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Militants from some 40 countries across the globe
are trekking to Teheran for a 10-day "revolutionary
jamboree" in which "a new strategy to confront the American
Great Satan" will be hammered out.
The event is scheduled to start on February 1 to
mark the 25th anniversary of the return to Iran from exile of the late
Ayatollah Ruhallah Khomeini, father of the Islamic Revolution. It is
not clear how many foreign militants will attend, but the official
media promise a massive turnout to underline the Islamic Republic's
position as the "throbbing heart of world resistance to American
arrogance."
The guest list reads like a who's who of global
terrorism.
In fact, most of the organizations attending the
event, labeled "Ten-Days of Dawn," are branded by the United
States and some European Union members as terrorist outfits. These
include 17 branches of the Hizbullah, a worldwide militant Shi'ite
movement created by Teheran in 1983.
Today, Teheran is a magnet for militant groups from
many different national and ideological backgrounds. The Islamic
Republic's hospitality cuts across even religious divides. Thus
militant Sunni organizations, including two linked to al-Qaida - Ansar
al-Islam (Companions of Islam) and Hizb Islami (The Islamic Party) -
enjoy Iranian hospitality. They are joined by Latin American guerrilla
outfits, clandestine Irish organizations, Basque and Corsican
separatists, and a variety of leftist groups from Trotskyites to
Guevarists. Teheran today is also the only capital where all the
Palestinian militant movements have offices and, in some cases,
training and financial facilities.
Iranian officials claim that the presence of these
terror organizations in Iran is limited to "cultural and
information activities." The militants' offices are known as daftar
ertebat, which means "contact bureau," while the
training offered by the Islamic Revolutionary Guards is presented as
"courses in self-defense."
The war in Iraq and the capture of Saddam Hussein,
however, have shaken the traditional Khomeinist assumption that the US
will never risk a direct confrontation with the Iranian regime.
THAT VIEW is expressed in a celebrated dictum of
Khomeini that is painted on the walls of the conference center where
the militants will meet. It reads: "America Cannot Do A Damn
Thing!"
Now, however, many in Teheran believe that unless
the Iranian regime modifies aspects of its behavior, notably in its
relations with terrorist organizations, it might find itself in
military conflict with the US.
"Anyone who ignores the presence of the
American war machine all around us suffers from deadly
illusions," says Imadeddin Baqi, a member of the outgoing Islamic
Majlis (parliament).
Until at least last December, one idea was to either
cancel the event or curtail it to a one-day prayer session in
Khomeini's mausoleum in Teheran. That idea was vetoed by the
"Supreme Guide" Ali Khamenei, who believes that any show of
weakness by the regime could encourage its numerous opponents inside
and outside the country.
Thus Khamenei plans to use the global jamboree to
show that Iran is still a revolutionary force and that he alone, and
not the ineffective President Muhammad Khatami, calls the shots in
Teheran.
Khamenei also hopes that the next elections, to be
held 10 days after the revolutionary jamboree ends, will produce a new
parliamentary majority that shares his strategy. His game plan is to
unify the regime by cutting the so-called "reformists" down
to size and adopting a wait-and-see tactic until after the American
presidential election.
The militants who are going to Teheran this week are
likely to be told that they must lie as low as possible for the next
few months without abandoning any of their radical goals. The Teheran
gathering is also expected to deepen the recent informal alliances
made between Islamist militant groups and a variety of communist,
anarchist and environmentalist militant groups against the
"American common enemy."
The Khomeinist regime is prepared to change aspects
of its behavior and even concede some tactical retreats to weather
what many in Teheran call "the Bush storm." But the regime's
strategy, which is aimed at driving the US out of the Middle East,
destroying Israel, and replacing all Arab regimes with "truly
Islamic" ones, remains unchanged.
It is no accident that two words are popular in
Teheran these days. One is "detente," often used by Khatami
and the so-called "reformists." The other is "hudhabiah,"
which is the name of a truce signed by the Prophet Muhammad with a
Jewish tribe in Medina at a time Muslims found themselves in a weak
position. At the end of the truce period, the prophet's army, having
rebuilt its strength, attacked the Jews and massacred all the adult
males, seizing women and children as war booty.
It is against that background that the question
"What to do with Iran?" must be debated. Today, Iran is
ready to offer all the behavioral changes required of it by Washington
and the EU. But it cannot change its nature. And there is no guarantee
that this particular beast will not bite again - and hard - as soon as
it feels that it is no longer threatened. A scorpion does not sting
because it is naughty; that is dictated by its nature. The writer, an Iranian author and journalist, is editor of the
Paris-based Politique Internationale |