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Here's a story about an uprising in the Middle East
you probably haven't heard of. For more than a
month, riots and violent protests have swept through
the Kurdish areas of northern Iran, resulting in a
government crackdown that has killed up to 20 people
and injured hundreds more. The unrest began on July
9, when Kurdish activist Shwane Ghaderi was killed
by Iranian security forces in Mahabad. He was
allegedly shot, dragged through the streets and
tortured to death. Demonstrations against Iran's
theocratic dictatorship erupted immediately and
spread across the region.
At least 10 Kurdish demonstrators were reportedly
killed when the government deployed helicopter
gunships against protesters who had attacked a
military outpost with rocks and sticks and ransacked
government offices in the city of Saqqez. Residents
of most Kurdish cities in the region called a
general strike in a show of solidarity. Shops closed
and streets were empty. All this information comes
from Iranian exiles and members of dissident groups,
who are in contact with Iranian Kurds on the ground
and who have passed on their reports, digital photos
and lists of the dead. Iran's state news agency
acknowledges the turmoil, but says that the unrest
is the result of "anarchists" and "hooligans."
I am almost certain that everything I have related
here is true. It comes from a variety of reliable
sources and from people who have family in the area.
But I can't compare these reports to those from
traditional Western media outlets for the strange
reason that, as near as I can tell, no Western
reporter has visited the area.
I partially understand why this is the case.
Iran, like most dictatorships, assigns a government
"minder" to shadow foreign correspondents in the
country and to control whom the journalist talks to.
Most correspondents don't like to mention this in
their dispatches. It ruins their allure as rugged
and independent truth-seekers.
Journalists who rub a dictatorial government the
wrong way may find their visas revoked and their
employer's bureau shut down. In the end, it's
easiest just to do what you're told. And if you're
told not to cover the deadly violence in Kurdistan,
well, maybe there's a press conference about Iran's
nuclear energy program you can report on instead.
I think this explains in part the media blackout
about what's happening in Iranian Kurdistan, but it
doesn't explain everything.
The bigger problem is an uglier one. Some causes,
and some people, are fashionable to Western
journalists and to the public at large, and some are
not. Imagine for a moment that 20 unarmed
Palestinians had been killed by Israeli soldiers in
the last month, with hundreds more injured and
scores arrested. Is it even conceivable that this
would not be front-page news? Already, photographers
working in the Middle East have to work hard to
avoid getting other photographers in their photos of
stone-throwing Palestinian children. The only photos
of the unrest in Iran come from local residents.
And what of the so-called "peace" protesters?
Unarmed civilians are being shot down by government
troops in helicopters. Where are Bianca Jagger and
the rest of the celebrity activists? Where are the
marching throngs with their "Free Iran!" and "Free
Kurdistan!" banners? Are Kurdish lives somehow less
valuable than Palestinian and Iraqi ones? Almost all
Kurds are also Muslims. Where is the outrage? Or are
the deaths of innocent Muslims only enraging when
they are killed by Americans or Israelis?
Recently, an Iranian friend in London emailed me.
"If only this Kurdish intifada had half the media
coverage as the Palestinian one," he wrote. He's
right. What's happening in Iranian Kurdistan is
important. Iran's religious dictatorship is resented
by many, perhaps most, Iranians. But it is
particularly abhorrent to the country's Kurds.
I visited Iranian Kurdistan for a few days last
spring, staying with a family in a small village
outside Mahabad. I had spent the previous two weeks
in Iran's major cities. Pro-government vigilantes
had covered walls with spray-painted death threats
against women who didn't wear the hijab. Religious
police decreed that even small plastic mannequins on
display in pharmacy shop windows and revealing the
body's internal organs must have their genitals
covered. Undercover government agents watched me and
took my photograph when I met with student
dissidents. And I never knew when my phone might be
tapped.
After all this, Kurdistan felt like a breath of
fresh air. Kurdish friends invited me to a wedding,
where men and beautiful, uncovered women danced
hand-in-hand in a riot of music and colour. "We
Kurds dance together," one man told me. "It causes
some problems with the Islamic people, but I don't
care."
That village is now under the heel of thousands of
government troops who have been sent into the region
to quell unrest, and the man from the wedding has no
choice but to care what the Islamic people think.
But it is still possible that the long-simmering
anger that is erupting in Iranian Kurdistan will
boil over elsewhere in the country as well. If this
happens, the consequences will be monumental. Pity
no one wants to talk about it now.
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