On a recent visit to Iran, Amani Maged spoke to leading figures about the country's foreign policy and views of the Arab revolutions Relations between Iran and Bahrain on the one hand and Iran and Syria on the other remain ambiguous, and anyone visiting Tehran will try to understand them by knocking on the doors of Iran's leaders. In answer to the question of why Tehran had supported the revolution in Bahrain, but had opposed the revolution in Syria, Said Al-Galili, director of Iran's National Security and Foreign Affairs Council, said that "our position regarding the Bahrain revolution is identical to our view of the Arab revolutions in Tunisia, Syria, Libya and Egypt. We are against injustice, tyranny and the oppression of any people." Al-Galili said that the US, which claims to stand by popular movements around the world, was in fact the primary supporter of the ousted former presidents of Tunisia and Egypt, Zein Al-Abedine bin Ali and Hosni Mubarak. The US, he said, was also the primary supporter of monarchies in the region, and it had backed the regime of the former Shah in Iran. The dichotomy in US policies was obvious, Al-Galili said. "While it was making declarations against Libya, we discovered that it had sent 4,000 soldiers into Bahrain. As for Syria, we issued an official statement noting the demands of the Syrian people and the importance of negotiating them." Syria was a special case for Iran, he said, "because it is part of the resistance front, is confronting the Zionist Entity, and has defended the Palestinians during the siege on Gaza. Hamas has also been hosted by Damascus." Ayatollah Al-Shahrudi, former chairman of the Supreme Judicial Council, asserted that Iran defended all revolutions, including the one in Bahrain. The Syrian revolution, on the other hand, he said, "is a fabrication. The US and Israel are igniting the strife in Syria, and the Syrian leadership is on good terms with the Iranian leadership." According to some observers, the demonstrations in Bahrain came about because of a conflict between Bahraini Shias, supported by Iran, and Bahraini Sunnis, backed by the ruling family and the forces of the Gulf Cooperation Council. Ayatollah Mohamed Ali Taskhiri, former secretary-general of the Forum for Bridging Religious Sects, said that religious doctrines had nothing to do with the situation, in Iran's view. During an interview in Qom, the religious city where the Assembly of Seminary Scholars and Researchers is located and from where clerics are considered to control the Iranian regime, Taskhiri said a "phobia of Iran" had caused this reading of the situation, as well as claims that Iran was spreading Shia beliefs. He said that the slogans chanted in Bahrain were the same as the ones chanted in Egypt and Tunisia and that sectarianism had not been a factor in the events in Bahrain. Taskhiri pointed out that Bahrain was the base for the US Fifth Fleet in the Gulf. "Our position regarding Bahrain is not based on doctrine, but is a position of defending truth and justice," he said. On Syria, Taskhiri said that efforts had been made to bring the country to its knees because of its support for the Palestinian resistance and that there was a Salafi and sectarian movement stirring up trouble in the country. While there would seem to be common elements in the events in Syria and Iraq, Taskhiri believed that the situation in Syria had been made worse because of Iraqi interference. He did not deny that the Syrian regime needed to reform itself, though he warned of US threats to Damascus and demands that it end its ties with Hizbullah and Iran. Taskhiri, a member of the Iranian Expert Leadership Council that chooses the country's leaders, said he was concerned about changes in the regime in Syria, such that the country could ally itself with the US, undermining the Palestinian resistance. "If it had not been for Syria's support, south Lebanon would have been lost and Hamas destroyed," he said, adding that in his view many resistance bases would fall if Syria fell. Iranian intellectual Hussein Shari'temdari, director of the Keyhan Journalism Organisation, one of the major journalism institutions in Iran, divided the region into countries whose regimes support Washington, such as Yemen, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and the former regime in Egypt, and those that represent "an axis of resistance and confrontation," these including Iran, Syria, Hizbullah in Lebanon and Palestine. Syria, in particular, he said, had played a prominent role in confronting Zionist hegemony. The accusations levelled at Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad from abroad had had to do with Al-Assad's ties with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Supreme leader of the Islamic Revolution in Iran Ali Khamenei and Hassan Nasrallah, secretary-general of Hizbullah. The Syrian people had legitimate concerns, he said, but the problems in Syria were being capitalised upon in such a way as to destroy the Palestinian resistance. He referred to statements made by Saudi Arabia's foreign minister, for example, in which the latter had said that the country had provided $1 billion to the Syrian opposition. Shari'temdari expected the Syrian regime to make core reforms. He said that the regime was being advised by its friends. Both Bashar Al-Assad and his father Hafez Al-Assad had stood by the Islamic movements and had fought the enemies of Islam. Members of the Iranian public interviewed believed that events in Syrian were unlike those in Bahrain. One man interviewed, Mohamed Naqduzada, said that he believed that the Syrian regime backed the Palestinians and therefore must be supported wholeheartedly, echoing previous opinions about the "forces of arrogance" supporting the country's opposition. In Bahrain, he said, there was a need to support the Shia community, which faced discrimination under the country's monarchy.
