Kazem Sedighi: Little Devils Say We Are at a Crossroads of Sanctions or Submission

Kazem Sedighi, the interim Friday prayer leader of Tehran, stated that "little devils in the country" are fueling the idea that "we are at a crossroads of sanctions or submission." According to Fars News Agency, Sedighi said during the Friday prayer on April 1 that "the enemy wanted to paralyze our nation with sanctions so that people would say we should not have revolted" and added: "These insinuations are the work of the Great Satan, and little devils in the country also exacerbate this issue." The Tehran Friday prayer leader warned: "If we submit, we must submit to the end, and the enemy will not relent." Sedighi's remarks are one of the latest examples of verbal attacks by close associates of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the leader of the Islamic Republic, against individuals and groups within the country who are calling for dialogue and relations with the West, particularly the United States, on various contentious issues. This comes as Khamenei, in a speech marking the arrival of Nowruz 1395, harshly criticized President Rouhani's government and the United States, referring to the nuclear agreement between Iran and world powers as "pure loss." He also severely criticized those who "hope that we can sit down and negotiate with the U.S. on certain issues and reach a point of agreement." The Supreme Leader had previously stated that he only permitted negotiations with the U.S. regarding the nuclear issue and not other matters. Following Khamenei's Nowruz speech, a wave of attacks against the eleventh government began from the Supreme Leader's appointees. Senior military commanders, the General Staff of the Armed Forces, and the head of the judiciary were among those who attacked the government's policies or its supporters during this period. In another part of his speech on April 1, Sedighi also criticized "some who say tomorrow is the day of negotiation, not missiles" and stated that they "know very well that our enemies will not stop on the issues they want to halt and will move forward rapidly." Kazem Sedighi added: "I do not know why some say these things and confuse thoughts. According to the Quran, we must reach a level of defensive power that the enemy does not dare to attack." Sedighi's remarks refer to statements attributed to Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani on Twitter, which stated: "Tomorrow's world is the world of dialogues, not the world of missiles." In one of his recent speeches, the Supreme Leader remarked that anyone who raises such issues unwittingly is "ignorant," and if they do so knowingly, they are "traitors." Following these remarks, sources close to Rafsanjani described the published statement as "incomplete" and "edited." ISNA quoted an "informed source" stating that the content of the Twitter account attributed to Rafsanjani has no relation to him, but is managed by "one of his admirers."