Skip to content or view mobile version

Home | Mobile | Editorial | Mission | Privacy | About | Contact | Help | Security | Support

A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

A Memory Abused: No Rest or Peace for Neda Agha-Soltan

Reza Esfandiari and Yousef Bozorgmehr | 13.12.2009 20:28 | Analysis | Anti-racism | Other Press | World

The ruthless exploitation of the death of Neda for political purposes is an egregious example of a propaganda war being waged by the enemies of Iran – everyone should be concerned, however, since the manipulation of the media and public opinion is a feature of domestic news coverage in the West as much as it is of reporting on a Middle Eastern state.





Editorial note: The ruthless exploitation of the death of Neda for political purposes is an egregious example of a propaganda war being waged by the enemies of Iran – everyone should be concerned, however, since the manipulation of the media and public opinion is a feature of domestic news coverage in the West as much as it is of reporting on a Middle Eastern state, notes Reza Esfandiari and Yousef Bozorgmehr.

__________________


A Memory Abused: No Rest or Peace for Neda Agha-Soltan


The tragic death of Miss Neda Agha-Soltan continues to reverberate five months after her shooting in Tehran. Documentaries have been made about it on British and American television and a scholarship has been awarded by no less than Oxford University in her honour. The pertinent question that needs to be asked is: why?

Why does the international media focus so much macabre interest in the dying moments of an Iranian woman? Why is there is such callous disregard for her right to privacy that her death should be viewed all over the world on Youtube and Twitter?

The answer, of course, is simple: Neda’s murder has been scurrilously exploited by those who seek to put a beautiful name and face to the “struggle for freedom” in Iran. These same people have decided to posthumously call her the “Angel of Freedom [1].”

Miss Agha-Soltan, it should be remembered, was not shot while in the act of any demonstration – the incident happened in a side street at least a kilometre away from where the protests were occurring. Moreover, the unassuming young woman was neither a political activist nor had any affiliation to a civic organisation. She was a student of Islamic philosophy with musical interests and who had a desire to become a tour guide.

If she intended to take part in any protest, she was certainly not any different from the hundreds of thousands who also did. And, unlike some of the more riotous elements among the demonstrators who also lost their lives, Neda did absolutely nothing to provoke any hostility from the security forces, let alone being shot at. She was a threat to none.

Yet we now have begun to hear that she was a high-profile “natural leader” [2] of the protest movement, “committed to the overthrow of Ahmadinejad” whom the Iranian regime had every reason to fear. And if that isn’t enough, she was determined not allow Iran to suffer the fate of a “tyranny worse than that of the Arab and Mongol” invaders of the past [3]. We are also told how she was prepared to be “shot through the heart” [4] in her pursuit of “freedom and democracy for the Iranian people”.

Of course, all of this is utter nonsense that only the most naive of individuals cannot see through. There are several points that the “investigative documentaries” failed to account for or delve into in any way.

A letter sent by the Iranian embassy in the UK to the Provost of Queen’s college [5], which has awarded the Neda scholarship sponsored by an undisclosed British citizen, correctly states that Neda had a high-resolution camera trained on her for a full 20 minutes before the incident took place – this, along with other important observations [6], does give the appearance of it being a pre-rehearsed and staged scenario.

The letter goes on to the mention the fact that Dr Arash Hejazi, a publishing student and medical doctor at Oxford Brookes university, had arrived only two days prior to Neda’s death and left the day after anxious to tell the story to the British media of an innocent woman being shot by a Baseej militiaman – this despite the fact that the Baseej never ever carry firearms outside of military compounds (they use sticks, chains and other household items).

The media has since accepted his testimony uncritically, in particular Times of London correspondent Martin Fletcher, who has been nothing short of an obsessed anti-regime propagandist in the wake of the June election. Indeed, Dr Hejazi changed his story early on – he had initially claimed that the assailant was a rooftop sharpshooter [7], but later said that Neda was shot by a man on a motorcycle [8].

