When Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu launched Israel鈥檚 war against Iran, ostensibly to wipe out Iran鈥檚 peaceful nuclear facilities, he said that Israel had excellent relations with Iran before the 1979 Iranian Revolution.
The regime Israel had such good relations with that of Shah Reza Pahlavi, put in power by a CIA-organised coup in 1953. The United States-backed coup overthrew the democratically elected nationalist regime of Mohammed Mossadegh 鈥 two years after it nationalised Iran鈥檚 British-owned oil industry.
The Shah鈥檚 dictatorship was characterised by unbridled brutality, murder and torture. The hated political police, SAVAK, was organised by the CIA and Israeli intelligence. Tens of thousands of US military personnel based in Iran trained the Army and the Shah鈥檚 elite Royal Guard.
United States jackboots were everywhere. The US embassy, the final authority, was huge, occupying a city block. Iran was a bastion for Washington in the Middle East along with the garrison state of Israel. The Shah maintained close relations with the Zionist regime in an alliance against the Arab countries and the Palestinian people. Bordering the former USSR, Iran was also a high-tech US listening post, monitoring the Soviets.
Mass upsurge
Netanyahu mischaracterises the Iranian Revolution as the imposition of a top-down, anti-democratic and theocratic regime, such as that now seen in Iran.
In reality, a mass upsurge for freedom and democracy brought down the Shah鈥檚 regime.
Millions of migrants from the countryside, forced off their land by the Shah鈥檚 鈥済reen revolution鈥 that built large agricultural businesses for export, settled in the slums in southern Tehran. They were demanding that the government provide them with services such as electricity, running water, sewage, health centres and transportation. But, because their pleas fell on deaf ears, they resorted to tapping into power lines and water supply lines.
The regime tried to evict the settlers, and from June鈥揝eptember 1977, the shantytowns became a violent battleground. The government sent in demolition squads with bulldozers, escorted by hundreds of paramilitary soldiers.
The people fought back with shovels, clubs and stones. Government cars were set on fire, their offices ransacked and some officials were killed. The Shah retreated and halted the demolitions. Millions of super-exploited people worked on and off in industries like construction. They had struck the first blow in what would become an upsurge so powerful it would overthrow the Shah in less than two years.
Demonstrations against the regime in Tehran and other cities became larger and larger, in 1978. In September 3-4 million people took to the streets. The Shah declared martial law, unleashing murderous repression. Hundreds were gunned down in Tehran alone and there were massacres in other cities.
General strike
But the repression didn鈥檛 stop the movement, and millions more took action. During the year, weekly demonstrations followed Friday prayers, especially following police and army massacres.
Bank workers struck, followed by teachers, journalists, postal workers, radio and television industry workers. Then all sectors followed, including the industrial workforce, in one the greatest general strikes in history, raising economic and political demands against the government.
Oil workers 鈥 a key sector 鈥 shut down production for export, but kept up enough production for domestic use, including petrol and vital heating oil for homes.
While most Iranians are Persian, oppressed nationalities including Kurds, Azerbaijanis, Arabs and others combined in opposition to the Shah with their own demands for national freedom.
Mass demonstrations continued daily. Battles between the people and the police and army resulted in many casualties. However, the Shah鈥檚 repression was combined with some concessions. Big wage increases were granted. Some of the thousands of political prisoners were released, but their stories of torture fueled the rebellion.
The leadership of the upsurge was the clergy. The Shah had allowed the mosques to function, as he shut down all other institutions that could become centres of opposition. He could not take on the religious establishment directly because to do so would have made it impossible to consolidate his rule after the 1953 coup. The coalition that was built to carry out the coup focused instead on destroying the communists and terrorising working people, in line with the US objectives in the Cold War.
The most popular opponent of the Shah was the Ayatollah Ruholla Khomeini. He had supported an unsuccessful uprising against the Shah in 1963, leading to his forced exile 鈥 first in Bagdad and then in Paris. Khomeini maintained contact with young clergy in the mosques, by smuggling in tapes of his speeches.
Many of the well-known leaders of the clergy were in prison, and newer younger member of the clergy in the mosques were pro-Khomeini and stood for abolishing the monarchy. His prestige grew in the rebellion as the mass actions developed, because of his consistent opposition to the regime. He supported the demonstrations and general strike in 1978.
