The most important group of religious leaders in Iran called the disputed presidential election and the new government illegitimate on Saturday, an act of defiance against the country’s supreme leader and the most public sign of a major split in the country’s clerical establishment.
A statement by the group, the Association of Researchers and Teachers of Qum, represents a significant, if so far symbolic, setback for the government and especially the authority of the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, whose word is supposed to be final. The government has tried to paint the opposition and its top presidential candidate, Mir Hussein Moussavi, as criminals and traitors, a strategy that now becomes more difficult — if not impossible.
In a statement to the press, the Assembly of Qom Seminary Scholars and Researchers said some members of the Guardian Council had “lost their impartial image in the eyes of the public.”
“How can one accept the legitimacy of the election just because the Guardian Council says so? Can one say that the government born out of the infringements is a legitimate one,” it said.
The Guardian Council is an unelected 12-member council made up of six religious leaders, appointed by the supreme leader, and six jurists.
The statement is further proof of a split at the top of Iran’s establishment, correspondents say.
They say that in particular, it was an act of defiance against the country’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Jonah Goldberg at The Corner
John Hinderaker at Powerline
So the Obama administration is now more pro-Ahmadinejad and pro-Iranian repression than the Association of Researchers and Teachers of Qum. If that isn’t Hope and Change, what is?
It seems difficult to maintain legitimacy while denying the will of the people in the name of theocracy when leading religious authorities are coming out against you. Not that pure logic is enough to defeat a dictatorship, but legitimacy does matter.
The group’s statement came the same day Moussavi published a 24-page dossier online, written by a commission appointed by Moussavi, detailing allegations of electoral fraud. The report “accused influential Ahmadinejad supporters of handing out cash bonuses and food, increasing wages, printing millions of extra ballots and other acts in the run-up to the vote.”
Also yesterday, a special adviser to Ayatollah Khamenei accused Mousavi of being a “foreign agent” working for the United States. The WaPo called it “the highest and most direct [accusation] issued by an Iranian official since the June 12 election.”
Can an arrest be far behind?
This puts Khamenei in a corner. He has repeatedly claimed that the election results were divinely authored, putting his religious credibility on the line to silence opposition. Khamenei has, through surrogates, accused Mousavi and other protesters of being foreign agents, enemies of the Islamic Republic that he claims authority from Allah to run. If the religious clerics that support that divine authority suddenly switch sides and accuse Khamenei and his Guardian Council of imposing illegitimate results on the nation, what does that do to his authority?
In fact, this is an escalation from Qum. They had earlier asked the regime to nullify the results in order to restore order and give an opportunity for calm, but hadn’t given a judgment on the election itself. Their latest statement abandons any effort to calm the waters, which makes this step more ominous for Khamenei. They have taken sides — and they have joined the opposition.
UPDATE: Joe Klein in Swampland
