Word: ayatullah
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...Somoza's national guard, cloned from the U.S. Marine Corps, was as ineffective against the Sandinista guerrillas as the Shah's army and secret police-the best that petro-billions could buy-were against the mostly unarmed followers of a cranky, theocratic graybeard, the Ayatullah Ruhollah Khomeini...
...DIED. Ayatullah Mahmoud Taleghani, 74, an advocate of moderation within the Iranian theocracy, revealed upon his death to have been chairman of the secretive Revolutionary Council, Iran's chief ruling body; of a heart attack; in Tehran. Taleghani was the first religious leader to pronounce the monarchy "illegal" and the first to be arrested for doing so. He remained in Iran throughout the Pahlavi reign, spending a dozen years in prison, but also shaping the groundswell movement that brought the exiled Ayatullah Ruhollah Khomeini to power. Known for his tolerance, Taleghani served as Khomeini's mediator in disputes...
...partly the spectacle of Western decadence that aroused the Ayatullah Khomeini to orgies of Koranic proscription. Alcohol, music, dancing, mixed bathing all have been curtailed by the Iranian revolution. Americans find this zealotry sinister, but also quaint: How can almost childish pleasures (a tune on the radio, a day at the beach) deserve such puritanical hellfires? But Americans are also capable of a small chill of apprehension, a barely acknowledged thought about the prices that civilizations pay for their bad habits: If Iran has driven out its (presumably polluted) monarch and given itself over to a purification that demands even...
...effect he declared: No more Mr. Nice Guy. His government had made a mistake, Khomeini said, in trying to be tolerant toward the dissident groups, especially leftists who encourage militancy among the minorities. "We knew they were non-Islamic, but they proved to be nonhuman." The Ayatullah also fumed at his appointed government's failure to rule effectively. Said he: "I shall come to Tehran and straighten things out in a revolutionary way if they don't shape...
...other parties will be either outlawed or kept under a tight rein. Among these is the pro-Moscow Tudeh (Communist) Party, which has followed the clergy's line so unashamedly that political observers in Tehran refer to the party's first secretary, Noureddin Kianuri, as the Ayatullah Kianuri. No matter. The Tudeh, like other "loyal non-Islamic parties," will be permitted to play only a "limited" role in the revolution...