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Soraya's Warning to the Mullahs
“No one has ever shown a stoning on film before, so I felt a real responsibility to make it something the audience will never forget,” says Nowrasteh. He followed Sahebjam’s description in the book and willed himself to look at covert footage of a real stoning. “All I can tell you is that compared to what I saw and read, the scene in the movie is far less graphic than it could have been. Most of all, I wanted to capture the whole ritual design of it and how it affects the crowd.”
It is also remarkable that parallel stories of brave individuals speaking out against the tyrannical government in Iran are making headlines at the exact time this film hits theaters. Millions of voters believe the election was a fraud, but Iranian authorities have ordered international journalists to remain in their offices and refused to allow them to report on the events on the streets. Still, even state media reports nearly 20 protesters—and in fact perhaps up to 100—have been killed in the crackdown.
“Yes, the film is gripping drama,” Nowrasteh says, “but more than that it is a form of bearing witness, much like Zahra does in the movie. It becomes a liberating story about the power of breaking a silence and hopefully will encourage others to add their voices.”
After living in Iran as a young boy, the director’s family was exiled. “I’m not in a position to change any governments or laws in other countries, but one thing I can do is to really make people aware that this is happening wherever women are still treated as second-class citizens. It is hard to conceive of this still going on, but my obligation was to getting the truth out there—again, so the world will know. My biggest hope is that people will fall in love with these women and their courage.”
With the release of this film, the world will know. This story will haunt you. When I first saw the screening of the film, I sat, along with other members of the audience, in silence and in shock for at least 10 minutes after the film was over. I cried for the first time in years. I have now seen the film more than a dozen times and each viewing has given me a different experience.
At the same time, each has inspired me to keep fighting the Islamist mobsters and Islamic radicals that govern hundreds of millions of people in the Muslim world and have established deceptive and totalitarian strangleholds over Muslim populations in the west.
If there is only one film that you watch this year, or just one that you watch for the rest of your life, this should be the one. It will profoundly change your life.
Steve Emerson is executive director of the Investigative Project on Terrorism and author of five books on terrorism. His most recent book is Jihad Incorporated: A Guide to Militant Islam in the U.S.
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Lloyd Grove is editor at large for The Daily Beast. He is also a frequent contributor to New York magazine and was a contributing editor for Condé Nast Portfolio. He wrote a gossip column for the New York Daily News from 2003 to 2006. Prior to that, he wrote the Reliable Source column for the Washington Post, where he spent 23 years covering politics, the media, and other subjects.
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Martin Jacques is the cofounder of the UK think tank Demos, writes a regular column for The Guardian, and is a visiting research fellow at the London School of Economics Asia Research Centre. His new book, When China Rules the World, is available now.
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Christopher Buckley's books include Supreme Courtship, The White House Mess, Thank You for Smoking, Little Green Men, and Florence of Arabia. He was chief speechwriter for Vice President George H.W. Bush, and is editor-at-large of ForbesLife magazine. His new book is Losing Mum and Pup, a memoir. Buckley's Daily Beast column is the winner of an Online Journalism Award in the category of Online Commentary.
The Creeping Homegrown Threat
Steve Emerson is Executive Director of the Investigative Project on Terrorism and author of 5 books and countless articles on terrorism. His most recent book is Jihad Incorporated: A Guide to Militant Islam in the U.S.
America’s Homegrown Terrorists
Steve Emerson is Executive Director of the Investigative Project on Terrorism and author of 5 books and countless articles on terrorism. His most recent book is Jihad Incorporated: A Guide to Militant Islam in the U.S.
Call the Terrorists What They Are
Steve Emerson is Executive Director of the Investigative Project on Terrorism and author of 5 books and countless articles on terrorism. His most recent book is Jihad Incorporated: A Guide to Militant Islam in the U.S.
Controlled outrage with an intelligent response is always better unrestrained outrage. Timing is everything and a targeted response appropriate, seems Obama is on the right path despite the emotional response some would prefer.
Tho less frequent men who commit adultery are stoned also. Two in 2009 so far and several who were able to escape and flee the country.
The author of this article is leaving out the fact that many young people in Iran who are fighting for their freedom don't want the west's help. Last time we helped them we installed someone people weren't happy with....let's not make this our problem by being aggressive....you're like the drunk guy at the party that just won't stop fighting.
All we can do is speak out against them for doing things like this. it is a fact that good ideas spread faster than bad ideas, and eventually, there will be justice for people in Iran.
We cannot stand by and do nothing.
An intelligent, measured, and appropriate response to the cry of the freedom-seeking in any country is in keeping with our beliefs.
The subjugation of women and children, the treatment of them as property, cannot be defended even on the basis of religious freedom. Too many countries have honor killings, sex slaves, child slaves, female mutilation and the ritualized murder of the inconvenient or different.
If my neighbor browbeats and verbally abuses his wife and children, I need to mind my own business. She may think he has the right to do this. She may not regard it as abuse.
If he beats her, and the children, I absolutely have to interfere.
In the world, there are no police to call on a bullying government.
No one but us.
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finderj, I hate the mistreatment of women, too. I am appalled at the way women in Muslim country's are treated as well, but look what happend in Iraq, we have mad things WORSE for women there. Women have been oppressed in these societies for a terribly long time. If it was that easy to change things by force, wouldn't we have been in Afghanistan (where women are treated like dogs) long before 9/11? The number of troops that it would take to supervise the rights of women throughout the entire middle east does not exist....it is ridiculous to think that we could regulate that. These women need to earn their own freedom, just like American women did in the 20's.
Let's not have another disaster like Iraq, and let these people build up their own society, the way they want it. Take a breath...Iran's population is 70% young people, the mullahs are a dying breed, just give it some time.
If you only see one movie for the rest of your life watch this one?
The truth is that we are all more interested in Michael Jackson than Tehran.
America should stay blissfully ignorant if all they are going to see is cinematic propaganda. Either get off your but and seriously investigate the "cultural genocide" of Tibet by China, subjugation under "sharia" law, and the Czarist totalitarianism of Putin OR SHUT UP
All this can do is create a fury for military intervention.
If you have not seen any movie in the last 9 years, watch Sicko. Then do some homework and write some e-mails.
Take care of home first.
Emerson is a crusader of the worst kind. A dangerous zealot filled with spiritual arrogance. Ignorance, not religion, forms the basis of barbaric cultural norms.
Thank you.
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