Anyone with even a measure of circumspection would be suspicious of Dr Hejazi’s actions and motives as well as his possible involvement with British intelligence which regularly approaches Iranian students and residents in the UK to serve as informers in Iran. Yet, he is hailed as the “man who heroically tried to save” a bleeding Neda (although there is very little to show for it).

The stolen/lost ID card of a certain Abbas Kargar Javid, posted on the Web with the intention of inviting vigilante-like retribution [9], and the video of a semi-naked man being accosted by demonstrators [10] prove absolutely nothing. There is nothing that links any member of the Baseej force with the murder of Neda. These two pieces of “evidence” were both produced after several months had passed, indicating that they were most likely dug up among the myriad of video footage and documents from the days of the unrest. Moreover, other witnesses present at the scene deny that there was any security presence.

It is inconceivable that an Islamic regime which understands the power of martyrdom in its own culture would sanction the cold-blooded murder of an innocent and ordinary young woman on the streets of Tehran.

However it is every bit conceivable that those who thought the opposition movement needed a symbol and icon of resistance – recipients and supporters no doubt of a $400m CIA-backed destabilization program for Iran [11] - would have arranged this horrible murder and try and pin it on the Iranian authorities.

It is especially salient that the British TV station, Channel 4, whose investigative “Dispatches” program had exposed that policewoman Yvonne Fletcher had not in fact been killed by Libyan diplomats but by underworld operatives linked to the American Government [12], would be so compliant with the official version.

The appalling and brutal murder of an Egyptian woman, Marwa El-Sherbini, in a German courtroom in July of this year has – just a matter of weeks after Neda’s death - has largely been ignored even though it is one of the worst racially-motivated and Islamophobic killings in recent times. Will Mrs Sherbini, “the headscarf martyr”, be honoured in any way by a German university or have films made in commemoration of her? Of course not.

The ruthless exploitation of the death of Neda for political purposes is an egregious example of a propaganda war being waged by the enemies of the Islamic Republic of Iran – everyone should be concerned, however, since the manipulation of the media and public opinion is a feature of domestic news coverage in the West as much as it is of reporting on a Middle Eastern state.

__________________


Notes:


[1]  http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,528441,00.html

[2]  http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/nov/15/neda-agha-soltan

[3]  http://nedasvoice.com/

[4]  http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/iran/6574330/Iranian-killed-in-protest-was-willing-to-be-shot-in-heart.html

[5]  http://extras.timesonline.co.uk/pdfs/letter1.jpg

[6]  http://www.phoenixsourcedistributors.com/html/who_killed_neda.html

[7]  http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/world/2009/0624/1224249417475.html

[8]  http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8119713.stm

[9]  http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article6802669.ece

[10]  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=01Ti-MnN3aY

[11]  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GRwUZ-u6KFo

[12]  http://ftvdb.bfi.org.uk/sift/title/573682

_____________________

Reza Esfandiari and Yousef Bozorgmehr
- e-mail: esfandiarireza@ymail.com
- Homepage: http://www.middle-east-online.com/english/opinion/?id=35869

Comments

Display the following comment

  1. FLASHBACK: Color revolutions, old and new — Stephen Lendman
Upcoming Coverage
View and post events
Upcoming Events UK
24th October, London: 2015 London Anarchist Bookfair
2nd - 8th November: Wrexham, Wales, UK & Everywhere: Week of Action Against the North Wales Prison & the Prison Industrial Complex. Cymraeg: Wythnos o Weithredu yn Erbyn Carchar Gogledd Cymru

Ongoing UK
Every Tuesday 6pm-8pm, Yorkshire: Demo/vigil at NSA/NRO Menwith Hill US Spy Base More info: CAAB.

