WAITING FOR THE MAHDI
Since his election in 2005, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has made no secret of his belief in the imminent return of the Islamic Messiah, or Mahdi. “Our revolution’s main mission is to pave the way for the reappearance of the 12th Imam, the Mahdi,” Ahmadinejad told a meeting of national religious leaders shortly after taking office. “Today, we should define our economic, cultural and political policies based on the policy of Imam Mahdi’s return.”
Now, Ahmadinejad's religious vision may be one step closer to being officially institutionalized. A notable Iranian cleric, Hojjatoleslam Samamedding Ghavami of the Qom Seminary School, has officially proposed that the Iranian government establish a "Ministry of Waiting" that will be tasked, among other things, with "management" of the mosque at Jamkaran – one of two possible sites within Iran from which it is believed the Hidden Imam will ascend. The move, according to Ghavami, is logical given what is expected to be "the public's increasing interest toward the Jamkaran Mosque in coming years." (Reuters, November 17, 2005; Tehran Rooz, August 26, 2008)
BAND-AIDS OVER BLEEDING ECONOMIC WOUNDS
Officially, Iranian policymakers are striking a defiant stance in response to widening international sanctions on their regime for its nuclear effort. An official with Bank Mellat, Iran's third-largest state-owned bank, told the Financial Times recently that the Islamic Republic has so far managed to mitigate the effects of new sanctions by the U.S. and Europe aimed at severing Iran's links to international markets. Telltale signs, however, suggest that in truth Iran's economic fortunes are not nearly so rosy. With inflation officially pegged at over 26 percent, Iran's central bank has established an emergency committee to draft currency reforms in an effort to mitigate soaring inflation within the Islamic Republic. The committee's quick fix? To "suppress" several zeroes of the country's currency in an effort to instill greater domestic economic confidence and facilitate large-scale financial transactions, which have become increasingly difficult to carry out as the Iranian rial has lost its value. (Financial Times, August 21, 2008; Agence France Presse, August 28, 2008)
MORE NUCLEAR MOVEMENT IN TEHRAN
Iran's ayatollahs may be under growing international pressure because of their nuclear ambitions, but this has not stopped them from thinking big about their atomic project. The Iranian government has announced its intention to build six more nuclear plants by the year 2021, and now appears to be making progress toward that goal. Iranian energy firms are currently said to be scouting locations within the Islamic Republic that would be suitable for additional nuclear installations – a process that is expected to take some 13 months. (Tel Aviv Ha'aretz, August 19, 2008)
BAD BEHAVIOR IN IRAQ
Since this spring, Iran’s political and strategic clout in Iraq has suffered a series of significant setbacks at the hands of the increasingly assertive government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. But Iranian officials do not appear to have given up their plans for influencing the politics – and the stability – of their western neighbor. American military officers say that members of Iran’s elite Quds Force paramilitary unit, together with elements from Lebanon’s Iranian-backed Hezbollah militia, are now actively training new cadres of Iraqi Shi’a inside Iran as part of an effort to rejuvenate the resistance against the Coalition. (London Telegraph, August 15, 2008)
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