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They appear at the first signs of protest in Iran: men dressed in black, on motorcycles, brandishing weapons or batons.
They are members of the so-called Basij, fiercely unwavering paramilitary volunteers to the Islamic Republic. The ayatollahs’ surprise troops have played a leading role in crushing dissent for more than two decades.
During the most recent protests, which erupted after the death of a young man in the custody of the country’s moral police last month, Basij (ba-SEEJ’) deployed in major cities, attacking and arresting protesters, who in many cases fought back.
A widely circulated video appears to show dozens of schoolgirls wearing their mandatory Islamic headscarves, known as hijab, and shouting at a visiting Basiji official to get lost.
It remains to be seen whether the latest round of unrest will peter out, but much may depend on how Basij and other security forces respond to more protests.
Here is a review of the Basij:
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WHEN WAS THE BASIJ OF IRAN CREATED?
The Basij, whose official name translates to Organization for the Mobilization of the Oppressed, was established through Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini some time after the 1979 Islamic Revolution to Islamize Iranian society and fight enemies from within.
During the ruinous Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s, Basij carried out infamous “human wave” attacks on Saddam Hussein’s army, with a number of poorly armed fighters, many of them teenagers, dying while crossing minefields and artillery fire.
Beginning with the student revolts of the 1990s, the Basij assumed a domestic role roughly similar to that of the ruling party of an authoritarian state. It is under the command of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards and fiercely unwavering Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who praises the Basij as a pillar of the Islamic Republic.
They established branches across the country, such as student organizations, business associations, and medical schools. The U. S. Treasury The U. S. has imposed sanctions on what it says is a multibillion-dollar network of corporations run in secret through the Basij.
The Basij’s security apparatus, armed brigades, riot police and a vast network of informants who spy on their neighbors.
Saeid Golkar, an Iranian educator at the University of Tennessee Chattanooga who has written an e-book on Basij, estimates the total number of its members at about 1 million, with security forces numbering in the tens of thousands.
“Because they are Iranians without uniform, the Islamic Republic presents them as supporters of the regime,” he said, referring to those confronting the protesters. “At the same time, most of those other people get salaries from the Islamic Republic. “
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WHY ARE IRANIAN FORCES ATTACKING PROTESTERS?
Experts say many who enroll in the Basij do so because of economic opportunities, as the club puts a special spin on college admissions and public sector employment.
But recruits are also subject to extensive indoctrination, adding the first forty-five days of military and ideological training. They are taught that the Islamic revolution is a divine struggle opposed to injustice, a struggle that is threatened by a myriad of enemies, from the U. S. to the United States. The U. S. and Israeli opposition teams in exile and even Western culture itself.
Even if new recruits are motivated primarily by private gain, Golkar says, “indoctrination can help replace those motivations. “
In the eyes of the Basijis, the Islamic veil, or hijab, is a bulwark against gender mixing, adultery and corruption; Its removal is a sign of the decline of Western culture. Iran’s leaders have voiced the latest protests as if it were a foreign plot to foment unrest.
Protesters reject this characterization, the protests are a spontaneous wave of anger that opposes decades of repressive rule, substandard government and foreign isolation.
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HOW ARE IRANIAN FORCES SUPPRESSING THE PROTESTS?
Surveillance of dissent in Iran begins with extensive surveillance of its citizens, much of it done through Basijis, who are provided in almost any and all state institutions. Iran also restricts Internet access, especially during periods of protest, and the Basij has a cyber department promised to hack suspected enemies.
“There are other strategies. Of course, the visual maxim is the most violent,” said Sanam Vakil, an Iran expert at the Chatham House tank in London.
When protests erupt, Basijis dress in black uniforms or commandos ride motorcycles, charging directly at demonstrators to disperse them. They function alongside Iran’s normal police and the Revolutionary Guards, who are also involved in the crackdown.
“They chased, beat, shot at protesters, surrounded them, beat them, put them in vans to take them to detention centers where protesters are being brutalized and pressured,” Vakil said.
Basijis can also be found among the protesters themselves, as informants seeking to identify the ringleaders. Amnesty International said in a report last month that four other people known to the Iranian government as basijis appear to have been shot dead by security forces while mingling with protesters. .
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WILL IRAN SUCCEED IN CANCELLING THE PROTESTS?
Iran has suppressed several waves of protests over the years, adding the Green Movement of 2009, when millions of people took to the streets after a disputed presidential election. .
But the most recent manifestations have another feeling, which can cause them to become extinct.
They are run by young women who are fed up with the increasingly brutal enforcement of the country’s conservative Islamic dress code. But they enjoy a much wider segment of society, adding ethnic minorities and even some employees in Iran’s very important oil industry.
Protesters accuse Iran’s morality police of beating 22-year-old Mahsa Amini to death for dressing in the cowardly hijab. Authorities deny he abused him, saying he died from an attack on the center similar to underlying physical conditions, a narrative disputed by his family.
Videos of recent protests show young people spinning their hijabs in the air and cutting their hair, while protesters chant “death to the dictator” and other slogans.
When the Basij arrive, we see the protesters defending themselves and, on rare occasions, succeeding in driving them out.
But no one expects the Iranian government to back down anytime soon.
“It’s too early to say from the outside, with the point of web censorship, exactly what’s going on,” Vakil said. “But I think (the government’s) hope at the beginning that the protests would die out, and now the repressive capacity is intensifying. “
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Follow Joseph Krauss on Twitter at www. twitter. com/josephkrauss