Best Friends Forever!

In early December, a surprising scene unfolded at Tehran University: 500 Marxist students held aloft portraits of Che Guevara to protest President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s policies. Smaller groups of Marxist students held similar protests in several other cities.

Political protest has been harshly suppressed under the current Iranian government, especially dissent linked to the West. But the radical left, despite its antireligious and antigovernment message, has been permitted relative freedom. This may be, analysts say, because, like the government, it rejects the liberal reform movement and attacks the West.

So die New York Times. Islamo? Socialists? What about Islamo-Communism?

“The government paved the way for leftist movements in the country when its best friends became Castro and Chávez,” he said, referring to Fidel Castro of Cuba and Hugo Chávez of Venezuela.

“The whole idea was that any country that was against America was on our side,” he said. “As a result, all communist leaders became the Islamic Republic’s best friends.”