Concerns about US involvement
The war has reignited debate in the Iranian diaspora about what role the US should play in Iran’s future.
The question is more than a distant geopolitical issue for Iranians in Los Angeles.
Many residents explained that their family history was shaped by US involvement in the region, either through US support for Iran’s fallen monarchy or the US decision to support Iran’s invasion of Iraq in 1980.
Aida Ashhouri, a human rights attorney running for Los Angeles city attorney, was among those who publicly condemned the latest US campaign in Iran at a city hall protest on February 28.
“This is a US imperialist war, and we need to make that clear,” he said. “Call a spade a spade. This war is not to liberate the women of Iran or the people of Iran.”
Ashouri was born during the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s. Her hometown of Isfahan was also bombed during the US and Israel’s 12-day war with Iran in June last year.
For Ashouri, it is telling that the US and Israel once again launched a first strike in the current conflict. For many legal experts, this violated international law and turned the conflict into an unprovoked war of aggression.
“The war indicates that the two sides are actively engaged, but Iran has done nothing to become involved,” Ashouri said.
“This is a unilateral military occupation, an occupation by the United States and Israel. They have the power to end it by stopping the bombing.”
She and other protesters drew parallels between the current Iran war and the US-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that began in 2003 and 2001, respectively.
“I’ve lived through the shadow of the war on terror, all the propaganda talking points,” said Shani Ebadi, an Iranian American anti-war organizer with the ANSWER Coalition. “What the Trump administration is saying reminds me a lot of the Iraq war.”
As someone who follows the news closely, Ebadi remembers feeling alarmed when the first strikes began in February.
“When I got the breaking news notification of the initial attack, my whole body was paralyzed. I felt anger and despair,” he said.
Both she and Ashouri fear that a military operation in Iran could spark a regional war that could further destabilize not only Iran but the entire Middle East.
“I fear that the war will repeat the disasters seen in Palestine, Iraq, Libya and Afghanistan,” Ashouri said, listing the countries targeted in the US’s “war on terror” over the past two and a half decades.
The question of whether the bombs could lead to freedom in Iran is a simple one for Ashouri and his fellow anti-war activists. The answer, he says, is simply no.
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