Inside Iran Series (FOX News Network)

[IPC]

Inside Iran Series (FOX News Network)

Amy Kellogg recently visited Iran, where she interviewed journalists, students and others on life inside the Islamic Republic. This is a series of eight installments about that trip, which will be aired every night on FOX News Channel. Watch this informing series, every night on FOX News Network

FOX News Network unlike Communist News Network (CNN), is fair & balanced news!

Those who cannot watch this report, not to worry, for your viewing pleasures, we will display the articles, photos and videos from this informing series in IPC Club.


Inside Iran Part I: A Country at a Crossroads
Thursday, November 24, 2005

Fox News Network
Fair and Balanced News
http://www.foxnews.com

Video Part 1
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,176313,00.html

TEHRAN, Iran — FOX News' Amy Kellogg recently visited Iran, where she interviewed journalists, students and others on life inside the Islamic Republic. This is the first in a series of eight installments about that trip, which will be aired every night on FOX News Channel.


Iranian students burn an American flag to show support for their nation's nuclear program.


Holding an anti-U.S. placard, Iranian clerics, attend a demonstration to support Iran's nuclear program.

From the people who chant "death to America" and burn American flags to those who like Western items and would rather spend money on iPods than jihads, Iran is a country at a crossroads.

A deeply religious society, many in Iran are trying to keep up with the times but are fighting a new hard-line government that wants to turn back the clock.

In the green glow of Ayatollah Khomeini's shrine, devotees pay homage to their late leader, while others question the path the Islamic revolution has taken. Thousands of reformist candidate were barred from the last parliamentary elections. One politician, Fatemah Rakeei, took herself out of the running out of frustration at the entire political process.

"I saw that there is not justice and there is a great lie and not any respect to the people," said Rakeei, who is a former parliament member.

The people in Iran want a better material quality of life, possibly as much as they want greater political freedoms. Iran is OPEC's second-largest oil producer, yet there are limited social services. The rich are very rich, but the masses squeak by on about $200 a month.

Prices on The Tehran Stock Exchange went way up in 2004 but have fallen dramatically since. Some say what goes up must comes down. Others say a number of factors are involved: Iran's increasing isolation, the nuclear problem and uncertainty about the new president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

As Iranians watch stocks plummet, there has been capital flight, some estimate, to the tune of $200 billion since the new president was elected.

Ahmadinejad won a landslide victory after he promised to redistribute the oil wealth to Iranians; but so far people haven't felt a difference. Still, he is what most Iranians asked for.

"I support anyone who [a] majority elects in this country. This is [a] democracy," said Mahmood Khaagani, who supports Ahmadinejad.

Meanwhile, others say there is no real democracy yet in Iran, but it will happen someday.Ebrahim Yazdi was the foreign minister in November 1979 when Iranian militants took about 70 Americans hostage and held them for 444 days; he resigned in protest. Yazdi has been arrested 12 times but is still fighting for change in his country for the next generation.

"The future of Iran belongs to democracy. It is unavoidable," said Yazdi, head of the banned Freedom Movement of Iran, which bills itself as a liberalist national opposition movement seen as close to Iran's reformers. "Our society has all the characteristics of a transitional society. We are the youngest nation in the world. These young men and women are an asset. They demand what they deserve."

For now, as Iranians go about their daily lives, divisions within the hard-line government are forming and reformers are working behind the scenes to regroup in the hopes of bringing greater personal freedoms to the Iranian nation.

[IPC]

Inside Iran Part II: The Younger Generation
Thursday, November 24, 2005

Fox News Network
Fair and Balanced News
http://www.foxnews.com

Video Part 2
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,176456,00.html

TEHRAN, Iran — FOX News' Amy Kellogg recently visited Iran, where she interviewed journalists, students and others on life inside the Islamic Republic. This is the second in a series of eight installments about that trip, which will be aired every night on FOX News Channel.


Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad


FOX News' Amy Kellogg speaks with Iranian youths.


A young Iranian couple walk through a plaza.

Some young Iranians mark the anniversary of the of the Tehran hostage crisis of 1979 by finding ways to send the message, "America is cruel."

But these hard-liners are not representative of the whole of Iran's population. Outside the capital of Tehran, where "Death to America" demonstrations aren't uncommon, is a kinder, more relaxed atmosphere.

Up in Iran's hills, at least some young Iranians feel a lot more like Americans; and they'd like us to be friends.

Iran's under-30 crowd makes up 70 percent of the population. Too young to remember the shah — Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, who reined from 1941 to 1979 — or for that matter, the Iranian Revolution, they didn't lose their youth in the Iran-Iraq war. This crowd says they like Americans but not U.S. policy. They love their country but also wish it were more free.