Every Tuesday, UK & worldwide: Counter Terror Tuesdays. Call the US Embassy nearest to you to protest Obama's Terror Tuesdays. More info here

Every day, London: Vigil for Julian Assange outside Ecuadorian Embassy

Parliament Sq Protest: see topic page
Ongoing Global
Rossport, Ireland: see topic page
Israel-Palestine: Israel Indymedia | Palestine Indymedia
Oaxaca: Chiapas Indymedia
Regions
All Regions
Birmingham
Cambridge
Liverpool
London
Oxford
Sheffield
South Coast
Wales
World
Other Local IMCs
Bristol/South West
Nottingham
Scotland
Social Media
You can follow @ukindymedia on indy.im and Twitter. We are working on a Twitter policy. We do not use Facebook, and advise you not to either.
Support Us
We need help paying the bills for hosting this site, please consider supporting us financially.
Other Media Projects
Schnews
Dissident Island Radio
Corporate Watch
Media Lens
VisionOnTV
Earth First! Action Update
Earth First! Action Reports
Topics
All Topics
Afghanistan
Analysis
Animal Liberation
Anti-Nuclear
Anti-militarism
Anti-racism
Bio-technology
Climate Chaos
Culture
Ecology
Education
Energy Crisis
Fracking
Free Spaces
Gender
Globalisation
Health
History
Indymedia
Iraq
Migration
Ocean Defence
Other Press
Palestine
Policing
Public sector cuts
Repression
Social Struggles
Technology
Terror War
Workers' Movements
Zapatista
Major Reports
NATO 2014
G8 2013
Workfare
2011 Census Resistance
Occupy Everywhere
August Riots
Dale Farm
J30 Strike
Flotilla to Gaza
Mayday 2010
Tar Sands
G20 London Summit
University Occupations for Gaza
Guantanamo
Indymedia Server Seizure
COP15 Climate Summit 2009
Carmel Agrexco
G8 Japan 2008
SHAC
Stop Sequani
Stop RWB
Climate Camp 2008
Oaxaca Uprising
Rossport Solidarity
Smash EDO
SOCPA
Past Major Reports
Encrypted Page
You are viewing this page using an encrypted connection. If you bookmark this page or send its address in an email you might want to use the un-encrypted address of this page.
If you recieved a warning about an untrusted root certificate please install the CAcert root certificate, for more information see the security page.

Global IMC Network


www.indymedia.org

Projects
print
radio
satellite tv
video

Africa

Europe
antwerpen
armenia
athens
austria
barcelona
belarus
belgium
belgrade
brussels
bulgaria
calabria
croatia
cyprus
emilia-romagna
estrecho / madiaq
galiza
germany
grenoble
hungary
ireland
istanbul
italy
la plana
liege
liguria
lille
linksunten
lombardia
madrid
malta
marseille
nantes
napoli
netherlands
northern england
nottingham imc
paris/île-de-france
patras
piemonte
poland
portugal
roma
romania
russia
sardegna
scotland
sverige
switzerland
torun
toscana
ukraine
united kingdom
valencia

Latin America
argentina
bolivia
chiapas
chile
chile sur
cmi brasil
cmi sucre
colombia
ecuador
mexico
peru
puerto rico
qollasuyu
rosario
santiago
tijuana
uruguay
valparaiso
venezuela

Oceania
aotearoa
brisbane
burma
darwin
jakarta
manila
melbourne
perth
qc
sydney

South Asia
india


United States
arizona
arkansas
asheville
atlanta
Austin
binghamton
boston
buffalo
chicago
cleveland
colorado
columbus
dc
hawaii
houston
hudson mohawk
kansas city
la
madison
maine
miami
michigan
milwaukee
minneapolis/st. paul
new hampshire
new jersey
new mexico
new orleans
north carolina
north texas
nyc
oklahoma
philadelphia
pittsburgh
portland
richmond
rochester
rogue valley
saint louis
san diego
san francisco
san francisco bay area
santa barbara
santa cruz, ca
sarasota
seattle
tampa bay
united states
urbana-champaign
vermont
western mass
worcester

West Asia
Armenia
Beirut
Israel
Palestine

Topics
biotech

Process
fbi/legal updates
mailing lists
process & imc docs
tech