Following the May 19th presidential
“election” in Iran and the incumbent Hassan Rouhani reaching a second term,
there was an outpouring of Western mainstream media describing him as a
moderate again.
As described by the National
Review, Iran’s sham election was nothing
but “a ridiculous farce. In reality, an anti-American jihadist beat a
slightly-worse anti-American jihadist.”
Rouhani was the first Iranian regime official in the early days
after the mullahs’ hijacking of the 1979 revolution who openly called for public
executions.
During
Rouhani’s first tenure (owing it to the ultraconservative Guardian Council, a
12-cleric body appointed directly and indirectly by Iranian Supreme Leader Ali
Khamenei, that vets candidates of all elections in Iran), the regime in Iran:
·
sent over 3,000 to the gallows
and escalated domestic crackdown,
·
increased its export of
terrorism through Shiite proxies across the Middle East,
·
boosted the Levant dictator
Bashar Assad in his massacring and displacing millions of innocent Syrians,
·
supported the IRGC in test
launching a significant number of ballistic missiles in violation of UN
Security Council resolutions and harassing US Navy vessels in international
waters,
·
went as far as increasing
Tehran’s support for the Afghan Taliban, according to the The Washington Post,
·
and made having dual
nationality a threat, as experienced by too many hostages.
And Rouhani
has actually become very useful for the ruling hardliners in Iran.
“For hard-liners and their affiliates — including the office of
Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), the
Basij, the judiciary and the Intelligence Ministry — Rouhani is more helpful in
achieving their major objectives,” as explained Dr.
Majid Rafizadeh, a leading expert on Iran and US foreign policy and president
of the International American Council.
For this regime the selection of Ebrahim Raisi, a conservative
cleric renowned for his three decade role in the judiciary and being involved
in the 1988 massacre of 30,000
political prisoners across Iran, would have raised tensions domestically and
with the international community.
Desperate to
maintain the nuclear deal intact and to prevent any possible snapback of UN
Security Council sanctions, Khamenei and his regime succumbed to blueprint a
second term for Rouhani.
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