Iran's Lost Generation

Though Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's thinking may be hard to tolerate, Christopher de Bellaigue does enable us to understand it. Katajun Amirpur has read his recent "Memoir of Iran"

Down with Israel – the Zionist state must be wiped off the map!

This is currently the Iranian president's favourite saying – and the whole world is wondering: "What makes this man tick?" While the international community is aghast at Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's anti-Zionist statements, his remarks on the allegedly impending return of the twelfth Imam are hardly any less alarming.

In eschatological terms, the twelfth Imam is comparable to the Jewish Messiah. Since this "Hidden Imam" vanished into "occultation" in the eighth century, Shiahs have been waiting for his return, which is commemorated each year during Muharram (the month of mourning).

Ahmadinejad has now announced that the Imam's return is imminent, and that he, the president, has witnessed that second coming in his visions. To say the very least, it all sounds decidedly strange.

Hardships and hopes of the president's generation

Anyone who wishes to understand where this kind of thinking comes from should read Christopher de Bellaigue's In the Rose Garden of the Martyrs: A Memoir of Iran. De Bellaigue is the former Iran correspondent of the Economist, and his book provides a fascinating analysis of the background to Ahmadinejad's latest remarks.

He describes, for example, the hardships, hopes, and expectations that characterised Ahmadinejad's generation as it went to war. In the hope of creating a fairer world, they carried out a revolution.

The author quotes one of the people he spoke to: "Of course, Khomeini! There was something about him that really made an impact on people. It was impossible not to be afraid of Khomeini; imagine him staring at you, like a torch that emits black light."

In the Ayatollah's presence, it felt shameful to be breathing the same air as the Shah's functionaries and lackeys. The people called Khomeini "Master" and yearned for his return from exile.

Shortly after the saviour's homecoming, men like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had to defend their country against an external aggressor: Saddam Hussein. Poorly armed, but heavily armoured in ideology, this generation succeeded in repulsing the enemy. In order to clear the way for Iranian tanks, young volunteers ran across fields that had been mined by the Iraqis. But when young people are so heavily influenced by ideology, can one still speak of "free will"?

On the way to paradise via a landmine

De Bellaigue explains why these youngsters were prepared to risk stepping on a mine: They had been given a "key to paradise" to wear around their necks and told that they would enter heaven as martyrs should they die.

Many of the stories told here are tragic. Iran's "lost generation" started a revolution out of a desire for freedom, and then had to endure a war for the very same reason. The journalist and political scientist Alireza Alavitabar is one member of this generation, and today, he can look back on many years spent in jail. His crime? He had started a newspaper that ventured to ask critical questions about the state of the Islamic Republic.

At some point, Iran had ceased being the Republic Alavitabar had fought to realise. Instead, it had become a country in which any dissenting voice was denounced, and where the wrong word could incur a prison term or even a death sentence. Both Alavitabar and Ahmadinejad are members of a disappointed generation.

Certainly, the reasons for their disappointment could hardly be more different. While Alavitabar had wanted a democratic Iran, Ahmadinejad stood for public office with the slogan: "We didn't make this revolution in order to introduce democracy."

"The people's streetsweeper"

Nonetheless, Ahmadinejad can still credibly claim to stand for another Revolutionary ideal: social justice. During the election campaign, he called himself "the people's streetsweeper" and presented himself as a simple man fighting the "fat cats" who had grown rich since the Revolution. That a system has to be just, above all, is a quintessentially Shiah idea – and right now, Ahmedinejad is successfully invoking it. Christopher de Bellaigue describes the origins of this idea and shows the strength of its roots in the Iranian popular imagination.

He also describes the murder of the Forouhars. Though chilling, this section of the book is important for an understanding of Iranian politics. It brings us back to the idea of democracy still cherished by Iranians like Alavitabar, and to the division of Iranian society symbolised by the polar opposition between him and Ahmedinejad. De Bellaigue describes all this with great insight and sensitivity.

In 1998, dissident intellectuals and politicians fell victim to a notorious series of murders. Among the first to die were Dariush Forouhar and his wife Parvaneh Eskandari, both of them political activists in the "Iranian People's Party". They had been brutally "executed" in their own home – Parvaneh Eskandari was stabbed in the chest more than twenty times – and it was later established that a department of Iran's Ministry of Intelligence had been responsible for the killings.

Christopher de Bellaigue's book is the work of a man who knows his material. It can be recommended to any readers wishing to improve their understanding of Iran.

Katajun Amirpur

This review was previously published in the Germany weekly Die Tageszeitung.

Christopher de Bellaigue: "In the Rose Garden of the Martyrs: A Memoir of Iran", Harper Collins, 2005. 304 pages.

Translated from the German from Patrick Lanagan

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