We are now, I believe, very realistic in being able to see an end of the regime in Iran… We’ve lived through this before in other oppressed countries — when the people take to the streets, and they protest day after day like they’ve done in over 142 cities in Iran, like they did the other day in Tehran … when that happens, then freedom is right around the corner.
I say to those countries that continue to support Iran, to those countries that do business with Iran, “You are paying for a regime that deprives women of their rights, that deprives children of their rights, and that murders people because they practice a different religion. How can you do that? How much better are you than the terrorists when you are giving them money and propping up this regime?”
We all know that the economy of Iran is in freefall. It’s evaporating. That’s terrible for the people of Iran, for your brothers and sisters and your relatives and friends. But I believe it’s a price that they’re more than willing to pay, like our martyrs were willing to pay with their blood. That’s what happened to the French Revolution. And that’s what’s happening right now in your homeland.
We saw a picture of a man that held up a sign and said he was willing to sell his kidney for $500. That’s a government on the verge of toppling. Thank God, my president turned his back on that very dangerous nuclear agreement with Iran. He said, “No, we’re not going to do business with the biggest state sponsor of terrorism. We’re going to reimpose the sanctions.”
Well, maybe when the greatest economic power in the history of the world stops doing business with you, you have the kind of economic collapse that you now see in Iran — and that is going to get worse because I guarantee you the sanctions will become greater and greater and greater. This president does not intend to turn his back on freedom fighters.
Many times, a very bad government is replaced by another bad government, and maybe it’s even worse. We’ve seen some of that in the Middle East with Egypt. However, here, we’re not replacing one government with a government we don’t know. You have an alternative. You’ve got an alternative that’s built on a solid foundation of 10 principles. Democracy, human rights, a non-nuclear Iran, separation of church and state, and the rights of women and of all minorities to be protected. My goodness, that sounds like a full-fledged democracy. That’s what the NCRI stands for. That’s what Madame Rajavi stands for, and that’s what your martyrs died for.
The era of appeasement is over. Those who practice appeasement are going to find themselves shamed in world history.
What have you accomplished? What have you accomplished with a tremendous pressure put on you? Since I’ve been working with you and all of my colleagues from the United States, we fought a worldwide battle to shed the unfair label of terrorism in the United States, the United Kingdom, the European Union. That label is now gone, and you’re seen as defenders of human rights because that’s what you are. And we won that battle.
You’ve been able to form resistance units all over Iran. Those protests are not happening accidentally. Those protests are happening because they’re being coordinated now, unlike in 2009. And what it says is we have an alternative.
Suppose the face of Iran was a brave woman in a country that recently has had a history … of treating women inhumanely. And this brave woman will be the face of the new, modern, liberated Iran.
Will it happen? (YES!) When will it happen? (NOW!) And I want next year, at this time — I want us to have this convention in Tehran!
• Former New York City Mayor Rudolph “Rudy” W. Giuliani is personal attorney to President Donald J. Trump.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.