TEHRAN, Iran — Final week, thousands and thousands of Shiite Muslims participated in ceremonies for Ashoura, which commemorates the bloodbath of a outstanding imam and his household within the seventh century. It’s the most solemn day within the Shiite calendar, however this 12 months it took on extra, political significance: It was the primary Ashoura since Iranian Supreme Chief Ali Khamenei was killed in a U.S.-Israeli airstrike in February.
The parallels between these two occasions usually are not misplaced on Iran’s leaders. Ashoura commemorates the killing of Hussein, the grandson of the Prophet Muhammad, in 680 C.E. for refusing to pledge allegiance to the Umayyad caliph, Yazid bin Muawiyah, a ruler he noticed as unjust. Fourteen centuries later, the Iranian state is framing Khamenei’s dying in the identical phrases: a frontrunner martyred by tyrannical forces.
The Islamic Republic’s non secular institution spent months constructing a symbolic bridge between these moments, previous and current.
