For decades prior to the current uprising in Iran, three groups claimed to speak on behalf of Iranians.
First up was the Iranian regime itself. It used the fiction of election participation to claim that it had popular legitimacy. In reality, it fabricated many of the voting statistics it provided to Western journalists and academics who, nevertheless, repeated them uncritically.
Then there was the National Iranian American Council (NIAC) that claimed, without any apparent basis, to be “the largest Iranian-American grassroots organization in the country.” Again, journalists often repeated NIAC’s claims uncritically. NIAC insisted that the positions it staked out, many in conformity with the Islamic Republic’s claims to legitimacy or its focus on sanctions relief, represented the priority of Iranian Americans. Today, both inside and outside Iran, Iranians condemn the group for its alleged willingness to work with the Iranian regime. The tragedy of the snake oil NIAC peddles is that it affirmed the instincts of ideologically driven policymakers and was enough to keep them from recognizing what Iranians truly wanted.
IRAN’S REVOLUTIONARIES NEED US
Finally, there is the Mujahedin-e-Khalq Organization (MKO). The MKO operates a number of regional, shadow, and pop-up organizations for which its National Council of Resistance of Iran claims to be the umbrella. While the MKO claims popularity, the reality is the high-level endorsements the group receives are part of a quid pro quo as it pays five-figure honorariums to a bipartisan array of high-profile former officials. The MKO is famously dishonest. The intelligence it reveals is often demonstrably wrong. When the MKO is right, it is less because of influence and connections inside Iran and more because foreign intelligence services launder information through the group to protect their own sources and methods. Further demonstrating the group’s dishonesty is the fact that its website omits any mention of the two decades it aligned itself with the late Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein. That would be the equivalent of the German government discussing its history but skipping from the Weimar Republic to the Adenauer era and hoping no one would notice. What should be the final nail in the coffin of the MKO’s credibility, however, is the fact that its leader, Maryam Rajavi, who claims to be free Iran’s president-elect, sports the same headscarf that Iranian women now risk their lives to shed.
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The Iranian protesters have already succeeded in stripping away any patina of legitimacy to the Islamic Republic but it is not yet certain they will triumph. The regime appears to be repeating the 2009 post-election unrest playbook when they sought to hold on until the international attention drifted elsewhere. Michael Jackson’s death at the time changed journalists’ focus and denied Iranians the oxygen and protection provided by press attention. Iran’s current protesters have also not yet rallied around a single charismatic figure. Outrage is important, but it is not a sufficient strategy to win change.
Make no mistake: Ultimately, someone will emerge. The Iranian people have had enough. The question is not whether the Islamic Republic will fall but rather when. Still, if the zombie regime continues, it is essential the West do no harm. It is time to put to rest any attention or naive legitimization of the groups that have falsely claimed to represent Iranian sovereignty, legitimacy, or interests.
Michael Rubin (@mrubin1971) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential. He is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.
