Anyone who professes a love for freedom and liberty must regard the current protests in Iran with a sense of awe.
How courageous are these people, knowing that they are up against an unabashedly brutal and repressive regime, which thinks nothing of wantonly killing their own people!
The more brutal and brazen the response of the Mullahs, the more desperate they appear and the more illegitimate they must be regarded by all those who cherish the rights of ordinary individuals.
One might say, well these people are just desperate, they feel they have no choice but to take to the streets. However, the reaction does not necessarily follow from the feelings. Others in similar circumstances might resort to self-destructive or to cannibalizing behavior vis a vis their neighbors.
They might resign themselves to the ongoing and unchanging rigidity and lack of caring for the well-being of the citizenry. In fact this has been from time to time the modus vivendus in Iran: slow, quiet desperation.
Why then is the situation so different now? For one thing, conditions in Iran have deteriorated to unprecedented levels. There are frequent water and power shortages. Prices have climbed consistently, and the Iranian currency has collapsed to wheel barrow toting proportions.
Simultaneously, Iranians are witnessing the complete wasting away of tens of billions of dollars spent by the Mullahs on their ideological quest to subvert the Satans, great and small.
The upshot of all this investment was abysmal failure. The proxies so heavily catered to by the regime have been neutered. Even worse, the regime itself has been neutered.
The 12 day war in June was the geo-political equivalent of Toto pulling back the curtain on the ominous Wizard of Oz, only to reveal a somewhat pathetic presence holding a microphone.
All that money, all that pain, all that denial of services to their own citizens, and for what? Aggrandizement? Hardly. All for humiliation.
It is hard to imagine a scenario more conducive, indeed more demanding, of the kind of reaction that the people of Iran have demonstrated.
Iranians are not naïve; they understand that their conduct can and has engendered murderous response. And yet, they are rising in numbers never seen there before because they recognize that they have reached a breaking point, a point of no return, a Rubicon of desperation demanding response, consequences be damned.
Tragically, the rest of the world has been negligent in expressing its support for the protesters. The silence of much of the Western mainstream media has been deafening.
This seeming lack of interest has triggered a whole host of conjectures as to what it represents. Is there, for whatever reason, a rooting interest in much of the Western media for the Mullahs?
The seeming absurdity of that idea should not be quickly dismissed. In the realm of the enemy of my enemy is my friend, Western media might see in Iran a way to address their own hatred of Israel.
And let’s face it: there are no Jews in this story, so like so many other international massacres, this one is not of the most intense concern. Certainly not as pressing as genocide in Gaza.
Grassroots response in Israel has been vociferous, but until very recently official response has been tepid so as not to give the Mullahs the opportunity to accuse the people of colluding with the Little Satan.
Of course, US President Trump has made some saber-rattling threats of reprisal in the face of killing by the regime. With reports now coming in of hundreds, if not thousands of murders, Trump is facing a put up or shut up moment.
Iranian officials have threatened reprisals against Israel if the US launches attacks, a prospect that ironically should liberate us from the discrete withholding of overt support.
In other words, an Iranian response to Israel should unleash our forces to double down on what we began last June.
I am proud to see my organization, Im Tirtzu, take an unabashed and vociferous campaign of support for the protesters. We here well understand the imperative of liberation, of self-determination and of recognizing that actualizing a people’s sovereign destiny must be striven, and yes, fought for.
We also know that left to their own devices and decision making, the Iranian people will choose a governing regime that is likely to restore the good will and working ties that existed between Iran and Israel before 1979.
How deliciously ironic would it be to have Iran as a key member of the Abraham Accords.
Okay, well, first things first. First the Iranian People must prevail. And for that to happen, they will need all the help, support and prayers that freedom loving people around the world can provide.
Citizens of Iran, we are with you. Rise and seize your destiny.
Douglas Altabef is the Chairman of the Board of Im Tirtzu and a Director of the Israel Independence Fund