UNLIKELY COALITION RE: IRAN

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is doing to his people now what he wants to do to mine.

Iran’s president could not get away with jailing, terrorizing and murdering thousands who demonstrated against him at the United Nations and in several other cities on Thursday, Sept. 24, since leaders here and in other Western countries, however imperfect, allow citizens the freedom to protest. More than 40 organizations created the Stand for Freedom in Iran coalition to demonstrate against Ahmadinejad’s brutality of his fellow Iranians and his plans to destroy Israel.

Most notably, Jews and Iranians joined together to send Ahmadinejad a blunt message. It is hard enough to motivate members of any single group affected by a given issue, but here are two unlikely groups that gathered for a common cause. This event presents an opportunity to sustain ongoing pressure on Ahmadinejad from our part of the world.

It is hardly coincidence that Ahmadinejad antagonized both Jews and his own people. As natural bullies, tyrants will subjugate their own when they must and intimidate external groups or nations whenever they can get away with it. He picked on Israel partly because there is already an anti-Israel groundwork and he holds the strategic high ground.

The convergence of American Jews and Iranians, including Muslims, is a minor miracle. The Sept. 24 rally launched a coalition between two interest factions with life-and-death stakes in Iran’s future. Iranians are struggling for freedom and Jews are confronting a threat to Israel’s existence. Their pressure on Ahmadinejad can only help their respective peoples. To put it mildly, they face an uphill fight, but their failure to organize will help give Ahmadinejad a free hand.

For that matter, let’s hope that the other organizations which sponsored the rally, including African Americans and Puerto Ricans, continue to work with them. Ideally, all concerned people should be involved.

The lives of both Jews and Iranians could depend on what we do. Ahmadinejad no doubt exploited the levers of government to steal the June 11 election. Ordinary Iranians faced retaliation for protesting the election results. Though they swamped the streets of Tehran and other cities, people of Iran risked death, torture and imprisonment. Some were murdered or jailed simply because they chose to marched for their liberty.

Interestingly, Americans who filled the block-long Dag Hammarskjold Plaza for the Stand for Freedom in Iran rally reflected a relatively low turnout. The rally was scarcely covered by the New York dailies, and the few news reports I could locate suggested a range of 3,000 to 10,000. That’s light by New York standards.

Rally participants griped to a New Jersey Jewish News reporter that turnout was insufficient. “Where were all the people?” asked Gail Kushner of West Orange, near Newark. “There should have been a stronger representation of adults,” added Stan Shapiro of Roseland, also a Newark suburb.

I had planned to attend, but I was sick that day. A bus was chartered to pick up demonstrators from the Philadelphia area in Elkins Park, a northern suburb. Besides, the rally was held on a weekday when most people are working.

Jews must be concerned with Ahmadinejad’s obvious threat to demolish Israel with a nuclear device, still in development, while denying that Hitler wiped out 6 million Jews; thousands of Holocaust survivors still live to testify to Nazi Germany’s crimes.

In fact, Israel is already engaged in a war with Iran. Ahmadinejad initiated the war when Iran supplied its first weapon to Hamas or Hezbollah. Israel fought a two-front war in 2006 against Hamas and Hezbollah and invaded Gaza last December. This is reason enough for Israel to attack Iran.

Ahmadinejad built his nuclear development sites with the intention of preventing Israel or anyone else from eliminating these places, and he claims Iran can effectively retaliate. An Israeli attack would likely incite outrage among Arabs who will mass behind Ahmadinejad.

On the plus side, Ahmadinejad must worry about the fury and resentment among his people, but one cannot be optimistic that they will succeed in ousting him.

It is ironic that masses of Iranians face jail or death for exercising the rights we take for granted, yet opponents here constitute a relatively small number in a city where the police consistently facilitate demonstrations.

The Sept. 24 rally possibly contributed to progress in dealing with Iran. One week later, Iranian delegates made small but significant concessions aimed at preventing development of a nuclear weapon.

No time to rest. It should embolden opponents of Iran in America to persist with their protests. This sums it up neatly:

“This has to be a sustained effort,” said Malcolm Hoenlein, executive vice president of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, as quoted in The Jewish Standard, a weekly in Bergen County, New Jersey. “What we have to show is we’re committed to a course of action that will be effective.”