Nightfall in Tehran

Nightfall in Tehran. The people have gone out onto their rooftops for the first time in a year. Cries of "Allahu Akbar" through the streets, the same cries we heard last year, and again three decades before that. Friends returning from today's demonstrations in Tehran, (and Tabriz, Kermansha, Isfahan and beyond) this time unfazed by the batons and tear gas, said the people were chanting "Khamenei hayaa kon, Mobarako negaah kon"...Khamenei have some shame, see what became of Mubarak. Elsewhere cries of "Mubarak, Ben Ali, now the turn of Seyyed Ali [Khamenei]".

There was something comforting, the first time around, knowing that Mousavi and Karroubi were there in the streets along with the people, in the illusion that their presence served as a kind protective embrace putting a limit on government brutality.   Now, with both figures under house arrest, there is a strange feeling that the people are unhinged, perhaps less safe but certainly more empowered to chart a more confident path. And as upheavals continue unabated in Yemen, Bahrain, Palestine, and Algeria, the poignant slogan of 2009 comes to mind "natarsid, natarsid, ma hame ba ham hastim" (do not be afraid, we are all together here) in the face of official violence. This time, the truth of that powerful idea extends far beyond Iranian borders.