No to 'Daesh Jurisprudence' Through the Assembly of Experts Elections

Ayatollah Khamenei and the IRGC have engineered the elections of the Assembly of Experts on March 7 in such a way through the Guardian Council that they create 'Sultanic Assemblies' (refer to the article 'The Attack of the IRGC and Basij Commanders to Capture the Parliament'). The Guardian Council has approved 161 candidates for 88 seats in the Assembly of Experts to ensure a 'Sultanic Assembly of Experts.' If two candidates were to compete for each seat, there should have been 176 candidates in the field. Khamenei, the IRGC, and the Guardian Council not only invalidated the entire tradition prevalent in the seminaries but also revealed the complete governmental/sultanic nature of the seminaries, showing that they have failed to train even one hundred jurists in the past 37 years (refer to the article 'Shut Down the Seminaries, as They Could Not Produce Jurists'). Khamenei, the IRGC, and the Guardian Council have left no credibility for the seminaries, as the questions in the jurisprudence exams were about prayer and its nullifiers. This means that those who have studied jurisprudence in the seminaries are even incapable of deriving the rulings regarding the nullifiers of prayer from jurisprudential sources (refer to the article 'Experts in the Poppy Field - The Close Relationship Between 'Hadath' and the Election of the Supreme Leader'). The power struggle over scarce resources of power/wealth/information/social status during Khamenei's leadership is intertwined with the battle over the legacy of Khomeini (refer to the article 'How the Khomeini Myth Was Constructed and What Remains of It?'). Khamenei began his leadership by removing Khomeini's closest associates and sought to elevate his own followers. From the very beginning, the leftists of the 1980s - the reformists of the 1990s and the Greens of the 2000s - stood against Khamenei by invoking Khomeini. They claimed that Imam Khomeini said, 'The measure is the vote of the people,' 'The republic in the Islamic Republic means the Republic of France,' 'Freedom in the Islamic Republic will be absolute,' and similar statements (refer to the article 'The Green Movement and Ayatollah Khomeini'). Standing against Khamenei's arbitrary authoritarian rule required a reinterpretation of Khomeini's principles and presenting a democratic, human rights-oriented, and freedom-loving image of him. They would go to war against Khamenei with a democratic and human rights-oriented Khomeini (refer to the article 'Why Do They Distort Khomeini and Make Him Liberal and Secular?'). Khamenei, fully aware of this approach, countered them by raising the issue of 'the distortion of Imam Khomeini' and 'the main geometry of Imam's thought,' reminding them that only he continues the path of Imam and that defending the late Imam means defending the Supreme Leader, opposing American imperialism, rejecting liberal democracy, and supporting the Guardian Council, the IRGC, the Basij, etc. Hashemi Rafsanjani and the reformists claimed Hassan Khomeini as 'the legacy of the Imam' and nominated him for the Assembly of Experts, but Khamenei, the IRGC, and the Guardian Council firmly stated that his qualifications for the Assembly of Experts were not met (refer to the article 'The Power Struggle Between Khamenei and Hashemi Rafsanjani Over Hassan Khomeini'). For Khamenei and the IRGC, who imprisoned Ayatollah Montazeri in his home for five years, and also imprisoned Mir Hossein Mousavi, Mehdi Karroubi, and Zahra Rahnavard in their homes for five years, rejecting Hashemi Rafsanjani's qualifications for the presidency in 2013 was not difficult. They did not want Hassan Khomeini to come first with a high number of votes in Tehran and become a danger to Khamenei's potential successors by entering the Assembly of Experts. Ayatollah Khomeini strongly and explicitly opposed the political activities of military personnel, comparing it to cancer spreading throughout the body, but Khamenei, lacking traditional and charismatic authority, needed to significantly expand the military's activities in the political realm. Ayatollah Khamenei not only uses the Hezbollah and Basij forces for internal repression but also instructs the government to dominate them everywhere (refer to the article 'Ayatollah Khamenei and the Occupation of Embassies: Open