Ahmadinejad and his entourage, which counts among its ranks former
Revolutionary Guard members who fought in the Iran-Iraq War, are under
attack from Khamenei’s camp, comprising senior clerics, conservative
politicians and rival Revolutionary Guard commanders.

On June 21, the parliament launched impeachment proceedings against
Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi over the appointment of his deputy,
Mohammad Sharif Malekzadeh, who was forced to resign after just three
days on the job. Malekzadeh was arrested on corruption charges on June
23.

The parliament then rejected Hamid Sajjadi, Ahmadinejad’s nominee for
the newly created Sports and Youth Affairs Ministry, due to his “lack of
experience.”

The parliament also vetoed Ahmadinejad’s decision to merge the Oil Ministry with the Industry Ministry.

As if that triple blow were not humiliation enough, lawmakers booed a
colleague who attempted to escort Ahmadinejad to the door of the
parliamentary chamber, driving the hapless deputy back to this seat.

That was a stark contrast to the picture just a few months ago, when
Ahmadinejad was routinely surrounded by crowds of lawmakers eager to
seek his opinion during his visits to the legislature.

Public Humiliation

The parliament – which has also launched an investigation into
vote-buying ahead of the 2009 disputed Presidential election – is
believed to be undermining the Iranian president with the express
blessing of the Iranian leader.

Khamenei, who publicly humiliated Ahmadinejad in April when he reversed
the president’s decision to fire Intelligence Minister Heydar Moslehi,
is said to be using parliament to clip the wings of the ambitious
Ahmadinejad and keep him under control.

In recent days several legislators have threatened Ahmadinejad with
impeachment. Deputy Fazel Mousavi said last week that Ahmadinejad was
“two yellow cards away” from losing office.

President Ahmadinejad has been undermined by
his close association with the deeply unpopular former Vice President
Esfandiar Rahim-Mashaei (left).

Lawmaker Ali Motahari, known as a staunch critic of the president, said a
motion to question Ahmadinejad – a measure that could serve as a
prelude to impeachment – will be tabled in ten days.

Those threats are unlikely to be acted upon for the time being, say most
analysts. They maintain that Khamenei has not yet given the green light
for the impeachment of the man whom he once said he trusted more than
his predecessors as president.

A Policy Of Containment

Political analyst and journalist Reza Alijani, who fled Iran recently,
says that Khamenei’s policy for dealing with Ahmadinejad and his
entourage is essentially based on the principle of containment, holding
the president at bay without completely destroying him politically.

Yet Alijani warns that Ahmadinejad’s next moves remain a big source of uncertainty.

“We do not know about what’s happening behind the scenes or anything
about the plans of Ahmadinejad and his clique, and this is key," he
says. "The actions of Khamenei are predictable – but that is not true at
all of Ahmadinejad’s moves.”

Ahmadinejad’s dismissal would fracture Iran’s already unstable political
establishment even more and could lead to uncertainty at a time when
the country is fragile domestically due to a shaky economy and the risk
of more street protests inspired by the Arab Spring. On the
international scene the country faces increasing isolation over its
sensitive nuclear work.

Ahmadinejad’s removal would also be another blow to Khamenei’s
legitimacy, which has already been seriously damaged by his past support
for Ahmadinejad and his endorsement of the president’s disputed
reelection despite allegations of massive fraud and street protests.

“Our understanding is that [Khamenei] would like the government to
continue its work in peace until the end of its legal term, [and] that
he would like the political life of the government to end naturally,”
said lawmaker Mohammad Reza Bahonar last month.

Treading Water With A Deviant Current

Yet Ali Mazroui, a former legislator and a senior member of Iran’s
largest political reformist political party, tells RFE/RL that there is a
chance Ahmadinejad could be dismissed before the end of his term in
2013.

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Both Mazroui and Alijani agree that the parliament is ready to get rid
of Ahmadinejad at just one hint from Khamenei. They believe, however,
that Khamenei’s priority is to preserve the current political
establishment while keeping the unruly president under control.

