Mick Hartley

The US and Iran opening pretend direct talks in Oman is an opportunity to recall some of the cautionary tales that Iran offers about:
1) Leftist alliance with Islamists
2) 'It's only about Israel and Zionism, we actually love Jews'
3) Sponsoring Palestinianism
More here:

1) The…

— Dr. Einat Wilf (@EinatWilf) April 11, 2025

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1) The forward looking, secular, educated, progressive leftists of Iran allied themselves with the Islamists for the joint goal of bringing down the Shah of Iran. They believed the Islamists were their allies in birthing a new, more democratic Iran, that would finally represent the will of its people against Imperial interests. They did help birth a new Iran and promptly became its victims.

2) Up until the Islamic Revolution Iran could boast of one of the oldest and relatively prosperous and integrated Jewish community. The Jewish community of Iran could trace itself to the Babylonian Exile and the time of Cyrus the Great, and under the 20th century Shahs enjoyed a period of relative prosperity and integration, with dozens of synagogues in Tehran alone.

The Islamic Revolution claimed to protect the Jews, even recognizing them as a religion minority in the new constitution, but then proceeded promptly to persecute and execute Jew on suspicion of Zionism (and no Jews, despite JVP's best efforts, will ever be able to evade suspicions of Zionism, because heaven forbid, they just said 'Next Year in Jerusalem' at the Passover Seder), and confiscated many Jewish businesses. As in Iraq, and across the Arab world two decades earlier, the Jews got the message loud and clear and fled the country. A confident flourishing community of 100,000 dwindled to a tenth of that number, living under strict limits.

3) The Islamic Republic of Iran, like all antisemitic and antizionist powers before it – from the Nazis, to the pan-Arabists, to the Soviets – took upon itself to sponsor Palestinianism (the ideology singularly obsessed with the destruction of the Jewish state). Although given the track record, one would have to wonder why. Seeing that the Nazis, pan-Arabists and Soviets have all ended in the dustbin of history, one could venture an educated bet that the Islamic Republic of Iran will suffer a similar fate.

And finally, although the evidence is mostly anecdotal, it seems that just as the best way to get people to disavow Socialism was to live under it, it seems that living under Islamic rule is not exactly endearing Islam to the people of Iran.

Let the talks begin.