Mojahed_(newspaper)

<i>Mojahed</i> (newspaper)

Mojahed (newspaper)

Persian-English political publication (1979–1981)

For the Algerian newspaper with the same name, see El Moudjahid.

Mojahed (Persian: مجاهد, romanized: Mujāhid, lit. 'The [holy] warrior') is the official newspaper of the People's Mujahedin of Iran (MEK), first printed in 1979 on a weekly basis. The newspaper published its last issue inside Iran on 30 June 1981 and after a hiatus resumed publication in exile on 2 December 1982.

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History

Mojahed staff spent months to prepare for launching it, before it was first published in late July 1979.[3] The paper was used to publicize the MEK's political campaigns and programs.[4] While trying to suppress the MEK, the Iranian regime banned the Mojahed on 2 November 1980 on orders of the Chief Prosecutor who said the paper was "spreading slanderous lies". However, it continued to print via clandestine printing press and was distributed underground.[5] According to Dilip Hiro, the newspaper sold about 30,000 copies by mid-1981.[6] Ervand Abrahamian said that Mojahed's circulation had surpassed Jomhouri-e Eslami of the Islamic Republican Party and reached 500,000 around the same time.[7]

After exile, the MEK established printing presses both in Europe and North America and in December 1982, the newspaper reappeared.[8] In 1983, Mojahed became available throughout an international network in several capitals and in some issues contained over seventy newsprint pages.[1] Members of the MEK were encouraged to read the publication in their spare time.[9] As of 2000, the newspaper continued publication for the MEK's cadre.[10]

In June 2003, French police raided the MEK in France and also banned publications of the Mojahed.[11] Group members denied any wrongdoing and accused French intelligence of working with the Iranian government to tarnish the group.[12]

Content

Ervand Abrahamian said that the MEK used the Mojahed paper to move "the issue of democracy to centre stage" and to accuse the Iranian regime, which it described as a "dictatorship of mullahs", of "betraying the Islamic Revolution".[13]

Anthony Hyman identified the newspaper as being "devoted to the personality cult of Masud Rajavi, the leader of this authoritarian party".[14]

References

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Mojahed.

Footnotes

  1. [1]
    Abrahamian 1987, p. 248
  2. [2]
    Buchta 2000, p. 115
  3. [3]
    Abrahamian 1987, p. 175
  4. [4]
    Abrahamian 1987, p. 194, 206
  5. [5]
    Abrahamian 1987, p. 212
  6. [6]
    Hiro 2013, p. 189
  7. [7]
    Abrahamian 1987, p. 207
  8. [8]
    Abrahamian 1987, p. 244
  9. [9]
    Abrahamian 1987, p. 250
  10. [10]
    Buchta 2000, p. 104
  11. [11]
    Howard 2004, p. 200
  12. [12]
    "New warships to join Iranian Navy's southern fleet". Reuters. 17 September 2014.
  13. [13]
    Abrahamian 1987, p. 209
  14. [14]
    Hyman 1990, p. 26

Sources

  • Abrahamian, Ervand (1987), Radical Islam: The Iranian Mojahedin, I.B. Tauris, Yale University Press, ISBN 9781850430773
  • Hyman, Anthony (1990), "Iran's press — freedom within limits", Index on Censorship, 19 (2): 26, doi:10.1080/03064229008534794, S2CID 143865652
  • Hiro, Dilip (2013), Iran Under the Ayatollahs (Routledge Revivals), Routledge, ISBN 978-1135043810
  • Howard, Roger (2004), Iran in Crisis?: Nuclear Ambitions and the American Response, Zed Books, ISBN 9781848137110
  • Buchta, Wilfried (2000), "The Militant Iranian Opposition in Iran and Exile", Who Rules Iran?: The Structure of Power in the Islamic Republic, The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, The Konrad Adenauer Stiftung, ISBN 9780944029398
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