Recent comments by lawmaker Bahonar, as well as by Mojtaba Zolnour,
Khamenei’s deputy representative to the Revolutionary Guard, also
suggest that confrontation is not on the agenda for now.

“The atmosphere of the society is not ripe for confronting this issue,"
Zolnour said on June 20. "Therefore, we should tolerate it. But that
doesn’t mean that we should allow the deviant current to do whatever it
wants.”

Conjoined Twins

“Deviant current” is a term Iranian officials have adopted to describe
Ahmadinejad’s inner circle, including his right-hand man Esfandiar Rahim
Mashaei, whose deep unpopularity is one of the main reasons for the
opposition to Ahmadinejad.

Most of Ahmadinejad’s critics used to differentiate between him and
Mashaei, but increasingly this is no longer the case. In what would seem
to be more bad news for the Iranian President, Zolnour compared
Ahmadinejad and Mashaei to the story, well-known in Iran, of a pair of
conjoined twins “who died when surgeons tried to separate them.”

Ahmadinejad has so far refused to withdraw his support for Mashaei. Even
if he does, it might be too late for him to regain his one-time status
as the Islamic Republic’s rising political star, back in the era when he
was still reaping praise as a miracle and a gift from God.

Both camps are said to be eyeing the March 2012 parliamentary vote,
which is now set to become the stage for even greater tensions.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said
Saturday the real dimensions of the September 2001 terrorist attacks on
the U.S. as well as genocide in the Second World War should be exposed
in order to be able to stop terrorism.

"If the black box of the 9/11 incident and
Holocaust were opened, then some of the truth would be exposed, but the
United States does not allow this," Ahmadinejad said at the two-day
international summit on terrorism in Tehran.

	The presidents of Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran in a trilateral meeting in Tehran, June 24, 2011
	Photo by: Reuters

The
president said both the Holocaust and the 2001 terror attacks were
pretexts by the U.S. to put down Muslims and at the same time make huge
economic benefits by spreading panic in the region. Ahmadinejad has
often questioned what he called accepted truths.

He said the roots of terrorism should be
explored before it can be fought effectively, and blamed U.S. militarism
for causing security to deteriorate.

"There are networks which have thousands of
members and sympathizers and it is the duty if the Islamic countries to
fight these groups without any foreign interference," Ahmadinejad said.

A two-day international summit on terrorism opened Saturday in
Tehran.
The conference is attended by the presidents of Afghanistan, Iraq,
Pakistan, Sudan and Tajikistan as well deputy presidents and prime
ministers from several other countries.

Omar Al Bashir is one of the controversial
guests at the summit .Sudan's president is wanted for war crimes by the
International Criminal Court. He has however been warmly welcomed by the
Iranian administration.

"The U.S. tries to expose those as the
guilty parts who themselves are victims of suppression and forgets its
own role in this regard," Al Bashir said at the conference. He thanked
Iran for trying to disclose the real dimensions of suppression and
terrorism in the Tehran summit.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai said the
meeting was important as terrorism in his country has increased since
the foreign military intervention 10 years ago.

"Terrorism in Afghanistan is spreading
despite all efforts to improve education and infrastructure, making the
threat of terrorism in my country more than ever and leaving us far away
from peace and security," Karzai said.

"It is a disgrace that Islam is misused by
some groups and all Islamic countries should therefore seriously try to
correct the image of Islam which is a religion of peace and friendship,"
the Afghan president added.

The presidents of Iraq, Pakistan and Tajikistan also called for joint efforts by all Islamic countries to fight terrorism.

Iran has on several occasions criticized the
U.S. and its Western allies for having deteriorated security in both
Afghanistan and Iraq by their military presence

Tehran argues that the most effective way to
fight terrorism is to allow regional countries to take care of security
and force foreign troops to leave the region.