Shah flees
Seven million demonstrators took to the streets on December 10. While the Shah said he would suppress them, he was forced to back down and he fled the country on January 16, 1979. Before he fled, he appointed Shahpur Bakhtiar as Prime Minister.
Khomeini announced on January 25 that he was flying in from Paris the next day. Bakhtiar launched a bloody crackdown. The army surrounded the airport with tanks and closed it down. Students demonstrated the next day at Tehran University. Army machine guns killed 100. One million marched to protest the killings, half of them women wearing the black chador (full veil).
鈥淒eath to [Jimmy] Carter, the shah and Shahpur!鈥 was a popular slogan. Bakhtiar was forced to retreat, and he allowed Khomeini to return on February 1.
The mass demonstrations continued every week. Many of the demonstrators wore funereal white, symbolising they were ready to die.
Bakhtiar unleashed British tanks on one demonstration. The tanks rolled at high speed along the street, over cars, firing at demonstrators with artillery and machine guns, killing many. But those who fell were replaced by other demonstrators. Some of them used steel I-beams from construction sites to attack the tanks鈥 treads. While the immobilised tanks could still fire on the people, many of the demonstrators got close enough to throw molotov cocktails at the tanks, setting them on fire. Some solders baked to death, while others fled.
At night, masses of people went to their rooftops chanting 鈥淎llah-u akbar鈥 (God is great). The army top brass and the regime were becoming more and more isolated.
On his return, Kohmeini appointed his own cabinet with Mehdi Bazargan as Prime Minister, in opposition to the Bahktiar regime. Bazargan had served as the head of the oil industry after it had been nationalised by Mossadegh鈥檚 National Front government.
Although the National Front was no longer significant, this represented broader forces than the clergy. On February 8, there were demonstrations in support of the Bazargan cabinet, with 1 million in Tehran alone.
Aircraft mechanics at air bases around the country held actions of their own in 1978. Trainee mechanics at an airbase near Tehran demonstrated on February 9 and were attacked by the Royal Guards, who inflicted many casualties. The next day the qualified mechanics, who did not live on the base, returned to work and saw the carnage. They refused to work, and were also attacked by the Royal Guard.
The mechanics fought back, and the civilian population around the base came to their aid. The mechanics raided the base armoury to get guns, which they distributed to the civilians, and a battle ensued. The Guards were pushed back block by block, and barricades were built as the fighters advanced. The wounded were taken by cars to hospitals.
The army lost control of the streets. The insurrection had begun 鈥 although no one knew it 鈥 and spread to Tehran, where masses in the south defied an army curfew and came out into the streets at night.
Insurrection to betrayal
Khomeini and Bazargan did not initiate the action 鈥 they were opposed to an insurrection.
In the face of the show of force by millions, the army cracked. The high command issued a notice that the army would no longer attack the people. The army disintegrated and the soldiers joined the people.
The Bahktiar government was overthrown. The Tehran insurrection rapidly spread throughout the country.
The Bazargan cabinet took over, but took no social or democratic reforms, and sought to keep as much of the old state apparatus as it could, in defense of the capitalists and landlords it was beholden to.
The working people, on the other hand, who had been on the general strike, returned to the factories and other workplaces, and began to take them over, electing committees to run them. The masses continued to make other gains.
The Bazargan government was weak. Khomeini was the real leader, with the backing of the high clergy. It was he who ordered the civilians to turn in their arms, saying it was a 鈥渟in鈥 to keep them.
The new government opposed the Zionist regime in Israel, and supported the Palestinians, and denounced the US as the 鈥淕reat Satan鈥. This reflected the views of the Iranian masses who knew well who had supported the Shah.
What ensued was a long period of the new regime gradually moving to restrict the gains that workers, peasants and the oppressed nationalities had won. This was not an easy task. The people had great confidence in their own power, since they had brought down the Shah and won gains in their workplaces and society through bloody struggle.
Women, who had marched in their millions with the men, were also betrayed.
It took until 1983 for Khomeini to consolidate his theocratic regime and crush the gains of the Revolution, except for an important gain: the winning of independence from the US and Israel.