Solidarity with Syrian Revolution in the presence of Syrian Opposition officials
Maryam Rajavi: we declare the month of Ramadan as the month of solidarity with the strong and resistant people of Syria Saturday night, June 11, 2016, a meeting was held in solidarity with the Syrian people and their resistance.
Maryam Rajavi and a number of prominent personalities from the Syrian opposition were in attendance. Hatham Maleh, Michel Kilo, Suheir Atassi, Dr. Nasr Al-Hariri, Dr. Taghrid al-Hagli, and Nagham Ghadri were among those present
Speakers of the solidarity meeting included Sid Ahmed Ghozali, former Prime Minister of Algeria; Sheikh Tayseer Tamimi, former Chief Justice of Palestine; Khalil Merroun, director of the Mosque in Evry in France; Dr. Nouar Malek, Tariq Abu Nour, Tahir Mahdi, Abdallah Khalaf, from Saad Hariri’s current; Redha Alredha, and Jalal Ganjeii, chairman of the NCRI Committee on Freedom of Religions.
Performances by a Syrian mystical music group led by Samih Chaghir was another feature of the solidarity meeting enthusiastically received by the audience.
Maryam Rajavi lauded the resistance of the people of Syria in this meeting:
In the name of God, the most Merciful, the most Compassionate
Oh you who believe! Fasting is prescribed to you as it was prescribed to those before you, that you may [learn] self-restraint
Dear friends,
The honorable delegation of the Syrian opposition,
Messrs. and Mmes. Hatham Maleh, Michel Kilo, Nasr Al-Hariri, Soheir Atassi, Taghrid al-Hagli, Nagham Ghadri;
Hail to you and to my brother George Sabra and other sisters and brothers in the Syrian Resistance.
Dear sisters and brothers,
I would like to congratulate you all on the Holy month of Ramadan.
Fasting is exercising self-restraint against the most natural human instinct. The message is that human beings and their society are able to overcome all forms of coercion and compulsion against freedom, justice and equality.
Yes, the message is that human beings can achieve emancipation, which means spiritual and social perfection.
The Quran gives glad tiding on the ultimate achievement of virtue in the verse on fasting, in the Chapter Baqara (The Cow). This is why we see the glad tiding of freedom, justice and peace in the month of Ramadan. The same message has inspired us in our struggle and resistance.
Sisters and brothers!
As we are observing the month of Ramadan, the world of Islam is witness to the continuation of a horrendous bloodshed in Syria, with few parallels in the past several centuries.
Isn’t Ramadan the month of worship and prayers? Isn’t Ramadan the month of peace? Isn’t it a month when hearts must get closer in friendship? Then, why is it that Iran’s ruling mullahs and Bashar Assad do no relent in their killings?
Since they do not see any viable future for themselves, they continue to execute people in Iran and spill the blood of people in Syria to protect their petty interests.
In diametric opposition, we, the Iranian Resistance, declare the month of Ramadan as the month of solidarity with the strong and resistant people of Syria. Tonight in this gathering for Iftar, we are thinking of Syria– blood-drenched and injured –and we pay tribute to the heroism and steadfastness of its great people.
A few minutes ago, in the exhibition here, we saw the images of bombardments and massacres in Syria. These images have shocked the world time and again particularly over the past couple of years.
The image of the innocent boy who did not let go of his father’s corpse and tearfully cried out, “Daddy, don’t leave me!” The image of the little boy in Daraa who was weeping for her five-year-old sister killed in the bombings and singing the anthem of “My land is a Paradise”, saying, “Rise up, rise up Daraa… A girl from Homs is seeking your aid”…
Also the images of fathers and mothers who wept beside the corpses of their children. And the images of Dr. Mohammad Wassim Mo’az, who refused to leave and stayed to treat the children of Aleppo, but was bombarded at the hospital where he worked.
But also beyond this agony and suffering, we see the images of resistance and high fighting spirits that have evoked worldwide admiration.
From here, we hail all those valiant and courageous fighters.
Hail to all the fronts of struggle and steadfastness in Syria,
Hail to the heroic Aleppo;
Hail to Mare’, Khan Touman and Hama;
Hail to Homs and Daraa;
Hail to Ghouta of Damascus, and the unwavering city of Darayya;
Oh heroes, your struggle builds the future of Syria and the future of the region.
You are the pride of Humanity.
Honorable guests!