"For example, we can't say our opinion about things our government do[es]. No, we can't," said one young Iranian.

But while freedom of speech is still an issue, society has loosened up over the past decade. Boys and girls are still not allowed to date in the Islamic Republic of Iran, but they sure do push the envelope.

At the local pizza and paintball joint, the girls come out to support their men. And at the high-tech mall, you can buy anything and everything.

When the government shuts down newspapers, curious and literate Iranians hit the Web; they are the fourth-biggest nation of bloggers.

At Tehran University, students want desperately to talk to an American, but most didn't want the camera recording their words. Some told FOX News they want to lose the mandatory headscarf, others want freedom to date. And one male student said he wished classes would be more relevant to the world around him.

"It's hard to talk about it because it may be dangerous but the only thing I can say about political science is this: We learn Islamic politics, not political science," said the student, named Hamid.

Timid yet nervy, too savvy to be silenced, it's a generation of competing voices. But it's thought the majority see their future solidly in the community of nations and that they are the engine that will drive, however slowly, Iran in the direction of democracy.

[IPC]

Inside Iran Part III: The Jewish Question
Friday, November 25, 2005

Fox News Network
Fair and Balanced News
http://www.foxnews.com

Video Part 3
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,176565,00.html

TEHRAN — FOX News' Amy Kellogg recently visited Iran, where she interviewed journalists, students and others on life inside the Islamic Republic. This is the third in a series of eight installments about that trip, which will be aired every night on FOX News Channel.


This emblem reflects current attitudes toward Judaism in Iran, but the faith once played an important part in the country's culture.


A small population of Iran's community still practices Judaism.


Amir Mohebian, of Resalat Newspaper


Iranian women wave flags and demonstrate.

It's tiny now, but Iran's Jewish community was once vibrant — dating back at least 2,500 years.

It was the ancient Persian King Cyrus who freed the Jews from Babylon and sent them back to Jerusalem to rebuild their temple. Iranians gave thousands of European Jews shelter during the Holocaust. And Iran was the first Muslim country to have dealings with Israel.

But after the Islamic Revolution, Iran adopted a hard-line anti-Zionist policy, one Iran's new president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, reinforced last month when he said Israel should be "wiped off the map."

Iranian officials and commentators continue to try to spin Tehran out of a diplomatic hole.

"We have a philosophical objection to Zionism much as we did to apartheid and fascism ... it doesn't mean we are going to attack," said Amir Mohebian of the Resalat newspaper. "After all, fascism has gone away, but Germany is still on the map."

Iran's foreign ministry denies the president meant what he said, adding official policy is for Israel and Palestine to have a popular referendum.

Even though some officials have tried to soften the president's comments, the plight of the Palestinian people remains a national obsession here. Symbols of the struggle are everywhere; in Palestine Square in central Tehran, there's a statue of Israel with a hole in the middle of it. Cartoons glorifying Palestinian suicide and homicide bombers are running on Iranian television.

Some Iranians privately wonder why their government makes Palestine such a focus when Iranians aren't even Arabs, and when Iran has enough problems of its own. And some took issue with Ahmadinejad's comments.

"I was shocked ... I didn't believe my ears, my eyes," said one Iranian.

One journalist doubts the comments were just a blunder. He feels extreme regimes like to cut themselves off from the rest of the world so they can do as they please at home.

"Radicalism is the best friend of isolationism," said analyst Saeed Laylaz.

But there are people, even in Iran's hard-line government, who don't relish isolation and who privately say they hope the president learned a lesson from the backlash he received. Still, no prominent figure has come out and condemned those comments publicly.

[IPC]

Inside Iran Part IV: Iran's Nuclear Capability
Friday, November 25, 2005

Fox News Network
Fair and Balanced News
http://www.foxnews.com

Video Part 4
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,176647,00.html

TEHRAN — FOX News' Amy Kellogg recently visited Iran, where she interviewed journalists, students and others on life inside the Islamic Republic. This is the fourth in a series of eight installments about that trip, which will be aired every night on FOX News Channel.


Iran's nuclear capability is a topic of much controversy around the world.


American-educated member of Iran's parliament, Rafat Bhayat, believes Iran should have a nuclear weapon for self-defense.

Iran's nuclear capability is a topic of much controversy around the world.

One American-educated member of Iran's parliament, Rafat Bhayat, believes Iran should have a nuclear weapon for self-defense. That position is even more hard-line than that of Iran's new president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who insists Iran just wants nuclear energy.

