Word: massoud
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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They were the two most wanted men in Iran, hunted for "high treason" by the vengeful mullahs around Ayatullah Ruhollah Khomeini. When darkness fell on Tehran on July 28, Abolhassan Banisadr, the deposed President, and Massoud Rajavi, his ally and leader of the urban guerrillas known as the Mujahedin-e Khalq (People's Crusaders), slipped on stolen military uniforms and sneaked from their hideout into a small army van. They were driven to a military airfield, passing unrecognized through security controls (Banisadr had shaved his familiar mustache), and boarded an Iranian air force Boeing...
Today the Mujahedin are by far the best organized opposition to Ayatullah Ruhollah Khomeini. Their leader, Massoud Rajavi, 33, commands a force of guerrillas estimated to be as large as 100,000, with several hundred thousand supporters among the intellectuals, workers, farmers and middle class. Says a Western intelligence analyst: "The Mujahedin have the capacity to make life miserable for the ruling clerics. They are a threat to Khomeini's people because to the common man both groups seem to be cut from the same cloth-both proclaim they will create a true Islamic state...