The Iran hostage-taking incident caused by a group of Islamist students who called themselves “Students of Imam Line” is a classical example of the IRP’s “go with the tide” attitude. Ezatollah Sahabi recalls that when the hostage taking crisis took place, the CIR clerics’ (also IRP members) initial reaction was not in support of students and indeed they disapproved of the action yet when they realised that the action had become extremely popular in the streets, they switched position under the justification that “there has been a wave formed and we should ride on it”. 242
It was in this environment that members of IRP caucus in the Council of Islamic Revolution or the revolutionary council had decided to go with the tide and ride on the wave in order to remain popular and powerful. Indeed Khomeini himself was mastering this game, switching from one position to another in order to keep the masses loyal.
One example of Khomeini’s switching positions occurred in the case of general amnesty. Prime Minister Bazargan’s relentless efforts to secure an amnesty from Imam Khomeini was successful. On 10 July 1979. Khomeini issued a general amnesty for members of the old regime.243
However in mid-March of the same year, when radical clerics including Tehran’s notorious revolutionary prosecutor Sadegh Khalkhali criticised Khomeini’s decision, Khomeini had abandoned his earlier stance.
Khomaeini took the view that the insistence on open trials, defence lawyers, and proper procedures was a reflection of “the Western sickness among us’’ that those on trial were criminals, and “criminals should not be tried; they should be killed.” He also believed that trials were an expression of the popular will. “If the revolutionary courts did not prosecute them,” he said of those brought to trial, “the people would have gone on a rampage and killed them all.” Radical clerics around Khomeaini encouraged this view.244
For IRP however no instance demonstrates the hypocritical attitude better than the process in which the Islamic Republic’s Constitution was passed. The first version of the constitution was drafted in Paris by Dr Habibi. At that time Khomeini thought it was good but needed some improvements. 245 After the revolution an assembly was constituted under the supervision of the provisional government of Bazargan by the name of “the Scheme of Revolution’s Assembly” that was headed by Dr Yadollah Sahabi, the Paris Draft of the constitution was amended by this assembly. The
242 Ezatollah Sahabi Nagoftehaie enghelab mabahese bonyadi melli , [The untold stories of the revolution], Tehran,
Gaame-No, 2004, p. 238.
243
Bakhash, Reign of the Ayatollahs, p. 62.
244 Bakhash, Reign of the Ayatollahs, p. 62.
main alteration at this stage was to reduce from the powers of the president and give it to the prime minister. 246
Then the draft was sent to CIR. Beheshti, who was then the vice president of CIR, took the lead on conducting the changes to the draft. The most important changes were economic ones. The constitution became more socialist and leaned to the left. Yet no word of velayate faghih was mentioned.
The hostage-taking gave the IRP and all the Khomeinists an upper hand in all political matters. The draft constitution with the added velayate faghih articles was easily passed through a referendum despite the boycott of many opposition groups of the election. The opposition groups and parties that boycotted the election included the Shoura Revolutionary Organisation, Muslim People’s Republican Party, The MKO, The National Democratic Front, Iran Kurdistan Democrat Party, The Komola, and Organisation of Iranian People’s Fadai Guerrillas.247
The anti-imperialist agenda that constituted the leftists’ image and identity was stolen from them alongside their hunting ground by the act of occupying the embassy of USA. In other words the momentum that the pro-Khomeini forces gathered as a result of hostage taking, increased their chances of winning the majority of seats in the first IRI Majles and gave them the self confidence to put the Velayate faghih added constitution into a referendum, without fearing an opposition boycott.
Said Saffari makes it clear the IRP members wasted no time in legitimatising the doctrine of
velayae faghih and securing Khomeini’s place as the definite leader of the country and by doing so
they also secured the party’s place as the most important and influential political party in Iran after the revolution.
During the first year of the revolution, a number of influential political parties became closely involved with political decisions in Iran. However, no party was more instrumental in the institutionalisation of Khomeini's political doctrine than Hezb-e Jomhuiri-e Eslami (the Islamic Republican Party, IRP). Without the leadership of the IRP, the Assembly of Experts might have produced a radically different constitution, without any mention of velayat-e faqih. Soon after it was founded in February 1979, in close association with Ayatollah Khomeini and the 'radical' elements within the 'ulama' camp, the IRP began to wield considerable influence over the affairs of the country. It mainly comprised Ayatollah Khomeini's faithful pupils and ideologically committed followers. The party's chief goal was to represent the radical 'ulama' in the post-revolutionary political arena. As the IRP gained momentum, party members included future Majles deputies, bureaucrats, and judges.248
246 Bakhash, Reign of the Ayatollahs, p. 74. 247
Jomhourie eslami, Azar 13/ December 04, 1979
248 Said Saffari, “The Legitimation of the Clergy's Right to Rule in the Iranian Constitution of 1979,” British Journal of
Bazargan and his government were overwhelmed by the intervention of the parallel government but what put the final nail in PRG’s coffin was the Iran hostage-taking situation.
As we mentioned before, in the competition between leftist and Islamist, each was trying to show himself more “anti-imperialist” and thus closer to the masses in the streets. Therefore, in a clever move to highjack the position of “anti-imperialism” from the leftist parties, a group called Students of the Line of Imam, led by a radical cleric Hojatolislam Mousavi Khoeiniha, planned the takeover of the U.S. embassy in Tehran.
Bazargan’s trip to Algeria to meet with Brzezinski gave the radical students the excuse they had been waiting for. At the time that Iranians were demanding the Shah’s extradition from the U.S. government, , Bazargan’s meeting with the Americans was portrayed as a betrayal to the revolution.
The students of Imam’s Line stormed the embassy taking every American that was inside hostage.
249
Bazargan was shocked when he heard the news of hostage taking. The efforts by his foreign minister Ebrahim Yazdi to ask for the Imam’s intervention were ineffective. In fact Khomeini, in a speech shortly after the incident, praised the move calling it the “second revolution”, leaving Bazargan no choice but to resign.
7.3.3. From Appointing Banisadr as a Member in CIR to His Removal from