When asked why Iran needs nuclear energy when it's rich in oil and gas, Bhayat responds: "The same question we can ask from [the] United States. They have oil, why do they want energy?"

It's not that the international community doesn't want Iran to have nuclear energy. But since Iran kept its program secret for so long, there is suspicion that the country really just wants to build a bomb.

It recently emerged that Iran has a document showing how to construct the metal core of a nuclear weapon and says its failure to report nuclear activity to the International Atomic Energy Agency over nearly 20 years was oversight, not subterfuge — something nuclear experts don't buy.

"If you have one instance of a failure to report, that's an error. If you have two, maybe you'd give them some benefit of the doubt but when you have 18 instances of a failure to report, it's a very clear pattern and it's obvious that their intention was to proceed without reporting this to the [U.N.] Security Council," said Mark Fitzpatrick, senior fellow for non-proliferation studies at the International Institute for Strategic Studies.

Iran's atomic energy organization is also the site of a major research center. It's as close as the FOX News crew was able to get to any of the nuclear sites around the country, and the crew wasn't given access to anyone in the organization. FOX News was told organization members are reluctant to talk ahead of the very crucial upcoming meeting of the IAEA's Board of Governors.

The right to nuclear energy has become something of a rallying point for the Iranian people, many of who feel ganged up upon and judged with a double standard.

"The Israelis were the first who introduced nuclear weapons in the Middle East and they have huge weapon of mass destruction which is very dangerous and [the] U.S.A. does not talk about that," said one Iranian interviewed by FOX News.

But the U.S. government said the two situations can not be compared.

"There is no comparison between the policies of the government of Israel and the policies of the government of Iran," said Nicholas Burns, undersecretary for political affairs at the State Department. "Israel is a democratic, law-abiding state, a country that time and again has indicated its interest in general peace in the Middle East. Iran is an outlaw state."

As long as Iran has missiles that can hit Israel and as long as it makes comments about wiping the Jewish state off the map, the international community will be suspicious of Iran's nuclear intentions.

For now, there is much focus on a proposal that would allow Iran to process uranium partially and have the rest processed overseas so it can't weaponize the material.

[IPC]

Inside Iran Part V: U.S.-Iran Relations Strained
Friday, November 25, 2005

Fox News Network
Fair and Balanced News
http://www.foxnews.com

Video Part 5
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,176692,00.html

TEHRAN, Iran — FOX News' Amy Kellogg recently visited Iran, where she interviewed journalists, students and others on life inside the Islamic Republic. This is the fifth in a series of eight installments about that trip, which will be aired every night on FOX News Channel.


Iranians burn a U.S. flag.


Ties between the U.S. and Iran have been strained since JFK was president.


Ebrahim Yazdi is a dissident politician in Iran.

There is no U.S. military or diplomatic presence in Tehran, just a lot of mocking graffiti.

The eagle's head is completely faded on the former U.S. embassy in Tehran; one can barely make out the words on the seal. The United States cut off diplomatic ties with the Islamic republic after militants took about 70 Americans hostage back in 1979.

"We have not received an apology from the Iranian government since then, [they] acted detrimental to American interests," said Nicholas Burns, undersecretary for political affairs for the State Department.

Iran has a history of resentment toward America; it predates U.S. support of the late Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, a strong Cold War ally whose secret police was loathed by Iranians.

The CIA was part of a coup that deposed Iran's first democratically elected prime minister, Mohamed Mossadeq, back in 1953. The Eisenhower administration thought Mossadeq was leaning toward the Soviets and that was the reason for the intervention. Iranians are still bitter.

Iranians point to a period of cooperation between Washington and Tehran after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks when Iran helped bring down the Taliban in Afghanistan. But they say President Bush's "axis of evil" comment set things back in Iran.

"This hurt many Iranian's feelings. If the United States president is interested to win the heart of Iranian people, I'm afraid that hurt more than gaining any sympathy," said Iranian dissident politician Ebrahim Yazdi.

But at this point, no one's talking about sympathy. Washington demands that Iran curtail its nuclear program, stop supporting terrorism in Israel and Iraq and improve its human rights record.

"Iran is a major violator of its own people; there is a great democracy deficit in Iran," Burns said. "It's a large, powerful country but that's going in the wrong direction on these three issues."

In Iran, there is both denial and a sense of siege. Tehran blames the Bush administration for the breakdown of relations.

"They are not ready to respect others, they are not ready to speak with others on equal footing. That is the problem," said Hamid Reza Asefi, spokesman for Iran's Foreign Ministry. "As long as American arrogance in thinking and approach exists, I do not think there is any way out."

