Why Are These Iranians 'Really, Really Happy With Trump'?
Mocking presidents of the Great Satan, the United States, has long been standard practice during state-backed rallies in Iran, where anti-Americanism is ingrained in state ideology.
For decades, Iranian revolutionary families would work late into the night to make sock puppets, cartoons and effigies of every American president since Jimmy Carter, then proudly parade them around during an anti-American protest and burn them in a bonfire.
Some would dress up with Uncle Sam top hats, Bill Clinton imitators would always have a big cigar hanging from his puppet mouth, and George W. Bush would be decorated with stars of David, to highlight the special relationship with Israel.
But as even the staunchest hard-liners would admit, the number of zealous protesters had dwindled over the years. In recent times, most people have been content just to pick up posters given to them by the authorities. Barack Obama’s outreach to Iran, brokering a nuclear agreement and giving up on regime change, was not good for the local sock puppet and effigy industry.
But in President Trump the United States has a new, colorful president (Well, orange is a color...- F.G.) who denounces Iran, and Iranian hard-line groups cannot believe their good luck. This Monday, at a cartoon and caricature contest where the only goal was to make fun of President Trump, the zealots were back in force.
Some of the cartoons were also hung across Tehran. One poster, featured prominently at a busy intersection, showed Mr. Trump doing something to the rear of an elephant, symbol of the Republican Party, while also wearing a swastika armband and with the decapitated head of Lady Liberty at its feet.
The winning caricature, worth a $1,500 cash prize, showed Mr. Trump in a suit made of $100 bills, his hair on fire and drool dripping from his mouth. Winning artists also received an abstract statue topped with a golden swoosh of Mr. Trump’s signature hairdo.
The date of the exhibition, July 3, is the anniversary of the downing of an Iranian passenger plane by the United States Navy in 1988 that killed all 290 people on board. While the Pentagon has always insisted the incident was a tragic mistake, many Iranians are convinced the plane was shot down to pressure Iran into ending its eight-year war with Iraq.
“We are really, really happy with Trump,” said Resalat Bouzari, a speaker at the event. “He shows the real face of the so-called United States democracy.” Everybody clapped, and when Iran’s national anthem played, stood up from their chairs to see a video of happy Iranians cheering for their country. Visitors were given books with the logo of the exhibition, a black-circled “T” on a white and red background, suggestive of the swastika that was present in several of the cartoons.
“Trump is the symbol of fascism and Nazism, and many investigated his statements and concluded they are similar to those made by Adolf Hitler,” said the organizer of the event, Masoud Shojaei-Tabataei. He has been organizing — or told to organize — cartoon contests for several years now.
He started after European newspapers began publishing cartoons depicting the prophet of Islam, Muhammad. In retaliation, Iran organized a Holocaust cartoon contest.
TheChurchMilitant: Sometimes anti-social, but always anti-fascist since 2005.
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