#Why_do_they_ support_ Rouhani?

Quds Day rallies were held in cities across Iran this past Friday, June 23, in support of Palestinian independence and to condemn Israel and “Zionism.” The rallies are an annual event started in 1979 by the new Islamic Republic, and as ever, this Friday’s rallies included chants of “Death to Israel!” and “Death to America!”. The flags of both countries were burned. The Revolutionary Guards displayed their Zolfaghar missiles, the same ones used to attack ISIS positions in Syria, and a number of young women posed next to the missiles and took selfies next to them.

Some marchers carried pictures of US President Donald Trump, British Prime Minister Theresa May and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, with captions saying  “Death to the Devil Triangle”. A countdown clock promised that Israel would disappear in exactly 8,411 days. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei issued his usual message of defiance towards the United States and President Rouhani participated in Tehran’s rally.

But then something strange happened. A group of marchers started crying “Death to Rouhani!” and shouted other chants linking his name to that of Abolhassan Banisadr, the first president of the Islamic Republic, who fled Iran in June 1981 after the ruling clergy rose against him and parliament impeached him. “Death to the American Mullah!” and “Death to the Liar!” were two other chants clearly heard at the rally.

Rouhani’s supporters, however, retaliated in their own way, online; for a few hours, the hashtag “#حامی_روحانی_ام” (“#ISupportRouhani”) was trending on Twitter with more than 27,000 tweets. It was the top-trending hashtag of the day. Similar hashtags “#RouhaniIsNotAlone” were tweeted more than 12,000 times.

It Started with Khamenei

Threatening Rouhani with Banisadr’s fate did not come out of the blue. In a speech on June 12, with Rouhani himself in attendance, Khamenei implicitly warned the president that he might meet the same fate as his forebear.

“The country should not be divided into two poles and groups,” Khamenei said. “The actions of the president of Iran in the year 1980 [Banisadr] – dividing the people into two groups of proponents and opponents – is a dangerous act.” And on June 20, Khamenei’s official website issued a video of his own 1980 speech against Banisadr – which he concluded by warning Banisadr against “getting off the revolutionary train.”

Khamenei’s thinly veiled attacks against Rouhani did not stop there – and they have been increasing ever since. In a gesture of support for Iranians favoring a hardline Islamist cultural policy, Khamenei gave a group called “Officers of the Soft War,” formed to promote and transmit his own messages, a free hand in countering Rouhani’s policies by telling them to “Fire at will!” After the June 7 Isis terrorist attacks in Tehran, the hardliners and the “Officers of the Soft War” tried to blame the attacks on Rouhani’s government and its policies. This leaves little doubt that the anti-Rouhani marchers on Quds Day believed that they were giving voice to the Supreme Leader’s wishes.

“It Was His Own Fault”

After the incident, Interior Minister Abdolreza Rahmani Fazli asked his deputy to work with the Intelligence Ministry and the police to identify the offenders and turn them over to the judiciary. It is not yet clear what this might achieve. But media outlets close to the Revolutionary Guards lost no time in blaming Rouhani himself while also seeming to condemn the anti-Rouhani marchers. Tasnim News Agency called their behavior “worthy of reflection although unwise.” And the newspaper Javan disapproved of the marchers’ actions while saying that Rouhani was weakening “national unity” and provoking people into divisive behavior.

Deputy Speaker of Parliament Ali Motahari, meanwhile, who was also at the receiving end of aggressive chants at the Quds Day rally in Tehran, said that the chants “[broke] the law.” Mahmoud Sadeghi, a a member of parliament from Tehran, tweeted that “insulting the president who has been elected by the people goes against the directives of the Supreme Leader and polarizes society.” Of course, “polarizing society” was exactly what Khamenei had implicitly accused Rouhani of doing in his June 12 speech.

It is not yet clear how Khamenei and his closest allies will react to the Quds Day events, if he reacts at all, but indications are that the pitched battle between Rouhani’s opponents and supporters will continue, both on the ground and in cyberspace, whether because of unexpected events like the ISIS attacked or mainstays of Iran’spolitical calendar like the Quds Day rallies.