Fears of Anti-government protests triggerred on ahmadinejad's move to address on al-quds day rally
Anti-government protests feared on Ahmedinejad’s move to address an al-Quds Day rally
Streets of Iranian capital, Tehran filled with pro and anti-government demonstrators have marked the country’s annual palestinian solidarity day. In a defiant intention of a government warning against the annual al-Quds Day rally to protest, the opposition supporters have raised anti-government slogans and waved green banners during their rally on Friday.
Clashes between the rival demonstrators as well as between opposition supporters and security forces were reported to have been witnessed.
It was reported that Mohammad Khatami, a reformist former president, was being attacked by a group of Iranian protesters while he was marching with opposition supporters in Tehran.
Independent verification of the reports was not possible immediately in a shorter span of time.
‘Khatami pushed by the Attackers’
Opposition activists quickly repelled the attackers when they pushed Khatami to the ground.
It reported “During the scuffle, his turban fell off and they wanted to beat him. But supporters resisted them and the riot police promptly intervened,” A news agency reported Mohammad Reza Khatami, Khatami’s brother, as saying ,The former president, a key supporter of Iranian opposition groups, was “not hurt” in the attack.
A call for mass protests by the opposition to coincide with the government-sponsored demonstration has marked the day. But a warning has been given by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard on Thursday that it would take repressive actions to halt any anti-government rallies.
“This nation’s brave children who are in the security bodies and the police, or in the Revolutionary Guards or the Basij (are ready) to confront firmly any deviation, and anti-revolutionary … moves,” the Guards said in a statement published by the state news agency, Irna.
Iran’s supreme leader,Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has also warned the opposition against using the al-Quds Day rally to launch street protests. He said “Be watchful so some who want to spread division do not succeed. No division should be created,” .
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran’s president, who is accused by opposition groups of rigging his re-election in June, marked the solidarity day with an address at a rally at Tehran University. He used the address to denounce Israel, saying the Holocaust was a “false pretext” used to create the state and that confronting the “Zionist regime” is a national and religious duty.Similar comments made by Ahmadinej ad in 2005 sparked international criticism.
Ronaghi said Ahmadinejad’s address marked a chance for the Iranian leader to show that his positions on Israel and the West remain unchanged. “It’s a very important opportunity for President Ahmadinejad to emphasise once again that his anti-Israeli and anti-Western stance hasn’t changed a bit by all that has happened after the election,” he said. “There have been accusations that Ahmadinejad is going to solve the government’s problems with the West.
One of the major sticking points would be Iran’s stance against Israel. “So it’s very important for him to emphasise that he’s not going to change that any time soon.” Ahmadinejad’s main rivals and also the defeated presidential candidates, Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi, had also been expected to take part in the main al-Quds Day march. But the officials said he was prevented from taking part in the rally after an angry crowd attacked his car.
Mousavi and Karroubi had led mass protests in the wake of the elections, trigerring a major clamp down by police and the detention of hundreds of people.