Opposition and Covert Support'). In a meeting with members of the Supreme National Security Council, he also told them: 'In order for the secretariat to perform its very important decision-making role correctly and well, the prevailing atmosphere in the secretariat of the Supreme National Security Council and its orientations must be fully in line with the correct and pure revolutionary and Hezbollah thought.' Khamenei's 'neo-sultanic governance' depends on the military and economic resources. He must constantly increase the military's power, and the plan to expand the Basij's powers is also in this context. With the complete engineering of the Assembly of Experts elections and the guarantee of a sultanic assembly, it seems that the gentlemen should be completely at ease and calmly await March 7. However, this is not the case. Kazem Sedighi told the people in his Friday prayer sermon on February 11, 2016: 'People should go to the ballot boxes with the intention of saying no to America and ISIS' and 'Voting for the seditionists brings no good.' The meaning of 'no' to America in the elections is quite clear. They consider reformists and moderates as agents and mercenaries of America (refer to the article 'Ayatollah Khamenei and the Sultanic Assembly Against the American Assembly'). It was Khamenei who raised the issue of the danger of 'sedition' and 'infiltration' of America through the elections. The issue is that this threat has been raised even after the widespread disqualifications by the Guardian Council. They are worried because they know that reformists and moderates can disrupt Khamenei's engineering in a negative way. Protesting participation and eliminating the symbols and main forces of Khamenei, including the 'Jim Triangle' - meaning Jannati, Yazdi, and Mesbah - in Tehran, Alim al-Huda and Saidi (the Friday prayer leader of Qom) in Razavi Khorasan, Sadegh Larijani in Mazandaran, Ahmad Khatami in Kerman, Ali Fallahian in Khuzestan, will be a big 'no' to Khamenei, the IRGC, the Guardian Council, and authoritarianism (refer to the article 'The Defeat of Jannati, Yazdi, and Mesbah, Khamenei's Decisive Test'). When Sedighi speaks of saying no to America in his Friday prayer sermon, he continues to pursue Khamenei and the IRGC's project. However, he has made a significant blunder in his statements. He said that with your vote, also say no to ISIS. What does 'no to ISIS' mean in the elections? Who are the symbols of ISIS? Those who are labeled as seditionists, infiltrators of America, and supporters of liberal democracy by Khamenei, the IRGC, the Basij, and the jurists? The answer is no. The jurisprudence defended by the 'Jim Triangle' - Jannati, Yazdi, Mesbah, Alim al-Huda, Sadegh Larijani, Ali Fallahian, Saidi, Ahmad Khatami, Hashemi Shahroudi, and other court clerics is the same as Daesh jurisprudence. This issue was raised long ago in Iran by the prominent thinker Mohammad Mojtahed Shabestari in the article 'If ISIS Asks the Jurists.' Others have also raised the same issue in other analytical articles (refer to the article 'The Theoretical Foundations of ISIS in Traditional Jurisprudence'). Therefore, if the goal is to say no to ISIS in the elections, it must be said no to those whose jurisprudence is Daesh jurisprudence. In fact, the reformists and moderates intend to eliminate these individuals in the Assembly of Experts elections by presenting a list and the people's votes. The main goal in Tehran is to eliminate the 'Jim Triangle.' Those who know that in Mazandaran the main goal is to eliminate Sadegh Larijani have pressured other candidates to withdraw and prevent Sadegh Larijani from being eliminated. On February 11, 2016, Allahverdi Moghadam withdrew from the elections in favor of Sadegh Larijani to reduce the risk of eliminating the head of the judiciary born in Iraq. Thus, participation in the Assembly of Experts elections is a protest participation for a big no to Khamenei through the elimination of the defenders of 'Daesh jurisprudence.' Those whose candidates have almost all been disqualified intend to reveal the lack of social base of the champions of Daesh jurisprudence. If this happens, Khamenei's and the IRGC's engineering will be disrupted. For this reason, this round of the Assembly of Experts elections is significant. Because it is still possible to say no to Khamenei and his arbitrary rule.