Meanwhile, the United States is waiting for Tehran to prove it is not a rogue regime.

The way things look now, especially with a new hard-line regime in Iran, cobwebs are likely to collect at the old U.D. embassy for some time to come.

[IPC]

Inside Iran Part VI: Women Worried About Freedoms
Sunday, November 27, 2005

Fox News Network
Fair and Balanced News
http://www.foxnews.com

Video Part 6
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,176806,00.html

TEHRAN, Iran — FOX News' Amy Kellogg recently visited Iran, where she interviewed journalists, students and others on life inside the Islamic Republic. This is the sixth in a series of eight installments about that trip, which will be aired every night on FOX News Channel.


Racecar champ Afsaneh Ahmadi


Golfer Talieh Khalkhali


Grand Ayatollah Yousef Sanei believes women should be allowed to enter the clergy.

In Iran, women are defying the traditional belief that they shouldn't be racecar drivers.

Afsaneh Ahmadi not only loves the track but she also loves to navigate. She and her female driver were national off-road rally champions last spring, leaving their male competitors in the dust.

Click in the video box to the right for a report by FOX News' Amy Kellogg.

Increasingly, Iranian women are seen getting involved in sports that are traditionally associated with men; and society is getting used to them playing hard, whether it's polo or golf. Across the board, these women say, sport a form of escapism.

"This is such relaxation," said golfer Talieh Khalkhali. "You don't think of anything else while you are here."

Women used to tee off on the same course where the former shah of Iran used to play golf. But after the Islamic Revolution, not too many women were seen on the green. But a few years ago, women golfers started playing in larger numbers again — albeit in the all-enveloping chador so as not to distract the men. But that clothing proved impractical and they've now loosened up their looks — and their swing.

Increasingly, the simple headscarf and short coat is passing as Islamically correct clothing in Iran.

The late Ayatollah Khomeini's granddaughter is one of Iran's leading feminists but she says western women pay way too much attention to the way Iranian women dress and argues there are more important issues in the struggle for equality.

"We haven't reached the equal rights that we believe exist in Islam," said Iranian feminist Zahra Eshraghi.

Eshraghi says it's not Islam that restricts women, but the particular laws of Iran, which, in some cases, don't treat women as equals. Women in Iran drive, vote and work. But they can't run for president, they can't be judges and they are barred from the clergy — something one of Iran's most important grand ayatollahs thinks is wrong.

But while Iranian women are active in society and their role in society is expanding, some want much more radical change. Even those less outspoken about women's liberation in Iran have expressed concern that the new conservative administration could take away some of the liberties they currently enjoy.

[Liberator]

Ties between the U.S. and Iran have been strained since JFK was president.

We normally hear ties between the U.S. and Iran have been strained ever since the overthrow of the U.S. backed Shah of Iran in 1979! Now this above quote is a new one and goes even further back! Does anyone care to elaborate? Is it true and am I over-reacting too quickly?????


Ba Sepaas

[IPC]

Inside Iran Part VII: The Ties That Bind Iran, Iraq
Monday, November 28, 2005

Fox News Network
Fair and Balanced News
http://www.foxnews.com

Video Part 7
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,176880,00.html

TEHRAN, Iran — FOX News' Amy Kellogg recently visited Iran, where she interviewed journalists, students and others on life inside the Islamic Republic. This is the seventh in a series of eight installments about that trip, which will be aired every night on FOX News Channel.


Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, left.


Officials say they think accusations of explosives coming from Iran have to do with Western disapproval of Iran over nuclear capability.

Iran has been accused by Britain and America of helping fuel the Iraq insurgency to keep secular democracy from taking hold on Iran's doorstep.

"We also have evidence that Iranians are involved in Iraq in a very unhelpful way in supporting terrorists groups in southern Iraq," said Nicholas Burns, undersecretary for political affairs at the State Department.

Most recently, British officials said explosives that killed some of their soldiers in southern Iraq came from Iran. Iranian officials don't simply deny any involvement but still criticize Britain for the accusations.

"Maybe British officials are saying this to divert from their own problems in Iraq," said Ali Askar Khaji, Iran's special representative to Iraq.

Foreign ministry officials also say they think the accusations have to do with Western disapproval of Iran over its nuclear capability.

Iran and Iraq have a bitter history, as evidenced at the Martyrs Cemetery in Tehran. As many as 300,000 Iranians died in the Iran-Iraq war from 1980 to 1988; hundreds of thousands of Iraqis died, too. But the countries have strong ties; both are majority Shiite countries in a region that is predominantly Sunni.

