Photos and text by Daniel Efram
Earlier this month, the Francis Kite Club, 40 Avenue C, hosted O/R Books author Behrooz Ghamari, of the Elahé Omidyar Mir-Djalali Institute of Iranian Studies at the University of Toronto, just in time to discuss the release of his timely new book "The Long War On Iran" amid rising tensions involving Iran.
The talk drew a standing-room-only crowd seeking background on the political and social forces shaping the long-misunderstood country as the United States and Israel launched wide-ranging attacks on Iran.
"From my childhood, I remember even in the first grade in childhood, everyone knew that the U.S. and the British committed a coup in 1953 to overthrow Mosaddegh (Prime Minister at the time) against the nationalization of oil and brought back the Shah," Ghamari summarized. "It was a given. We didn't need to wait until the declassification of documents to know that the CIA was involved. Everybody knew. It was common knowledge."
Ghamari also expressed bewilderment at members of the Iranian diaspora celebrating in the United States following the Feb. 28 death of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.
"How puzzled I am by what is going on — these kinds of bizarre ideas about how the world works, from subscribing to the 'civilizing' mission of the West to basically celebrating the bombing of their own neighborhoods in Tehran. It's so puzzling."
Throughout the evening, the historian discussed what he described as the influence of Western political and cultural ideology in Iran over the decades — ideas that, he said, framed outside intervention as a form of liberation.
He also argued that the 1978-79 Iranian Revolution, which overthrew the Shah and established an Islamic republic under Ayatollah Khomeini, should be understood as an anti-imperialist revolution — a perspective he said is often misunderstood in the West.
"The idea of social justice was very very key in the Iranian Revolution (after the imperialist planting of the Shah). The question of freedom was very much important at the center of this revolution," he said. "And the question of sovereignty… it was always inherently an anti-imperialist."
Ghamari ended the conversation by suggesting that many immigrants arriving in the United States encounter dominant Western cultural narratives and often feel pressure to adopt them to avoid marginalization.
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