As a result of the developments in Syria, Iran’s ruling religious dictatorship can no longer claim in the region that it defends Islam, because it has been revealed that it is an aggressive regime willing to drown the region in blood to protect its own shaky rule.
In Iran, the religious dictatorship has already been defeated theoretically and ideologically since a long time ago. The blood of 120,000 members of the PMOI and other dissident groups shed in the struggle against the regime, and the PMOI’s impact and role in offering a genuine interpretation of true Islam, exposed the mullahs’ demagoguery.
In the Islamic and Arab countries, however, the mullahs were able to mislead some uninformed people and conceal their criminal objectives under a religious veil for long years.
In Iran, they executed thousands upon thousands of the most progressive Shiite youths, but abroad, they pretended to be defending Shiism. They provoked sectarian strives between Shiites and Sunnis to spread terrorism and fundamentalism. They dispatched their hand-made groups like the Hezbollah of Lebanon to attack the people of the Middle East. Khamenei’s headquarters in Tehran directed the hostage-taking of western nationals in Lebanon to use them as pawns in their deals with Western governments and to compel them to placate their religious fascist regime.
As for Palestine, the mullahs struck the worst blows to the cause of the Palestinian people. They had a counterproductive role by dividing the people of Palestine and promoting hostility to Middle East Peace.
In Iraq, under the banner of export of revolution and Islam, the mullahs divided the country and drove it towards total destruction and disorder.
Reports and evidence indicate that Daesh (ISIS/ISIL) has been the product of the clerical regime’s suppression of the people of Iraq and massacre of the people of Syria with the help of Nouri Maliki and Bashar Assad. Daesh’s terrorism, of course, has not remained limited to the boundaries of Iraq and Syria and has expanded to France, Belgium and Denmark.
If Iran’s ruling mullahs had not interfered in the affairs of Iraq and Syria and committed its crimes, the ugly phenomenon of Daesh would not have spread in the Middle East, nor would the terrorist attacks take place in France and other countries. This is why we have always emphasized that so long as the Iranian regime is not countered, the terrorist crisis in Europe is not going to be uprooted. Velayat-e Faqih and Daesh are two sides of the same coin.
Now, thanks to the resistance and all the sacrifices made, the mullahs’ juggleries have unraveled today. It has been proven that the mullahs’ uproar against the “World’s Arrogance and Zionism” was but a mere hoax to conceal their hostility to the nations of the region. Just as they have been at war with Iraq for eight years, with the people of Syria for five years, and with the Iranian nation for 38 years.
Their bogus Islam has destroyed Syria, massacred its people and displaced more than half of its populace. Yet, the mullahs seek to justify their presence in Syria with the pretext of defending the Holy Shrine of Sayyidah Zainab (pbuh) and place an Islamic and Shiite veneer on the disaster.
The regime’s record in Iran is marked with 120,000 political executions, the greater majority of them Shiites. Of course, they keep executing Sunni youths of Iran merely for their beliefs.
We have not forgotten that it was the Tehran regime that bombed the shrines of the Shiite Imams in Samarra, Iraq. It was also the mullahs that bombed the Shrine of the Eighth Imam in Mashhad and victimized a large number of people in a set-up to attribute the crime to the PMOI.
Therefore, Muslims – both Shiite and Sunni – have no enemy more evil than the mullahs ruling Iran. Today, Shiites and Sunnis, Muslims and Christians, Arabs and Persians, Turks and Afghans, have no enemy worse than Iran’s clerical regime. As our brother, Prime Minister Ghozali, once said, it is the so-called Islamic regime of Iran that has killed the largest number of Muslims in contemporary times, from both Sunnis and Shiites.
Yes, the Velayat-e Faqih regime in Iran is the main enemy of nations and governments in the region.
Dear Syrian friends!
Eminent personalities,
The people of Syria have paid an enormous price, yet their blood and suffering has brought about precious experiences for the peoples of the region and the world.
One of the Syrian Revolution’s major achievements has been the fact that its people and pioneers have relied solely on their own strength to continue their struggle. No major power has backed you over these years, while some have confronted you and formed alliances with the butcher of Damascus, or at best, remained indifferent. Whatever support and aide that has come to you, would not have been realized without your steadfastness.
Your steadfastness has given you the strength to remain firm under international pressures to make you back down from the Syrian people’s demands. So, it is not the big powers who draw your roadmap, but the initiative is in your own hands.
