Lets start with the Supreme Ruler – Khamenei. He is NOT an ayatollah at all. Calling him Ayatollah Khamenei – is a lie. . Current Supreme Leader and Grand Ayatollah Ali Khamenei rose to the pinnacle of power without proper merits, experience, or religious qualifications. His rule and authority challenge democratic and theocratic perspectives.
Muslim scholars criticize Khamenei’s position in Iran. The constitution originally required supreme leader candidates to be marjas. Khamenei was neither a marja nor an ayatollah before he replaced Khomeini. When Khomeini did not see a worthy heir among his potential successors, he ordered an amendment to the constitution before his death. Once revised, supreme leaders were only required to have an expert understanding of Islamic philosophy and possess “appropriate political and managerial skills.” Stipulations regarding religious rankings were removed.
Khamenei rose through Islamic echelons and became an ayatollah overnight as Iranian officials rallied behind him.
In their efforts to support Islam, neo-fundamentalists have defeated themselves. The very idea of a supreme leader, a human being on relatively equal footing to God, goes against their religion’s teachings. Islam is a monotheist belief system. Muslims believe there is one and only one God, and all of God’s people are considered equal to one another.
Grand Ayatollah Mohammad Shirazi, still under house arrest for opposing Khomeini, did not support the idea of a single, all-powerful leader. He favored a committee of grand ayatollahs to lead the country instead.Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri questioned the powers of the supreme leader in 1997. The government closed his religious school and attacked his office in Qom soon after. Similar to Shirazi, he was placed under house arrest.Approximately 20 ayatollahs currently live worldwide. Their views regarding the role of religion within politics differ wildly from one to another. Some claim it is better to function as a teacher. Others support the idea of divine status and responsibility. Regardless, neither the Quran nor traditional Islamic teachings define the role of an ayatollah. The current theocracy has no legitimate, religious claim to the contrary.While the traditional role of an ayatollah remains questionable, ayatollahs claim power in Iran as “supreme leaders.” It has become an imperial role, and Iranians are forced to serve the Islamic Republic’s equivalent of an emperor, rather than have their leader serve them and their country. Iran’s theocratic regime, which challenged and replaced the Shah 30 years before in the name of religion and democracy, simply introduced Iran to a new form of dictator.The grand irony of Iran’s theocracy is that Supreme Leader Khamenei, Ayatollah Khomeini, and other political leaders such as Ayatollah Rafsanjani, have never had the proper religious credentials to hold their ranks. They did not rise to the stature of an ayatollah through religious merit, but were promoted overnight due to political expediency.Many decent and qualified religious leaders disagree with these theocratic usurpers and are offended by these pretenders.Simply put, Khomeini and Khamenei are frauds, self-appointed leaders of the Islamic world. It is not surprising that their appointees are similarly unqualified and offer false credentials to justify their positions.President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s doctoral degree is a crowning example of questionable qualifications. While a student at the Iran University of Science and Technology (IUST), Ahmadinejad worked as governor-general of Ardabil. When Sayyid Mohammad Khatami became president, Ahmadinejad was removed from his post, his thesis was accepted without defense, and he joined the faculty of IUST as “Dr.” Ahmadinejad.Ahmadinejad’s faculty also falsified their records. Hamid Behbahani, the minister of roads and transportation who asked for Ahmadinejad’s dissertation to be waved, published papers which copied text from previously published articles. Kamran Daneshjoo, the minister of science, research, and technology who was involved in rigging the election of 2009 never received degrees he claims to possess.
The Supreme Leader and his entourage are all shameless frauds.
Beyond the basic fraud and credentials of the Theocracy, and the government of Iran; there is the simple fact that 75% of the economy of Iran is controlled by religious charities (under the command of the theocracy) and their private army – The Islamic Republic Guard Corps (IRGC). The IRGC influences the economy at the will of Supreme Leader Khamenei. As a private military under only his jurisdiction, Majlis approval is not required for their activities. Required to patrol the borders, members of the IRGC illegally import goods and negatively impact the economy. Their large-scale smuggling allows common and illegal goods to enter the country tax-free. This causes cheaper versions of expensive domestic products to flood the market and kills Iran’s economic productivity and growth.Since the beginning of the new millennium, the IRGC has extended its economic reach. It won billions of dollars in oil, gas, and chemical contracts, as well as major infrastructure projects. The government awards no-bid contracts to Khatam Al-Anbia, the IRGC’s engineering division. Many firms owned by IRGC soldiers receive contracts as well.Khatam Al-Anbia received a contract worth over $2 billion to develop phases of South Pars, a natural gas field. They also received contracts to build a metro line in Tehran, a pipeline between Iran and Pakistan, and a railroad to Chabahar, all three collectively worth $5 billion. These projects were all given to Khatam Al-Anbia in 2006 alone.
Then there is the huge volume of drugs (narcotics) imported by the IRGC into Iran from Afghanistan. Over two thirds of Afghan Opium and Heroin comes into Iran, and much of it is transhiped to the rest of the world from Iran. We are talking about literally thousands of tons of drugs – almost the world’s supply of these narcotics being consumed domestically in Iran and transhipped by the IRGC to the rest of the world.
IRGC officials have accrued significant amounts of wealth from all this. The children of the IRGC’s elite carry the latest technology and pursue quality educations while lowly soldiers in other branches of Iran’s military earn next to nothing.Officials throughout the government of Iran continuously gain more and more money at the expense of the very people they pretend to represent. Islamic clerics in nearby regions dream of the wealth that Iran’s representatives hoard.As the Islamic Republic remains in power politically and economically, a greater threat emerges. The negative influence on politicians and figureheads in other Islamic countries could lead to similar revolutions and tear down the region altogether.
The mullahs and the IRGC rob their country in plain sight. Iranians are disadvantaged by their leaders and caught in a constant cycle of suffering. While the mullahs and their agents control the economy and horde Iran’s wealth for themselves, 12 million Iranians live in poverty with minimal assistance. Iran’s greatest fraudsters, greatest criminals, greatest enemy are the very theocracy itself.