Read his obituary here. From al-Jazeera: “Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri, Iran’s most senior dissident cleric, has died, official media has reported. Montazeri, 87, was an architect of the 1979 Islamic revolution who fell out with the present leadership. He had been held under house arrest for several years. ‘Hossein Ali Montazeri passed away in his home last night,’ the official IRNA news agency said on Sunday. He lived in the city of Qom, which lies south of Tehran, and was referred to as the spiritual leader of the opposition after the country’s recent disputed election. Ghanbar Naderi, an Iran Daily journalist, told Al Jazeera: ‘This is huge blow to the reformist camp, because he is unreplaceable and nobody is happy to hear about his sad demise. ‘He used to say that religion should be separated from politics, because in this way, we can keep the integrity of religion intact.‘
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“The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance; it is the illusion of knowledge.”
Meta
The Saudis are disappointing, even to the point of being repulsive, but I guess they are understandable. It is an example of colonial-era indirect rule that began long before oil was discovered. But this type of rule was thrown off in almost all of the rest of the world. Indians removed from power the subordinate “kings” of the British Raj, Egypt threw off its king, though the US has successfully emplaced a replacement. The colonial kings of Iraq, Libya and many Muslim countries have been removed. China’s pro colonialist monarchy was removed. Saudi Arabia allowed indirect colonial rule of their country to pass from Great Britain to the United States, along with Jordan and many of the Gulf dictatorships.
It is a disgrace, the people of Saudi Arabia pay for this failing, in large and small ways they do so along with the people of Palestine and nearly every non-Jewish person in the region. But people do not reject the material benefits patrons such as Britain and the US are able to offer their subjects without a strong ideological reason. People under colonial rule do not organize and sacrifice to repulse such rule without believing in a greater historical project.
http://mideastreality.blogspot.com/2009/12/some-words-from-saudi-foreign-minister.html
Iran – the other sanctions on the other dictator
http://www.iranaffairs.com/iran_affairs/2009/12/iran-the-other-sanctions-on-the-other-dictator.html
I have written a lengthy post in memoriam of Grand Ayatollah Montazeri, which you may read here:
http://brownfolks.blogspot.com/2009/12/on-passing-of-ayatollah-montazeri.html
Dr. Jehuda Hiss
The Israeli military has admitted harvesting organs from dead Palestinians after an interview conducted over the issue in 2000 was broadcast again.
Over the weekend, Israel’s Channel 2 TV broadcast an interview conducted in 2000 with the then-head of Israel’s Abu Kabir forensic institute, Dr. Jehuda Hiss who revealed that forensic pathologists harvested organs from dead bodies, including Palestinian corpses in the 1990s, the Associated Press reported.
“We started to harvest corneas … Whatever was done was highly informal. No permission was asked from the family,” said the doctor.
According to the report, the forensic specialists harvested skin, corneas, heart valves and bones from the bodies of Israeli soldiers, Israeli citizens, Palestinians and foreign workers, often without seeking permission from relatives.
Hiss also described how his doctors would cover up the removal of corneas from bodies.
“We’d glue the eyelid shut,” he said, adding that “We wouldn’t take corneas from families we knew would open the eyelids.”
In response to the broadcast, the Israeli military confirmed the report in a statement but said, “This activity ended a decade ago and does not happen any longer.”
The report was released after an article by Swedish journalist Donald Bostrom, accusing Israel of killing Palestinians in order to harvest their organs, caused a huge controversy.
The article, entitled They plunder the organs of our sons, published by the Swedish daily Aftonbladet, sparked outrage among Israeli officials, who called it “groundless,” “outrageous” and “anti-Semitic.”
Bostrom, however, said the purpose of his opinion article was to call for an investigation into numerous claims in the 1990s that such activity was going on.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=114324§ionid=351020202