Iran regime change the only path forward, Iranian-Canadians say
OTTAWA — Despite enduring institutionally enforced hatred against both Israel and the United States, everyday Iranians aren't directing anger over weeks of airstrikes targeting Iran's nuclear ambitions at them.
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'I've never heard anyone say, 'Why is Israel doing this,'' Iranian-Canadian Maral told the Toronto Sun.
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'Everyone was saying, 'This is this regime, they are the root cause of this. They put us in this situation.''
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Maral, her identity concealed over fears of reprisals to her and her family, offered an unflinching view of life in Iran, and why Iranians believe the best way forward is to overthrow the Ayatollah Khamenei's despotic dictatorship.
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'Every day for school, even in elementary school, there are flags of the U.S. and Israel on the floor — (students) have to walk over the flags to start our morning,' she said.
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That, along with official regime slogans calling for the death of America, Israel and the 'three corruptors' — former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein and former Israeli PM Menachem Begin — are seeing quiet but conspicuous resistance.
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Students at universities in Tehran are going out of their way to not tread on the flags, a small but sure sign of growing resistance to Iran's brutal theocracy and a growing desire for regime change.
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Few understand what living in Iran is like better than Iranians, who saw their once-promising beacon of democracy and prosperity transformed into an Islamofascist dystopia.
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'Economically, this is a country that, 40 years ago, was one of the fastest-developing countries in the world,' said Kaveh Shahrooz, a lawyer, activist and Macdonald-Laurier Institute Fellow.
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'Since the revolution, it's become one of the most stagnant economies in the world — thanks to corruption and mismanagement, but also the incredible international isolation as a result of the regime's foolish international policies, sponsorship of terrorism and pursuit of nuclear weapons.'
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