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By Shahla Firouz

For the past thirty years, the Islamic Republic has made innumerable mistakes and glaring errors in dealing with the Baha’i community. Some of these errors include summary executions, harassment and imprisonment, confiscation of property, and various forms of economic, social, and cultural isolation. This approach to the Baha’is stems from a distorted ideology that fails to differentiate between what is religious expression and what may constitute political dissent. This confused ideology has yet to define whether Iranian law should be rooted in Islamic shari’a or in fundamental human rights; whether adherence to the laws delineated by the Ayatollahs in their books of Islamic guidance must supersede the respect of the international community; and whether Iran is committed to a democratic society or whether pursuit of an Islamic polity is in its best interests.

At first glance, it may appear that these conflicts in defining the Islamic republic’s identity are irrelevant to its dealing with the Baha’is. However, upon closer scrutiny, we find that this unbalanced duality of the Islamic republic’s ideology is the root cause of its grave errors in dealing with the Baha’i community of Iran. Among many such errors, two mistakes of the Islamic Republic stand out as the most impressive.

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