Back to Brief on Iran
LYON—They had been waiting for this moment a long time, and 35 minutes before kickoff they began with a chant. The Stade Gerland was not yet nearly full, but the decibel level was already ear-bleeding and the message was coming through loudly and clearly:
"Viva, Viva, Ra-ja-vi. Viva, Viva, Ra-ja-vi . . .''
The mujahideen - the Iranian resistance, which comprised the vast majority of the audience of 44,000 - had arrived, and for the rest of the evening they commanded the stage. True, a match was played and they noticed that, roaring and gnashing whenever it mattered, but it was almost incidental. And their opponents - Iran's opponents - from the United States, which some of them now call home, were nearly irrelevant.
No one watching on television could have noticed the level of tension and passion and bubbling, partisan ferment in the stands. For these thousands, this was their World Cup championship, their protest, a time for which they had waited 19 long and violent years.
They made everything they could of it, and as hard as the dissidents worked to get their message across, it never spilled into ugly….
A few exiles in the crowd walked around in their own version of that flag - green and red bars, and a bare white middle stripe, without the "symbol of the mullahs,'' as one exile put it. They wore Nike and Reebok and UCLA Bruins baseball caps, they filed into the stadium joyously, peacefully, not at all fearful that their pictures were being taken by Iranian embassy officials….
They unfurled banner after banner that security personnel tore away from them in keeping with FIFA regulations against political signs, only to see another identical message sprout up a few rows away - "Down with Khatami,'' in reference to present Iranian president Mohammad Khatami; pictures and T-shirts of Maryam and Massoud Rajavi, leaders of the Mujahideen….
Just before kickoff, a Rajavi banner borne by two balloons glided ghostlike by the Iranian team huddle and stopped, as if controlled, right at midfield.
As it ended in victory, the Iranian players acknowledged the crowd, for the first time, with waves and smiles in front of the bleachers. And one resistance supporter breached the security cordon and stood alone at midfield, brandishing a Rajavi T-shirt.
None of it came within the view of the FIFA-controlled cameras.
Sitting in the stadium, only one word could describe it: unforgettable.
Protesters Waived T-shirts and Banners Against Regime,
The New York Times, June 22
LYONS—…Although soccer's world governing body had feared that protesters would try to disrupt the game, just the opposite happened…. The only demonstration was a vigorous but peaceful protest against Iran's Islamic regime, launched by several thousand Iranian expatriates who smuggled T-shirts and banners into Gerland Stadium showing the pictures of two leaders of a Paris-based opposition group called the National Council of Resistance….
Dissidents also tried to capitalize on the forum by promoting their resistance group. French police rushed into the stands several times to confiscate banners and new pictures celebrating the two leaders of the National Council of Resistance, but new banners and pictures kept popping up like mushrooms….
Security was heavy in the blocks surrounding the stadium. And French police confiscated flags of the Iranian opposition, which showed a lion and a sun in the white field of the tricolor instead of the religious symbol of Allah….
"No Commotion; Iranian Fans Very Friendly; No Hooligans Here", Los Angeles Times, June 22
LYON—…Predictions of a politically charged match played out, although not entirely as expected. In fact, the political schism between the United States and Iran was all but eclipsed by an internal conflict within Iran between the Tehran government and an opposition group of exiled Iranians, the Moujahedeen Khalq.
Sunday morning, hours before kickoff, members of the opposition group, including two players from the 1978 Iranian World Cup team, held a news conference in a hotel half a mile from Stade Gerland, denouncing the current regime for attempting to use the U.S.-Iran soccer match as a propaganda device. Yet inside the stadium, thousands of Iranian fans wore and waved T-shirts bearing the likeness of the leader of the resistance group, Massoud Rajavi--T-shirts distributed outside the gates by members of the Moujahedeen.
It helped create a sometimes surreal atmosphere: The underdog Iranian players beating the United States on the field while thousands of Iranian fans wearing opposition-group T-shirts danced to "The Macarena" and performed the ultimate form of Western social expression, the Wave….
"It's been very peaceful," said one American fan, Jay Ribera of New York City. "No commotion. All of the Iranian fans have been very friendly with us. There are no hooligans here."…