The Iranian Resistance leader has said in this regard: “Nobody is supposed to bring us freedom or human rights other than our friends and our own people. The children of Iran, Iraq and Syria must write the history of freedom and human rights with their own suffering and blood, pay the price, and teach others to do the same. This is the point where the ranks of Revolution and Reaction are completely separated and polarized. This is the prerequisite for the evolution of the peoples’ emancipating struggle.”
Another achievement of the Syrian Revolution is that the battle in Syria has been a huge deathtrap for the clerical regime. The mullahs are stuck in the quagmire of the Syrian war and they would be the losers in every conceivable development regarding Syria.
Your important experience is that showing the role of the Iranian regime in Syria and the need to confront it is the top priority in political and international area. This is important because the main dynamic force that has kept Assad in power is the Iranian regime which mobilizes all its influence and deception skills to involve others in the war against the opposition.
Western powers, especially the US, try to turn a blind eye on the Iranian regime’s presence in Syria because they pursue a policy of appeasement of the Iranian regime. Unfortunately, the United Nations also accompanies them in this policy. Therefore, the Syrian opposition’s firm stance against engagement of the clerical regime in the international talks on Syria is quite a responsible and admirable position.
The experience of the Syrian Revolution has also shown that although the military might of Bashar Assad and his allies is terribly destructive and genocidal, but the more destructive force is their efforts to sow the seeds of discord and create internal strife in a bid to waste the powers and potentials of the Syrian people and Revolution. Fortunately, the Syrian Revolution has matured and developed step by step to be able to neutralize such divisive attempts.
But let me emphasize that due to the bloody price that you and your people have paid so far, now you have all the necessary means and components of victory at hand and it leaves no doubts that victory is going to be realized.
Dear friends,
The element making these achievements possible, is your resistance. Resistance is a sublime value; resistance for the honor and dignity of a nation, and resistance for freedom as the essence of a nation’s life. This is the same value that has bound the Iranian people’s Resistance with the resistance of the people of Syria.
The People’s Mojahedin of Iran have been engaged in a struggle against two dictatorships for 51 years, with more than 120,000 martyrs, and hundreds of thousands of tortured victims, but they continue to remain resilient and steadfast, and keep moving on.
The National Council of Resistance of Iran, the democratic coalition of opposition groups and personalities, has been able to play a significant political role in the enduring resistance against the ruling regime in Tehran.
In recent years, your brothers and sisters in Ashraf and Camp Liberty, have stood up to two regimes, namely the Iranian regime and the Maliki government in Iraq, despite being subjected to a vicious blockade. They were run over by armored vehicles and attacked by missiles. Twenty-four of them lost their lives in the latest rocket attack against them last November.
So, having gone through such steadfast resistance, we are able to appreciate the value of the resistance in Syria more than anyone else. We have deep respect for it and we always stand by you and the resistant people of Syria. Your fight is our fight, and your victory is ours.
Dear brothers and sisters,
Based on what I said, I have to emphasize on several points on behalf of the Iranian people and Resistance:
1. The people of Iran loathe the terrorism and interferences of the Velayat-e Faqih regime in Iraq, Yemen, Lebanon and Syria, and they stand by their suffering sisters and brothers in Syria.
2. The Iranian regime is the greatest cause of war and discord in the world of Islam and it has to be expelled from the Organization of the Islamic Conference. The Iranian regime does not represent the people of Iran and its seat in the OIC belongs to the Iranian people’s Resistance.
3. The most important component of a correct and effective solution for the crisis in the region, is the eviction of the mullahs’ regime from all the regional countries.
So long as the IRGC is in Syria, the country would not experience peace and calm; so long as the Iranian regime is not excluded from the international talks on Syria, the negotiations will not produce any results; and so long as the regime is not evicted from Syria and Iraq, the fight against Daesh will not amount to any decisive outcome.
4. Khamenei and Bashar Assad must be prosecuted in international tribunals for their direct involvement in the massacre of hundreds of thousands of Syrians and destruction of their country. The executions and torture of hundreds of thousands of Iranians and all types of other crimes are part of Khamenei’s record for which he must be held accountable.
I would like to conclude my remarks with the warmest salutes to the Syrian nation and our deep appreciation of their proud Resistance. No doubt, in the month of Ramadan, numerous Muslims around the world are praying for the suffering people of Syria.
My best wishes for the victory and freedom of the people of Syria, the people of Iran and all the peoples of the region.
Thank you very much indeed.
