Iranian dissident rejoices at Khamenei's fall

On Saturday, exiled Iranian dissident Masih Alinejad was being interviewed on CBS News about the Israeli and American strikes against Iran's Islamist regime when the anchor told her about the first reports of the death of that regime's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Alinejad's reaction was extraordinary: pressing her hand to her heart in hope and disbelief, she exclaimed that if Khamenei is indeed dead, "this is a day of celebration" — and vehemently exhorted people not to mourn a terrorist.

Alinejad had good reason to rejoice: the 49-year-old New York City resident has been herself the target of repeated assassination plots by Iran's theocratic regime. Her joy also resonated with me because I have still-fresh memories of seeing her speak two years ago at a two-day event in Brooklyn, Dissident Dialogues, where her appearance was one of the indisputable highlights.

Alinejad's appearance was memorable starting with her stage entrance: She took off her neck scarf and waved it exuberantly over her head, shouting several times, "Woman! Life! Freedom!" in imitation of the protesters whose demonstrations had shaken Iran two years earlier. The 2022 protests had started with a young woman's death in police custody after she was arrested by the morality police for not wearing her hijab properly. Alinejad asked the women in the audience to imagine a life in which they had to look at themselves in the mirror before going out, not to make sure they were happy with the way they looked but to make sure their hair wasn't showing.

Alinejad, a journalist who ran afoul of the Iranian government for criticizing corruption, left her country in 2009 and settled in the United States in 2014. She has paid a difficult personal price for her activism.

"I haven't seen my family for years," she told the audience at Dissident Dialogues. Her family paid a price too: "They actually interrogated my 70-year-old mom for two hours ... they brought my sister on TV to denounce me publicly." There were attempts not only to kill her but to kidnap her — among other things, by trying to lure her to a meeting with relatives in Istanbul. Her brother was imprisoned for warning her that it was a trap.

Alinejad, who had participated in the 2017 Women's March in D.C., said she was badly disappointed when she approached the organizers about speaking out on the plight of women in Iran and was rebuffed because of concerns about "Islamophobia." As she put it: "Supporting your sisters in Iran, in Afghanistan doesn't make you Islamophobic." Urging a "global rally" for women who have lived under Islamist dictatorships — be it Iran's Islamic Republic, the Taliban, or ISIS — she summed up, "We deserve to have the same freedom, democracy and dignity that you take for granted."

Alinejad concluded her remarks with a trenchant call to the world: "Support us. Support the dissidents who sacrificed their lives to end [this] barbaric regime."

Today, the end of that regime may be nearer because of American and Israeli intervention.

Should we be celebrating? Even many staunch opponents of the regime in Iran warn that the future is extremely uncertain, the United States does not seem to have a well-thought-out strategy, and President Donald Trump's words cheering for Iran's freedom fighters ring hollow after abandoning them to slaughter in January. And yet, watching Alinejad's passion for that regime's overthrow, two years ago and today, it's hard to avoid a paradox: What hope exists for freedom-loving Iranian women and men today exists thanks to Trump's actions.

Opinions expressed by Cathy Young, a writer for The Bulwark, are her own.

By Cathy Young

Cathy Young is a writer for The Bulwark.