| In the case of its transformation from a revolutionary combat group on the ultra Left, the People’s Mojahedin have become a sect serving the personality cult of a particular man and woman: |
“The New Men”
Before taking power in Teheran, it is necessary to recreate a new “man renewed by the revolution”. This is a mirage that all the most totalitarian regimes have made their main goal. From Hitler’s Nazis to Stalin’s Communists, they all put forward this illusion of the “new man”.
For the PMOI, it is essential constantly to stimulate the bravery and fighting spirit of their members. While celebrating the Death Cult, they exult in sacrifice. Yet the People’s Mojahedin used every opportunity to show possibly doubting militants what awaited them if they ever went back to Iran:
“In their Baghdad Headquarters, the People’s Mojahedin have a private museum. It is a museum of death and sacrifice. On the walls, colour photographs show tortured bodies, some hanging from gallows or construction cranes. Behind the display windows are photos of hundreds of martyrs. To one side, things that belonged to the dead: a pendant, a pair of binoculars, eyeglasses, a handkerchief, a string of beads, poems, a goodbye letter in which the deceased declared that he never doubted the rightness of his struggle and even a Koran with a bullet hole.
Upstairs, there is a Madame Tussaud’s museum of horror, with wax people tied to execution posts, frozen in the moment of terror before they were shot. In one picture, we can see the body of a woman —Ashraf, Massoud Rajavi’s first wife — killed in February 1982 during a siege of her house in Teheran”. 1
On the military front, they faced the Pasdaran, the Guardians of the Revolution. On the internal front, there is always the enemy within: the “coward” who is only waiting for a chance to leave the Rajavi couple. For this particular enemy, it was necessary to hunt him down in the movement’s ranks. Mao showed the way:
“After the armed enemies are wiped out, there will still be... enemies; those who will not miss a chance to carry out a fight to the death with us. We must never underestimate them. If we do not see and do not understand the problem in this way by now, we will commit a very serious mistake”.2
Why then be surprised if other exiled opposition groups, frightened by this form of paranoia, have taken their distance from the PMOI? Above all, they fight against their claim to represent the Iranian people. The Fedais Organisation of the Iranian People is among the most outspoken:
“If the creation of this ‘Democratic’ Islamic Republic is based on current needs, namely the changes and developments in society, it should be emphasised that its democratic ‘club’ has been already used to put down its opponents and will be used again. What shall we believe? We think the Democratic’ Islamic Republic has no basis and is only a simple, false advertisement. It is as if someone claimed to be able to control the Earth’s movement around the Sun...
Basing the analysis of the activities and the documents public-shed by this sect, and in the view of all supporters of freedom, a ‘Democratic Islamic Republic’ in Iran’s current situation can only make the situation worse and increase the repression and massacre of our people: nothing more. For this sect, the need for liberty, democracy and the right of free assembly make no sense.
In other words, the ‘knights’ who are betraying our country have, beginning a long time ago, abandoned the people”. 3
Having lost its way, without achieving its goals, the PMOI ended up becoming “something else”. Even if the initiative appears shocking, it is, in fact, a process of mutation widespread among leftist groups. History especially that of the Second World War, is full of examples of Socialist and Communist leaders who gave up their basic ideals and joined the totalitarian movements. If we only consider Jacques Doriot, one of the most prominent leaders of the French Communist Party during the early Thirties, the record shows that he became one of the most passionate supporters of collaboration with the Italian Fascists and then the Nazi occupiers.
In the case of its transformation from a revolutionary combat group on the ultra Left, the People’s Mojahedin have become a sect serving the personality cult of a particular man and woman:
“Rajavi, during his ‘cultural revolution’, liked repeating: ‘I will make new men; give me all you own, walk on my legs and speak with my tongue”.
That revolution ran into growing resistance, especially after Massoud Rajavi married Maryam in 1985... About 600 militants left the movement in protest of the rule on ‘enforced divorce’. Rajavi had them arrested and many were imprisoned”. 4
1- Jean-Pierre Perrin, Liberation, 19 June 2003.
2- Mao Tse Tung, Report to the Second Plenum of the Central Committee elected by the VIlIll Party Congress, op. cit., volume IV.
3- Kar, op cit.
4- Ismail Zayer, op cit.