Word: ayatullah
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...AYATULLAH ALI KHAMENEI, Iran's ruling cleric, during a televised address in which he pilloried the U.S. government for mixing peaceful overtures with anti-Iran criticism...
...than three millenniums marked the beginning of spring in the Persian world. The popular holiday, celebrated with bonfires and, more recently, illegal fireworks, is so hoary it predates the three Abrahamic religions - Judaism, Christianity and Islam - a fact that the mullahs who rule Iran are quite sensitive about. One ayatullah, Nasser Makarem Shirazi, called the first day of Nowrooz a "superstitious act and baseless. Pious and sensible Muslims will stay away from...
...near accusations that it is fomenting unrest during its celebration. The so-called Green Movement leadership actually asked its followers not to target the day for protest, as has been done with Muslim holy days and the anniversaries of important dates in the Islamic revolution led by the late Ayatullah Khomeini. The blowback would be worse for opposition leaders like Mir-Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karoubi if they were seen as promoting demonstrations during a festival from the days before Iran converted to Islam. No one wants to be called un-Islamic. (See how Iran's opposition is searching...
...past 31 years, the rulers of the Islamic Republic of Iran have attempted to diminish the public's attachment to these holidays. Last week, the Friday-prayers leader in the seminary city of Qom, Ayatullah Reza Ostadi, said Chaharshanbe Suri "is no different from other days, and, given that the outsiders of the establishment have heavily invested in this day, we must turn our backs on it." Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei echoed those sentiments, issuing a statement on his website Sunday in which, in reference to the celebration, he wrote that it has "no basis in shari'a [Islamic...
...reformist opposition - Ahmadinejad's two rivals in the polls, Mir-Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi, and former President Mohammed Khatami - have called for the abolition of the republic. They have in fact framed their protests as part of the legacy of the Islamic revolution's founding father, the late Ayatullah Ruhollah Khomeini...