IP: The Iranian By Afsaneh Najmabadi

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

> Date: Fri, 05 Oct 2001 14:35:53 -0400
> To: David Farber <farber () cis upenn edu>
> From: "K.Ellis" <guavaberry () earthlink net>
>
> The Iranian
> By Afsaneh Najmabadi
> September 18, 2001
> <http://www.iranian.com/Opinion/2001/September/Wrong/index.html>
>
>
> Like so many people around the world, I, an Iranian
> living in the United States, have been deeply pained
> by the tragedy of September 11th. Yet after the shock
> of the first few days, I became increasingly aware
> that what I was feeling was not just pain, and
> definitely not just sympathy for those killed, the
> immediate survivors and their loved ones.
>
> Initially I thought I was experiencing this "excess"
> discomfort because my Middle Eastern origin had put me
> in a position of feeling as if I had to "explain" what
> had happened, or to defend and apologize for my
> sympathies for those people in the Middle East who are
> fighting injustices and wrongs of various sorts and
> who were now increasingly seen to be somehow
> implicated in this tragedy.
>
> Though my sense of refusing to be put in this position
> was real, I soon began to realize that my refusal was
> connected to feelings of shame and responsibility for
> what had happened. How could I possibly feel
> responsible for this event, my friends have asked me,
> when I have indicated this state of mind to them?
>
> To answer their question, I have had to go to other
> instances over the past thirty years when I had
> similar feelings. The first to come to mind was the
> hostage crisis in 1979-80, and then Ayatollah
> Khomeini's fatwa on Salman Rushdie in 1989. In both
> instances the same feeling of shame and responsibility
> overcame me.
>
> So here is an attempt to explain to other Middle
> Easterners:
>
> The people who took American hostages in Tehran in
> 1979 clearly felt America had done Iran wrong and this
> was their way of setting things right in the world.
> Those of us -- Iranians/Middle Easterners, residing in
> the Middle East or located elsewhere -- who did not
> agree with the action, more often than not chose to
> act as "explainers": explaining why people in Iran
> were angry at the US (usually starting with the 1953
> coup and there goes a familiar story).
>
> To the extent that we chose to explain, I suggest, we
> became implicated in regenerating an ethical stance
> and a political culture that encourages the idea that
> the wronged ones are morally entitled to do anything;
> a popular motto was "by any means necessary," and it
> was up to the oppressed to decide the modalities of
> that necessity.
>
> What was the alternative? I think there was an ethical
> and political alternative; a stand that would say
> regardless of what the United States had done in Iran,
> it was wrong to take those hostages. This was in fact
> the gut-reaction of many ordinary (that is, outside
> Islamist and anti-imperialist left) Iranians in Iran.
>
> But this was a very dangerous position for any Iranian
> to take inside Iran. Outside Iranians in their great
> majority did not take this stand. Many of the most
> articulate Iranians chose "to explain."
>
> This pertains to much of what is happening in the
> Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Every time a Palestinian
> suicide bomber kills a group of Israelis, I hope
> against all odds that some voice from among
> Palestinians, especially those Palestinians living in
> the relative safety and comfort of Europe and America,
> would say loudly and with no prevarication, that
> despite everything Israel has done and continues to do
> to Palestinians, it is wrong to commit this act,
> instead of trying to "explain" how it is part of a
> cycle of violence, etc. At most we may hear: it is
> wrong, but. . . .
>
> Yet every time that we say "but", every time we choose
> to "explain", we become implicated in regenerating a
> political culture and an ethical outlook that becomes
> part of the state of being in the world that allows
> hostage-taking and suicide bombing. It allows the
> September 11th tragedy.
>
> It is in this sense that I think we were all
> implicated in that tragedy. We have become part of the
> conditions of possibility for these kinds of actions.
> To the extent that we, Middle Easterners, raise our
> critical voices, we would make the work of those
> Americans (and Israelis) who are engaged in explaining
> (in their case a necessary work) easier, their voice
> more credible for a wider audience.
>
> To the extent that we say these acts are wrong despite
> the prior history that is often invoked to explain
> them, we put Americans in a stronger position to also
> say: despite September 11th, going to war is wrong. In
> an important sense, I take my courage to say these
> words from the brave Americans who have already begun
> to organize against possible military action by their
> government and have said by words and deeds: it is
> wrong to go to war despite September 11th.
>
> My heroes and heroines of last week were the two
> hundred young Iranians who held a spontaneous
> candlelight vigil in Tehran to express their pain and
> sympathy for American people. It was a brave gesture
> that gives me hope against all odds.
>
>
> ---------------------
>
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