On March 31, 1925, the National Assembly of Iran (Majlesse Showraye Melli) approved the modern Iranian calendar. Under this new law, the Iranian New Year was to begin on the first day of spring, and dates were to be based on the Solar Hijri calendar. Prior to this change in the law, the names of the months were mostly Arabic words. This law, however, revived and adopted the ancient Persian names, which are still in use today.
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On this day, March 30, in 1970, with the approval of the Shah of Iran, a group of U.N. representatives entered Bahrain and began a survey to determine whether the islanders wanted independence from Iran. The Shah agreed to this survey because he wanted the British to withdraw their forces from the Iranian islands of Abu Musa, Greater Tunb, and Lesser Tunb in the Persian Gulf.
After the majority of Bahrain’s population declared their desire for independence, the Shah agreed. Despite the disapproval of Persian nationalists, Iran ultimately renounced its claims of sovereignty over Bahrain in May of 1970.
A very eventful week!
John McCain has been in Congress since 1983. He has been serving in the United States’ Senate since 1987. During his long tenure, he has served as a Member of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, as well as the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Armed Services. He has also ran for the presidency on several occasions, and was the Republican presidential candidate in 2008. It is thus evident that he has a significant amount of foreign policy and national security experience. In addition to this, he has often referred to himself as a “maverick” – sometimes rightfully so - due to his willingness to stand up to the right wing of the Republican Party on certain issues. Given his experience and his principles, it baffles me that he willingly signed the open letter from the GOP members in the Senate to Iran’s leadership.
Here is his reasoning as to why he signed it: “I saw the letter, I saw that it looked reasonable to me and I signed it, that’s all. I sign lots of letters.” He also stated: “Maybe that wasn’t the best way to do that, but I think the Iranians should know that the Congress of the United States has to play a role in whether an agreement of this magnitude.” Okay. First a side point; when someone says: “I sign lots of letters” so nonchalantly, it makes them sound almost senile. And it is not good to appear senile when one is involved in shaping global politics. Second, I sincerely hope that someone in a position as important and influential as McCain’s gives more weight and thought – than it simply "looking reasonable” - to letters before signing them. This is especially true when that letter has the potential not only to impact U.S. foreign policy or U.S.-Iran relations, but also regional and global affairs, as well as the lives of millions of people. I often look at something and make a decision without much further analysis because the decision looks or seems “reasonable.” But my decisions are related to what kind of gum I should purchase at the store or whether it reasonable to sign an iTunes Terms and Conditions Agreement. But you can rest assured that I would give much more thought and analysis to a decision of this caliber. Fortunately or unfortunately, I am not in charge of making such decisions. What I can decide is whether it is reasonable to write a blog post about how irresponsible the 47 GOP signatories are. Much has been said about these 47 little men being traitors. While I do not believe that they are traitors in the legal sense, the Republican Senators have shown their lack of respect for diplomatic norms, historical customs, and the institution of the American presidency.
I agree with Mr. Friendman that the U.S. and the West have to understand the various factions of the self-declared Islamic State before getting deeper into another war in Iraq or Syria. I think, however, that Mr. Friedman has overlooked another crucial faction, or perhaps, sub-faction, and that is the anti-Iranist (or anti-Shiite) faction.
To put it mildly, the Islamic Republic’s foreign policies since 1979 have not endeared the Shiite nation to its Sunni neighbors. It has sought to export its ideology across the region through funding terrorist networks, broadcasting Shiite propaganda, and stirring religious extremism in various nations. Feeling defenseless against the Islamic Republic’s political and ideological “expansionism,” many Sunni extremists – mainly funded by Saudi Arabia – sought to counter Iranian influence in the region. As the war in Syria escalated, and as the Islamic Republic poured more resources into the war-torn nation in support of Bashar al-Assad, extremists fueled by Saudi money and anti-Iran or anti-Shiite sentiments surged into Syria, and eventually Iraq. Their cause was certainly aided by the passive support of former Baathists. As Mr. Friedman has correctly pointed out, Sunnis who ruled Iraq for generations simply cannot accept that Shiites are now in power. It is these Iran-hating, Sunni Baathist, adventure seeking, loser ideologues, who created a coalition that ultimately became the “Islamic State.” And while distinguishing the three factions identified by Mr. Friedman are essential for the West’s understanding of IS, I believe that understanding the anti-Iranist or anti-Shiite elements within IS are as fundamental.
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