Quote:
Originally Posted by blankall
Yes, it has been ethnically cleansed of 90% of the Jews who live there. The fact that so many has left is evidence towards things being not so great for Jews in Iran.
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Perhaps we have different ideas of what ethnic cleansing is. Let's leave the term alone for a minute.
Can we agree that most of the Jews who left Iran did so immediately following the creation of the republic in 79 and was a reaction to the changing politics of the country, with a second wave fleeing the Iran/Iraq war in the 1980s?
Can we agree that the number of Jews in Iran has not declined significantly in the last 20 years?
Can we agree that Jews are allowed some rights in Iran (freedom to religion, education, legal rights, domestic travel) while being denied others (lack of political representation, restrictions on international travel, lack of association with certain foreigners, potentially including family)?
Can we agree that in 30 years of the republic a handful of Iranian Jews have been executed by the state for political reasons (some on obviously trumped-up charges), which matches a pattern of political executions throughout Iran's history?
Can we agree that there has been little to no civilian-on-civilian or military violence toward Jews in Iran?
Can we agree that emigration from Iran is extremely heterogenous, with a diaspora that includes a majority of Muslims, but also Christians, Jews, Baha'is, and Zoroastrians?
Those facts add up to in emigration pattern that does not match with my concept of ethnic cleansing. A difficult life in a totalitarian state? yes. A campaign of violence aimed at producing a homogenous ethnography? Far from it.
Look at, by comparison, Iran's campaigns against homosexuality. That is an example of a cleansing campaign, and a vicious and ugly one at that. Even the treatment of Baha'is is awful (though not quite cleansing).
Feel free to dispute any of the points above, or bring other facts that you feel make this an ethnic cleansing situation. Reading this post now, I think that it's tone might sound patronizing, which isn't my intent; I genuinely welcome further discussion on it.