to go... now... the funny part is... every time we passed the White House (and we passed it some 20 times... seeing it from different angles) I would hear the little girl crying out excitedly: I want to see president Bush, Can we go to see President Bush? But why can’t we see President Bush? I want to see President Bush. I know him. Please?

B) On Friday I will be on hunger strike alongside many others to show support for Ahmad Batebi.


C) On another note... I don't know how it is with other poets... but I have this poem “For Women of Afghanistan” that I wrote in 1999 and was first published in 2000 while the Talibans were in power... and since its publication it has had a life of its own... it has been translated, taught in classrooms worldwide, used in paintings, art works, and more... recently I was contacted to be informed it will be presented as my work in amnesty international. How is that for a poem that has a life of its own... I say a good one.