When the Arab uprising began in December 2010, leaders of the Islamic Republic of Iran were quick to claim credit, declaring their 1979 revolution as its “religious and ideological progenitor.”
Iran’s ayatollahs proposed that fundamentalist Islamic theology should direct change from Morocco to Yemen. Iranian Shiite clerics hoped Sunni Muslims across the Middle East would install governments similar to their own system of “velayat-e faqih,” or governance by a supreme religious jurist.
Iranian ambitions remain only partially fulfilled. But the ayatollahs are patient, firm in their belief that Arab Sunni Islamists will eventually make common cause with Iran.
Iran has nurtured ties with Tunisia’s Al-Nahda Islamist movement since 1988, when its leaders were exiled to Europe. The Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and Libya, in addition to the Islamic Action Front in Jordan, received clandestine Iranian support for decades. Bahrain’s politically disenfranchised Shiite majority views Iran as its religious mainstay, as do Shiite minorities in Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait. Shiite Houthi rebels along the porous border between Yemen and Saudi Arabia look to Tehran for support.
Yet, when regimes in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Yemen fell, citizens did not seem eager to replace autocratic leaders with intolerant Muslim clerics. Opinion polls demonstrate the ayatollahs’ esteem has fallen since Arabs witnessed images of Tehran’s hypocritical leaders unleashing violence against their own citizens in 2009.
So, as the Arab uprising unfolds, some Sunni Islamist groups have begun to portray themselves as moderates who would accommodate democracy. But they also have been careful not to actually renounce their officially declared fundamentalist stances.
Before Tunisians went to the polls in October to elect a constituent assembly, Al-Nahda saw Turkey, not Iran, as an ideal political model. It was the largest winner in that election, garnering 89 out of 217 electoral seats, and will head a coalition government.
During Morocco’s November elections, the Justice and Development Party focused on efficient, transparent governance rather than pushing strict Muslim codes. The Islamist group emerged as the largest parliamentary block with 107 out of 395 seats, and will lead a coalition government that reports to King Mohammad VI.
In Egypt’s elections, which are being conducted in stages until March 2012, first round results gave the Muslim Brotherhood 48 percent of the seats. Salafists took another 20 percent. The Muslim Brotherhood is expected to fare well in the subsequent stages and form Egypt’s new government.
Moroccan Justice and Development Party’s leader Abdel Ilah Bin Kiran stated, “Religion belongs in the mosques; we are not going to interfere in people’s personal lives.” Issam al-Erian, a leader of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party, noted, “Millions of Egyptians voted because they want a strong, democratic Parliament.”
Yet their words may not reflect how Sunni Islamists will govern once in power. Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini spoke similar conciliatory words until his intolerant supporters gained control of Iran. At the least, those three Arab nations will be governed by Islamists more sympathetic to Tehran’s causes and less to Washington’s – a major foreign policy shift.
Furthermore, irrespective of the election outcomes in Morocco, Tunisia and Egypt, the Arab uprising has shaken other Sunni leaders’ confidence. Tehran’s rhetoric, which tars those heads of state as self-serving cronies of the United States and Israel, leaves them vulnerable to Islamist and populist rebellions. Not surprisingly even Shariah-following Sunni leaders in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf emirates perceive the ayatollahs’ hands behind the Arabs revolt, although an official report on the unrest in Bahrain affirmed that no direct Iranian involvement could be discerned.
So the Saudi monarchy, its own totalitarianism notwithstanding, has led the Gulf Cooperation Council’s resistance to Iranian influence. It also is spearheading the Arab League’s economic sanctions, assets freeze and investment embargo against Tehran’s major Arab ally, Syria. Tehran and Damascus denounce those actions as escalations of centuries-old sectarian attacks against Shiites by Sunni hegemons.
The greatest setback to Iran’s foreign-policy goals has been the uprising against Syria’s Alawite elite, led by a dictator, Bashar Assad. When Syrian protestors, a majority of whom are Sunnis, began seeking domestic change, Tehran initially provided guidance and technology for Assad’s forces. But as the revolt spread, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and other officials of Iran’s executive branch urged Assad to accommodate his “people’s legitimate demands” while warning against Libya-like “interference by foreigners.” Iran’s presidency increasingly seems to have written Assad off and has made contact with Syrian opposition groups.
The ayatollahs do not concur with abandoning Assad. So how to respond to the upheaval in Syria has divided Iran’s powerbrokers, adding to schisms over domestic demands for socio-political liberalization. Despite their differences, Iranian officials seek to maintain influence over an Arab nation that has facilitated supplying resources to Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza.
Despite setbacks, Tehran’s ayatollahs still nurture hopes of spreading their radical model of Islamic politics. Because the dissatisfaction fueling Arab protest is homebred, they realize that Sunni rulers may not be able to hold the line against fundamentalism.
Indeed once Tunisians concluded voting, Iran’s Foreign Ministry revealed that Al-Nahda leaders were in regular contact with Tehran while planning election strategies. Muslim Brotherhood and Salafist organizers too have visited Tehran frequently since President Hosni Mubarak’s fall, in preparation for Egypt’s elections and for Pan-Islamic Awakening conferences.
On the military front, powerful rebel army commanders in Libya have ties to Iran’s military. As factions within the new Libyan polity contest one another, the ayatollahs could equip groups sympathetic to them. Likewise the eclipse of President Ali Abdullah Saleh will not end the Houthi rebellion. A Yemeni-Saudi counteroffensive there could beget rebel dependency on Tehran.
The ayatollahs’ ideology and resources remain a potent threat to the establishment of representative governments throughout the Middle East. Tehran’s biggest appeal is its anti-monarchist, anti-Western stance. As Arabs seek political restructuring and attempt to rebuild their nations, Iran’s ayatollahs will continue to point to the U.S., the United Kingdom and Israel as obstructing tangible change.
But ongoing contention with the West over Iran’s nuclear program is producing additional sanctions which could cripple Tehran’s ability to finance overseas influence-peddling.
It may seem that Iranian leaders often unwittingly sabotage their own plans while strengthening the world’s will to oust them. But the ayatollahs see more isolation from democratic currents of the West and Arab world as strengthening their grip at home. Taking on the U.S. also allows them to depict themselves as defiant Muslim victims of the global powers. So the struggle to contain Iran’s fundamentalists while enhancing democracy in the Arab world will continue.
Jamsheed K. Choksy is professor of Iranian, Islamic and Central Eurasian studies, a senior fellow of the Center on American and Global
Security, and a former director of the Middle Eastern studies program at Indiana University, Bloomington. This commentary is reprinted with permission from YaleGlobal Online (www.yaleglobal.yale.edu), Copyright © 2012, Yale Center for the Study of Globalization, Yale University.
