March 4, 2022
OPINIONS Established 1874
An Iranian Refugee Speaks On Professor Mahallati Sima Kalavani Undoubtedly, you have not heard of me. I am just one of hundreds of thousands of Iranian citizens who were forced by the terrorist regime under Ruhollah Khomeni and Ali Khameni to leave their beloved homeland in the past decades. Unlike you, I don’t get to study at one of the most prestigious liberal arts colleges in the U.S. I live a much simpler life in a developing country in Latin America: the only place I could run away to after the Iranian regime began to investigate my political cartoons and activities. While you know nothing of me, I and many other young people from Iran have heard all about your college. Specifically, we have been shocked to hear you employ a former Iranian regime diplomat, Mohammad Jafar Mahallati, as a professor of Religion and Islamic Studies. We have been stunned to hear that this official is involved with interdisciplinary courses in the field of “friendship and forgiveness studies.” Much of the debate about Professor Mahallati’s position at your college seems to focus on the question of whether he knew about certain mass executions of dissidents by the regime, and whether, as an Iranian diplomat at the United Nations, he knowingly misled the world about them. But debating this question is a waste of time. We will never know whether Professor Mahallati knew about the specific crimes committed by the regime, and was periodically parroting the denialist propaganda coming from his superiors in Tehran merely as a part of his job, or whether he really believed what he was saying, unaware of his colleagues’ crimes. Let’s look at it in the light most favorable to him: that he didn’t know about these massacres, and that he presented Tehran’s excuses and denials at the U.N. with sincerity and credulity. The point here is not what exactly Professor Mahallati did, said, or believed while employed by the terrorist regime in Tehran. The point is that he
voluntarily worked for this regime as an international representative and diplomat. People like him — soft-spoken, well-mannered, bureaucratic drones — are exactly the reason why the regime apparatus exists, and why it continues to oppress my people. Individually, such people do nothing of note. In fact, they might well be incapable of killing a fly, let alone planning a crime. Together, as part of the bureaucratic apparatus working for the usurper’s regime in Tehran, such people are the trivial face of unspeakable evil. They are the cogs and bolts in the apparatus of a regime that represents true depravity and sadism like almost no other. Islam does not know national chauvinism. But the regime viciously promotes Persian language and toxic Persian ethnic supremacism at the cost of the many other Indigenous peoples of Iran, their languages, or cultures: Baluchs, Arabs, Armenians, Lurs, Jews, Georgians, Kurds, Turkmen, Azerbaijanis, and many others. One of the very first acts of the so-called “Islamic Republic” in 1979 was ethnocidal mass murder against rebellious Kurds; countless other non-Persian Indigenous ethnic groups have been targeted since then by discrimination, land theft, and forced assimilation. Shia Islamic thought emphasizes social justice and compassion, but the regime emphasizes social-Darwinist capitalism with no limits. The rich live in huge villas filled with the latest imported luxury goods, while the poor literally starve. The regime consciously chooses to spend the money on terrorism, bombs, and war, rather than on helping Iranian citizens put bread on the table. This is the reality of the regime Professor Mahallati chose to work for. I do not wish to tell you to sack ProContinued ‘Mahallati’ on page 6
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The Oberlin Review | March 4, 2022
Volume 151, Number 13
Editorial Board Editors-in-Chief
Anisa Curry Vietze
Kushagra Kar
Managing Editor Gigi Ewing
Opinions Editors
Angel Aduwo
Emma Benardete
Ukraine Good Model for Responding to Global Refugee Crises On Tuesday, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees said that over 660,000 people have fled Ukraine in the days following Russia’s invasion last Thursday, Feb. 24. The UNHCR has estimated that a total of 1.8 million Ukrainian refugees will be displaced from their homes, uprooted from their lives, and forced to seek refuge in other countries. That number could greatly increase, however, with the European Union estimating that up to four million people might be forced to leave the country. Countries across the continent, but especially those in Eastern Europe, have rallied to open their borders to refugees. The EU had been preparing to “welcome and host” refugees from Ukraine for weeks leading up to the invasion and will increase funding for refugees past the $1.2 billion already available, according to EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen’s statement on Feb. 24. Poland is planning to accommodate 1 million Ukrainian refugees; as of Thursday, Hungary had welcomed over 139,000; Moldova, 97,000; Slovakia, 72,000; and Romania, 51,000. In Poland, there are eight reception points across the border where Ukrainian refugees can receive food, medical care, and transportation into other parts of Poland. But Poland’s open-border policy toward Ukrainian refugees is not reflective of its general stance toward refugees. In stark contrast to Poland’s current efforts, contractors began work on a $400 million wall at its border with Belarus just over a month ago, in an effort to bar the predominantly Muslim refugees seeking asylum from Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan. In November, thousands of these refugees were trapped at the border without shelter or food; over a dozen died in the freezing temperatures. This contrast is devastating. It demonstrates something deeply dystopian about Western civilization: that we only care about suffering and humanitarian crises when the people suffering look a particular, whiteskinned, blonde-haired way. “We’re not talking here about Syrians fleeing the bombing of the Syrian regime backed by Putin,” said French journalist Phillipe Corbé. “We’re talking about Europeans leaving in cars that look like ours to save their lives.” The outpouring of support for Ukraine proves that when it actually wants to, the EU is capable of providing resources to genuinely help refugees. It proves that the international community is capable of acting with kindness and empathy toward communities in need. To put it bluntly, it proves that it is racism and classism, not lack of resources, that bars us from creating a model to reduce suffering and provide aid to those in need. It is not a lack of ability or resources that have historically prevented white, Western nations from opening their arms to refugees. It’s also important to note that racism is impacting the way that refugees fleeing Ukraine are treated. There are reports that the Ukrainian military is dividing the crowds of people trying to take trains to safety into a group for people of color and a group for white people. Others are reporting that Ukrainian border guards have been using physical violence against Africans and other Black people trying to flee. After reflection and consultation, this Editorial Board would like to encourage its readers to donate and work to support refugees from Ukraine, while simultaneously thinking critically about how they can do the same for displaced people suffering all over the world. We call on our readers to educate themselves, not just about the situation in Ukraine today, but about other refugee crises and the systemic difference in our individual and global responses. It may be tempting to say that now is not the time to bring up issues of racial consciousness — now is the time to be supporting people experiencing immediate violence in Ukraine. You’d be right, but only in part. As challenging as it may be to have nuanced and open discussions that address multiple facets of this complex problem, now is the perfect time to do so. We have the opportunity to practice what we preach about anti-racist work, and we should take it. Editorials are the responsibility of the Review Editorial Board — the Editors-in-Chief, Managing Editor, and Opinions Editors — and do not necessarily reflect the views of the staff of the Review.
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