-Ilana Freedman
On Wednesday night I stayed up until my eyes were burning, reading the tweets coming from Iran as the uprising of February 11 unfolded. It was the anniversary of the Iranian Revolution and the day the Green Revolution had chosen to demonstrate against the repressive Iranian government. It was 4 am before I finally packed it in. Despite the eight and a half hour time difference, it was difficult to tear myself away as I watched history unfold through the magic of cyber communications.
In preparation for the day, the Iranian government had attempted to shut down the lines of communication. Cell phones all over Iran were down. So was the Internet, Google e-mail, and many of the television stations. The primary vehicle for communications that night, therefore, was Twitter, which amazingly stayed open throughout the long day and the following night.
The pace of conversation over Twitter was almost overwhelming, with thousands of new tweets every few minutes. There were no videos, but a constant flow of reports, conjectures, confirmations, and much repetition of information that had been tweeted before. But the energy level was high, and the chatter was remarkable.
We in the West may find it difficult to understand what is now going on in Iran. We depend on the press to keep us informed and, even more than usual, the press let us down. As the streets of Iran filled with opposition Green demonstrators and the government forces who would try to beat them back, the world media barely reported anything out of the ordinary. What they did report, largely toed the government line. They played down the demonstrations, later calling them a "disappointing turnout" and a failure.
According to the tweets coming in throughout the day, however, the reporters had been warned against writing anything derogatory about Ahmadinejad or his speech. In fact, as of Wednesday, 63 foreign reporters had already been arrested, and the mainstream media representatives must have understood that the stakes were high and personal. They fell in line and reported the pap demanded by the Iranian government.
So on Thursday, when we should have been hearing about the demonstrations, we heard nothing, except what the Iranian government wanted us to hear, which was very little. But while the mainstream media was largely silent about what was happening in Iran, the real news came over Twitter in a flood of information. It was this newest form of electronic communication that kept us in the game, bringing us the news as it unfolded. Although many of the tweets were unverifiable, there was so much activity, with thousands of tweets coming over our Internet every few minutes, that it was possible to make sense out of most of it.
Green Movement's elderly leaders Mehdi Karroubi, former president Mohammed Khatami, and Zahra Rahnavard, the popular wife of opposition leader, Mir Hossein Mousavi, had been beaten severely by Ahmadinejad's thugs
It was through Twitter, for example, that we heard about how Green Movement's elderly leaders Mehdi Karroubi, former president Mohammed Khatami, and Zahra Rahnavard, the popular wife of opposition leader, Mir Hossein Mousavi, had been beaten severely by Ahmadinejad's thugs. Tweeters reported that thousands of green supporters were pouring into the streets, and, significantly, that in some places, women were removing their head scarves, in defiance of laws which require them to keep their heads covered.
Another story, important in order to understand the context, reported interviews with people who helped to form the huge crowds of Iranians who came to support the government. They had been bribed with food and home goods and transported from long distances, to appear at the official demonstration in Teheran and show solidarity with the President and his regime.
Tweeters also reported that the official Iranian television, broadcasting Ahmadinejad's speech at Azadi Square in Teheran, may have used a filter to wash out the green color displayed by the large numbers of opposition demonstrators who were present in the square, in order to minimize their apparent numbers. They also said that videos being aired on official television of the assembled crowd, prior to his speech, were from another year, when the sky was blue, the weather warmer, and the crowd less hostile. It must have been a pretty obvious deception; this year the sky was overcast, the temperature was a bitter 37 degrees, and opposition was definitely in the air.
Ahmadinejad's speech was long and rambling. Someone tweeted that it seemed more like gossip than a speech to the nation. The "news" that had been promoted as "world changing" before the speech, was that Iran was now a nuclear nation, but the evidence he gave to back up his claim was either old news or just plain doubtful.
What really happened on Wednesday, February 11 was that an arrogant, psychotic, but extremely powerful dictator used all his resources to brutally clamp down on public opposition, even including the Western press in his oppressive tactics. The repression was harsh, violent, and calculated.
But despite Ahmadinejad's most cruel efforts, the groundswell in Iran is not likely to go away. This is a revolution that will appear in waves, and each wave will be larger and achieve more than the last. The first wave was memorialized by the brutal death of Neda, the beautiful young woman whose murder in the street was caught on camera and who became the symbol of that first wave of rebellion. The second wave happened this week.
"My people, Sooner or later, no matter what it takes, Iran will be free, a secular democratic nation."
I believe that it will ultimately be disclosed that our media has vastly under-reported what happened in Iran on February 11. We will find that there were many more people who responded to the call to come into the street and support the Greens than our media reported. That the media failed to do their job, leaving most of us in the dark, is a disgrace.
The Green movement did not expect to overturn the government on Wednesday, but they made a statement that will in time be heard around the world. I believe that the shaky government, led by a psychopathic megalomaniac, will ultimately fall because of the tenacity and courage of the Iranian people. Ahmadinejad's lies and threats will fail to gain him the power he craves, and, despite his dearest dreams, he will not conquer the world.
The people of Iran are angry and full of courageous energy. They will not give up. Perhaps it is best summed up in the words of a tweeter who wrote on February 12, "My people, Sooner or later, no matter what it takes, Iran will be free, a secular democratic nation."
Ilana Freedman is CEO and Director of Intelligence at Gerard Group International.
She has been a respected intelligence analyst of homeland security and business intelligence for over twenty years. For an interview or speaking engagement please call: 800-950-4213. For more information,
For continuing information about events in Iran, visit planet-iran.com
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