I've had Al Jazeera on constantly and the seem to think it probably was.
Actually there is almost unanimity among even the strongest critics of American policy that the election was most likely stolen or at the very least riddled with enormous fraud.
With only a few rare exceptions even the strongest critics of American policy in the Middle East are convinced this was a stolen election. What concerns some progressives most is that this stolen election will be used by the neocons and other reactionaries for retching up the rhetoric toward a military strike on Iran.
Absolutely nothing would harm the pro-democracy and pro-reform forces in Iran more than and play into the hands of the theocratic hardliners more than the appearance that the pro-democracy, pro-reform movement are stooges for the United States. There was a good article today on Alternet by Steven Zunes. Also Juan Cole who strongly argued against and exposed the dishonest media propaganda that claimed that Ahmadinejad advocated launching a nuclear attack against Israel, still Dr. Cole has come out very clear in two different articles clearly laying out the case that the election was likely stolen. Professor Cole has lived and studied in Iran and is fluent in Farsi and is an Iranian expert and a strong supporter of America establishing friendly relations with Iran.
Has the Election Been Stolen in Iran?
http://www.alternet.org/world/140626/has_the_election_been_stolen_in_iran/?page=1 If it is true that Ahmadinejad's victory is fraudulent, it'll be a dream come true for those pushing a more confrontational approach with Iran. By Stephen Zunes, AlterNet. Posted June 13, 2009.
Stephen Zunes is a professor of Politics and chair of Middle Eastern Studies at the University of San Francisco and serves as a senior policy analyst for Foreign Policy in Focus. http://www.alternet.org/world/140626/has_the_election_b... /
"It is certainly not unprecedented for Western observers to miscalculate the outcome of an election in a country where pre-election polls are not as rigorous as Western countries, particularly when there is a clear bias towards a particular candidate. At the same time, the predictions of knowledgeable Iranian observers from various countries and from across the political spectrum were nearly unanimous in the belief that the leading challenger Mir Hossein Mousavi would defeat incumbent president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad decisively in yesterday’s presidential election, certainly in the runoff if not in the first round. This also appeared to be the assumption among independent observers in Iran itself.
So overwhelming were the signs of imminent Ahmadinejad defeat and so massive was the margin of his alleged victory, the only reasonable assumption was that there has been fraud on a massive scale. What polls did exist showed Mousavi leading by a clear majority and Ahmadinejad well under 40%, a margin roughly similar to what most analysts had suggested based on anecdotal evidence. Instead, the official results show Ahmadinejad winning by an overwhelming 63% of the vote. "
snip: "There are also more direct indications of fraud.
In past elections, there have been substantial variations in the vote of various candidates based on ethnicity and geography, but the official results show Ahmadinejad’s vote totals being relatively uniform across the country. Mousavi, an Azeri from the province of Azerbaijan who has been quite popular there, did poorly, according to official results. This is particularly striking since even minor candidates from that area had done disproportionately well in previous elections. Similarly, Mehdi Karoubi, the other reformist candidate and an ethnic Lur, supposedly fared poorly in his home province of Luristan. Nationally, Karoubi went from 17% in the 2005 election to less than 1% this year with no apparent reason for such a precipitous decline. Meanwhile, the much-despised Mohsen Rezaie, the other hardline candidate, allegedly got twice as many votes."
snip: "The stealing of the Iranian presidential elections is a dream come true for American neo-conservatives and others pushing for a more confrontational approach with Iran. It is imperative that we not allow the hard-liners of either country an illegitimate victory and give our support to Iranian democrats in their struggle to reclaim their country."
link to full article:
http://www.alternet.org/world/140626/has_the_election_been_stolen_in_iran/?page=1 Ahmadinejad reelected under cloud of fraud
By Juan Cole
http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2009/06/13/iran /
"Obama administration officials were privately casting doubt on the announced vote tallies. They pointed out that it was unlikely that Ahmadinejad had defeated his chief opponent, Mir-Hossein Moussavi, by a margin of 57 percent, in Moussavi's own home city of Tabriz. Nor is it plausible, as claimed, that Ahmadinejad won a majority of votes in the capital, Tehran, from which he hails. The final tally also gave only 320,000 votes to the other reformist candidate, Mehdi Karoubi, who had helped force Ahmadinejad into a runoff election when he ran in 2005. It seems odd that he get less than 1 percent of the votes in this round. Karoubi, an ethnic Lur from Iran's west, was even alleged to have done poorly in those provinces.
The final vote counts alleged for cities and provinces, even more so than the landslide claimed by the incumbent nationally, strongly suggest a last-minute and clumsy fraud. A carefully planned theft of the election would at least have conceded Tabriz to Moussavi and the rural western Iranian villages to Karoubi."
snip: "The primary challenger to incumbent Ahmadinejad, former Prime Minister Mir-Hossein Moussavi, was widely thought to have a number of crucial constituencies behind him. Urban youth and women, who had elected a reformist president in 1997 and 2001, showed enthusiasm for Moussavi. He also showed an ability to bring out big crowds in his native Azerbaijan, where a Turkic language, Azeri, is spoken rather than Persian. (Azeris constitute about a third of the Iranian population.) It was expected that if the turnout was large, that would help Moussavi.
But not only did Iran's Electoral Commission announce that Ahmadinejad had won almost two-thirds of the general vote, it also gave him big majorities in major cities such as Tehran and Tabriz (the latter is the capital of Azerbaijan). These results seemed unbelievable not only to Moussavi supporters but to many professional Iran observers."
http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2009/06/13/iran /
Saturday, June 13, 2009
Stealing the Iranian Election
by Juan Cole http://juancole.com/2009/06/stealing-iranian-election.htmlTop Pieces of Evidence that the Iranian Presidential Election Was Stolen
1. It is claimed that Ahmadinejad won the city of Tabriz with 57%. His main opponent, Mir Hossein Mousavi, is an Azeri from Azerbaijan province, of which Tabriz is the capital. Mousavi, according to such polls as exist in Iran and widespread anecdotal evidence, did better in cities and is popular in Azerbaijan. Certainly, his rallies there were very well attended. So for an Azeri urban center to go so heavily for Ahmadinejad just makes no sense. In past elections, Azeris voted disproportionately for even minor presidential candidates who hailed from that province.
2. Ahmadinejad is claimed to have taken Tehran by over 50%. Again, he is not popular in the cities, even, as he claims, in the poor neighborhoods, in part because his policies have produced high inflation and high unemployment. That he should have won Tehran is so unlikely as to raise real questions about these numbers.
3. It is claimed that cleric Mehdi Karoubi, the other reformist candidate, received 320,000 votes, and that he did poorly in Iran's western provinces, even losing in Luristan. He is a Lur and is popular in the west, including in Kurdistan. Karoubi received 17 percent of the vote in the first round of presidential elections in 2005. While it is possible that his support has substantially declined since then, it is hard to believe that he would get less than one percent of the vote. Moreover, he should have at least done well in the west, which he did not.
link to full article:
http://juancole.com/2009/06/stealing-iranian-election.html
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