I'm in Shiraz, on the way to Esfahan.
It's good to get out of gray, smoggy Tehran, one of the least photogenic cities in the world, where black is the new black, from the hejabs on down.
One of the attractions of Shiraz is the tomb of Hafez, a Persian poet from the 14th century. It's thronged at night. Iranians bring flowers, then stand or kneel beside the sarcophagus and recite his poems. My personal reaction is, this is how writers should always be treated.
Iranians are among the most gracious and hospitable people I've ever met.
The question, of course, is whether we should bomb these people?
In America today, we tend to see things in Manichaean terms. That is, we divide things into absolute opposites, light and dark, good and evil, us and them.
We could, if we went back far enough, blame that on them. The word Manichaean refers to the Persian prophet Mani (from around 250 AD). The whole notion of good and evil, with man in the middle, having to make a choice, then rewarded and condemned in an afterlife, goes back to an even earlier Persian prophet, Zoroaster, from around 1,000 BC. Those ideas entered Judaism during the Babylonian exile and the liberation of the Jews by Cyrus the Great of Persia, and from there into Christianity.
There are still Zoroastrians and Jews in modern-day Persia, the Islamic Republic of Iran.
These are people with a rich and varied history. A very humanistic history.
The question is, why should we bomb these people?
The answer is that they are part of the Axis of Evil!
Iranians are somewhat confused by that designation.
The United States was attacked on Sept. 11, 2001, by a ragged group of conspirators called Al Qaeda, led by Osama bin Laden, headquartered in Afghanistan, where they were protected and nurtured by the Taliban. The Taliban were, and are, fanatical, fundamentalist Sunnis. They're the ones who put women in burkhas, those full-body coverings and veils; required men to be bearded; and banned all music, television, movies, photographs, statues, stuffed animals and dolls.
The Taliban came to power in 1996. They were supported by Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
They were opposed by the Northern Alliance. The Northern Alliance was supported by Russia, India and, most of all, by Iran.
punditman says...From the article link above:
Iran is, ultimately, ruled by the Supreme Leader. He is deemed to be infallible. In 2003 he issued a fatwa, a ruling of holy law, against the development and use of nuclear weapons. This is when, according to the U.S. National Intelligence Estimate, Iran stopped such developments.Iran claims it only wants nuclear energy...At least 56 countries have nuclear research reactors.
If they had nuclear weapons and used them, especially if they used them aggressively, as a first strike, then Israel and the United States would retaliate with far more force and effectively destroy Iran. What we are likely to have in reality is the sort of mutual stand-off we had with the Soviet Union for 50 years.
punditman further says...
So we are supposed to believe that this is Iran's intent; we are supposed to believe that an ancient civilization is engrossed in the notion of collective suicide. Ah...unlikely, Sherlock! Do your flipping homework.
