In fear of the people - 5

Mohsen Makhmalbaf and Marjane Satrapi speaking on Wednesday at the European Parliament in Brussels on behalf of the Moussavi campaign. More details at The New York Times.

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In the previous post I noted that The Guardian was the only UK national paper to lead on Iran yesterday. The paper’s news blog has also been excellent at providing rolling coverage. See here for today’s updates.

However, as Norm points out, the paper’s leading Stalin apologist Seumas Milne has proved as reliably wrong as ever. Like Galloway, it seems Milne never met an ‘anti-imperialist’ he didn’t like, no matter how murderous. Milne was The Guardian’s comment editor from 2001 to ’07 and is currently an associate editor. A paper that pays Milne’s salary is a paper I would be embarrassed to spend money on.

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More from today:

From Martin, We just want to be normal, ctd. 

From ModernityBlog, Not just rich kids in Iran.

Today’s updates from The New York Times.

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On the broader implications of events in Iran:

The Poor Mouth points to an article from AP on reaction in the Arab world.

Andrew Sullivan on making the Russian connection, follow up here, and here.

Talking of Russia and Caspian Sea oil and gas, if relations between Iran and the West change considerably, it would make the Russian threat to the Caucasus fuel route via Georgia much less critical.

Michael Totten on the view from Beirut.

A lot of focus has been put on what these events might mean for Israel regarding the Iranian regime’s support for Hamas and Hizbollah, its threats regarding Israel’s existence, its promotion of Holocaust denial, and its nuclear weapons programme. However another aspect to consider is the lesson that it is not Iran’s population that is the problem, in fact they are showing themselves to be the solution. There might be something to learn here regarding how security is to be achieved for Israel closer to home.