“No to the Islamic Republic” Campaign Seeks to Unite Iranian Opponents

Maryam Memarpour Sadeqi, an analyst and political activist and former founder and manager of “Tavana: Iran’s Civil Society Academy,” wrote in a note published on the internet publication “Boulevard” that the power of this campaign stems from recognizing the reality that the Islamic Republic regime is not reformable.

Memarpour Sadeqi says that since an authoritarian Islamist regime took power in Iran in 1978, the Iranian people have endured many hardships, but have not been able to unite within a single opposition. The ruling conspirators exploited ideological differences, rivalries, and mistrust, and by assassinating opposition leaders and spreading misinformation, they implanted the myth of “reform.” The aim was to create confusion, intimidation, demoralization, isolation, and render Iranians inside and outside Iran powerless.

The emergence of a coordinated campaign based on the power of the people for the peaceful overthrow of the Islamic Republic and transition to a liberal democracy testifies to the fact that the Iranian people are no longer willing to play by the rules of their oppressors. The “No to the Islamic Republic” campaign is a call to everyone opposed to the regime; a regime whose evils have left no family unharmed.

This is a revolutionary call, but completely different from the 1978 approach: there is no anti-Western ideology, fanatical leadership, call to take up arms, and promise of a utopian city. “No to the Islamic Republic” is in fact a peaceful, rational, secular, and humane call to achieve democratic freedom in the future for all Iranians of any background and belief.

This is a call to join the world.

In the forefront of this campaign are the mothers and fathers of peaceful protestors who were killed in November 2019 during protests in more than 200 cities across the country. Parents of the countless victims of the regime’s waves of terror and oppression and Iranians around the world have also joined this campaign. Prince Reza Pahlavi has also joined the campaign, in which he sees the result of his calls for unity to achieve non-violent overthrow.

One consequence of the campaign is the call to boycott Iran’s next presidential election in June. The Iranian regime, like all authoritarian governments, relies on voter turnout rates. Iranians, seeing that no reform promises have materialized, hold reformist politicians complicit and guilty of some of the regime’s biggest lies, corruption, and the Islamic Republic’s leader’s calls for massacring protestors.

Iranians have realized that the Islamic Republic is neither capable nor willing to make gradual changes. It is not reformable and must end.

People have grown angry over economic hardships and corruption that existed long before Trump administration’s “maximum pressure” policy.

In various ways, through strikes, street protests, open letters, and their slogans, people have clearly shown that their enemy is the regime, not America.

This campaign has faced a U.S. government that apparently seeks to preserve the Islamic Republic as a legitimate regional power. Iranian opponents have written to President Biden and asked him to lift the pressure of sanctions on the regime. The sooner the United States and the rest of the free world realize the scope of the Iranian people’s capacity to achieve victory, the sooner they can ensure lasting peace for the entire Middle East.

Source: Voice of America