BY FARHAD SALMI
FRANKFURT, Germany - Morgh-e-Amin, a bookstore and a
publishing house in central Tehran, Iran, that stays open 24
hours a day, was set ablaze at half past midnight (Tehran
time) August 23. The five assailants took the store
attendant as a hostage, poured gasoline on stacks of books,
and set the shop on fire. No one was injured but the store
attendant was severely beaten before being released because
he refused to disclose the whereabouts of Ebrahym Rahimi
Khamenee, the store owner.
The arson of this bookstore has sparked widespread opposition and debate.
One of the recent titles carried by Morgh-e-Amin, Gods Laugh Only on Mondays, had come under attack earlier in some newspapers as insulting Islam and the efforts of young volunteers who fought during the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war. (The author's name was not disclosed in Tehran dailies, but the weekly Iran Times, published in Washington, D.C., identified the author by his pen name as Mohammad Reza Khoshbin Khoshnazar.) Under pressure, the Ministry of Islamic Guidance had rescinded its permit for the sale of the book and had already confiscated all the copies before the attack took place on Morgh-e-Amin.
The day after the assault, Seyyed Attaollah Mohajerani, deputy to President Hashemi Rafsanjani on legal matters, wrote a column in the Tehran semi-official daily Ettelaat condemning the burning of the store. He wrote that the arson was either the work of "clever enemies" who want to portray Iran as a country of book burners backed by its government, or the work of "ignorant friends" who burn a bookstore because they are opposed to one title sold there. Mohajerani wrote, "This fire, smoke, and ignorance can neither silence ideas nor undermine the Islamic Republic."
In addition to literary works the Morgh-e-Amin bookstore has also carried political books. They include titles with speeches by Nelson Mandela, Malcolm X, leaders of the Cuban Revolution, and some revolutionary classics. The bookstore had not encountered any problems on those accounts.
Forty-three publishers, distributors, and bookstores have sent a petition to President Rafsanjani protesting the attack on Morgh-e-Amin and calling for the arrest and prosecution of the assailants and compensation for damages. In solidarity, publishers from around the country have started sending stacks of books to Morgh-e-Amin and have made financial contributions. Most dailies in Tehran have taken editorial positions against the bookstore burning.
Some of the opposition to the arson, however, has been conditional. The semi-official Tehran daily Kayhan opposed the attack because the "offensive" book had already been taken out of circulation and there should have been no need to burn a bookstore.
The weekly Sobh, while not condoning the attack, characterized the publishers who had petitioned Rafsanjani as "Westomaniacs," dazzled by the "Western world." The Tehran daily Salam, which has strongly condemned the burning, stated that the book itself is "worthless" and "banal" and should not have been published in the first place.
Nevertheless, this is the first time that such a wide opposition is being voiced against these kinds of extralegal attacks, which sometimes are carried out under the name of Hezbollah. Even some of the semi-official papers that voice the views of different tendencies in the ruling circles have not been immune to attacks. In his Ettelaat column Mohajerani referred to a sound bomb that had been placed at the entrance of the paper earlier by unknown assailants.
Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, a powerful figure in the regime and secretary of the Supreme Council of Guardians, which has veto power over all legislation, spoke at the weekly Friday prayer meeting in Tehran on August 25.
Referring to Ayatollah Khomeini's directives in his will, Jannati said that "if Hezbollah comes across a wrong doing and complains to the judicial authorities, and they do not pay any attention, then the Hezbollah people can act on their own initiative and the judicial system does not have the right to prosecute those who have taken the necessary actions."
Coming three days after the assault on Morgh-e-Amin and the young man working there, Ayattolah Jannati's remarks have been viewed as sanctioning those violent actions.
Salam criticized Jannati for these remarks and named some of the publications - Gardoon, Farad, and Donyaye Sokhan - that had been violently attacked after similar speeches at Friday prayer meetings in the past. Salam's list of assailed publications includes Payame Daneshjoo (Students' Message), which is known to represent the continuation of the current Students Following Imam's Line. This group led the occupation of the U.S. embassy in Tehran in 1979 in opposition to Washington's moves against the Iranian revolution. After Payame Daneshjoo ran documents on financial corruption of high level state functionaries, its offices were ransacked. The paper was later suppressed by legal authorities.
After Salam criticized Jannati's speech for justifying extra-legal acts of violence, a debate has ensued between Salam and Kayhan. The second paper sided with Jannati.
A writer in Kayhan accused Salam of trying to get a "feeble" head start in the coming election campaign for the fifth Majles (parliament) by taking up the defense of Morgh- e-Amin and other such issues. Supporters of Salam, who were called "radicals," had a majority in the third Majles, but many of them were disqualified in running for the fourth Majles and lost out in the elections.
Salam has pointed to the "almost absolute majority" that supporters of Jannati have in the Majles and have rhetorically asked why don't they pass legislation to ban things legally, rather than resorting to illegal attacks.