All this sets the scene for either confrontation or cooperation.

In Qom, the center of Shiite scholarship in Iran, people say though the system of government that is emerging in neighboring Iraq is different than the one in Iran, they want things to work out for the Iraqis and they see no reason why Iran should want any instability on it's boarder.

Iran has even sent financial and technical aid to Iraq. Still, Grand Ayatollah Yousef Sanei, one of the top figures in Shiite Islam, admits that if Iraq's secular system works out, it could threaten Iran's theocracy.

"It's natural that if it happens there, it won't be to our benefit," Sanei said. "We have to do what we can with our religion and politics to make our people happy and they have to do with their religion and politics what makes their people happy."

In the meantime, the two countries are putting on a brave public face, with many recent meetings and photo opportunities of leaders from the two nations. The United States and Britain, however, remain unconvinced that these pictures tell the whole story.

[IPC]

Is it true and am I over-reacting too quickly?????

Yes,
You are a Time Bomb!

It only means that the US-Iran conflict has roots going back to 1953 coup.

Of course thats only one view!

Regards,
IPC Office

[Liberator]

Is it true and am I over-reacting too quickly?????

Yes,
You are a Time Bomb!

It only means that the US-Iran conflict has roots going back to 1953 coup.

Of course thats only one view!

Regards,
IPC Office

Thanks but that came a bit too late, this bomb has already blown up lol.


Ba Sepaas

[IPC]

Inside Iran Part VIII: Saddam's Iranian Victims
Tuesday, November 29, 2005

Fox News Network
Fair and Balanced News
http://www.foxnews.com

Video Part 7
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,176927,00.html

TEHRAN, Iran — FOX News' Amy Kellogg recently visited Iran, where she interviewed journalists, students and others on life inside the Islamic Republic. This is the last in a series of eight installments about that trip, which will be aired every night on FOX News Channel.


Amy Kellogg reports from inside Iran's borders on the lasting impact of Iraq's use of mustard gas on Iranians.


Cemetery

Mehdi Asgari is one of 50,000 Iranians suffering from the affects of exposure to Saddam Hussein's mustard gas.

Most of the victims were soldiers in the Iran-Iraq war, which took place in the 1980s and left nearly one million people dead between the two countries. Some of the war veterans observed by FOX News could barely breathe.

The West rarely hears about them because it mainly focuses on Iraqi victims of Saddam's terror during his reign as president of Iraq.

During a 1987-88 campaign called Anfal, Saddam used mustard gas on Kurds in northern Iraq. The worst attack occurred in March 1988 in the Kurdish village of Halabja. A combination of chemical agents including mustard gas, sarin and possibly VX killed 5,000 people and left 65,000 others with severe skin and respiratory diseases, abnormal cancer rates and various birth defects.

Some Iranian victims say they are glad the former Iraqi dictator is finally facing justice. But Asgari, weak and getting sicker by the day, just wants someone to find a way to cure him so he can take care of his family.

"If anyone can find some medication for me, please God … I need to get better … I have no other chance," he told FOX News.

Dr. Mostafa Ghanei looks after the Iranian veterans of the war. He says many are bitter that no one is punishing the Western powers that helped Saddam procure his chemical weapons and that no one condemned Saddam when he was attacking Iranians with mustard gas — one of the most potent chemical weapons.

"The United Nations also confirmed that the Iraqis used this agent but nobody cared [about] this problem and nobody punished Saddam for using these agents against us," said Ghanei, who works at Baqiyatallah Hospital in Tehran.

Even though the war between Iran and Iraq ended in 1988 — close to two decades ago — the losses suffered by Iranians are still very real and very much a part of the present. There's always a steady stream of people visiting the Martyrs Cemetery in Tehran; mourning ceremonies are also broadcast constantly on loud speakers.

It's an eerie place but the scene can be moving as children play atop an old Iraqi tank to the strains of funeral music.

One can find some family members of the war dead who are indifferent to Saddam's trial because it won't bring their children back. The way they cope is to be proud, so powerful is Shiite veneration of those considered martyrs.

"My son was a martyr. What he did was good for his religion and the country and I am sometimes even thrilled about that," said Reza Hatami, who lost his son in the war.

Even though Muslims fought against Muslims, Iranians consider their war with Iraq a holy war because Saddam's regime was a secular one. And many of the devout at the Martyrs Cemetery believe that the former Iraqi dictator, while he'll be tried in a traditional court, will also have a more important judgment day sometime in the future.