Talk:Mir-Hossein Mousavi/Archive 2

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Archive 1 Archive 2 Archive 3

Relation to Khamenei

Let's deal with the issue of Mousavi's relation to Ali Khamenei to avoid edit warring. This article points out that "Mr. Mousavi is the grandson of the Ayatollah's paternal aunt" (which we point out in the article) "which makes the two men cousins" (which we don't bother saying, and I don't think we should since "cousin" has different meanings in different cultures).

Kurdo777 wants to say that the two are "distant" relatives based on this source. I don't think this is an appropriate adjective to use. First Kurdo inserted "distant" without a source, but then when I reverted that the editor went out and found one source which describes them as "distant relatives." It does not specify the nature of their relationship though as the above article from the Globe and Mail does (which calls them cousins), so I think we should use the article which goes into more detail and simply describe them as being related.

It's also worth pointing out that "grandson of the Ayatollah's paternal aunt" is not nearly as unrelated as it may sound (or at least not necessarily so). For example, my paternal aunt's son is my cousin, who I know rather well (in this situation I am filling the same familial role that Khamenei does for Mousavi). If my cousin ever has a kid, I would probably know them somewhat well too (and that person would be Mousavi to my Khamenei). I think a simpler way to say this is that Mousavi's father or mother is Khamenei's cousin, which I think is the correct relationship and hardly "distant" (I don't know a great deal about Iranian kinship patterns, but I do know my Iranian friends are fairly close with their cousins, and certainly would know about children they had or have).

I could be convinced that the adjective "distant" is appropriate (for example if we're talking about an enormous family with rifts in it such that they never had any contact), but we'd need a better source than an offhand mention in a Reuters story which does not even detail the nature of the relationship between the two men. The default should be to simply say they are "related" which is easily provable. Saying the relation is "distant" requires better sourcing, and is inherently more subjective which is not desirable. Again I'm happy to change my thinking if we have better sources on this. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 20:17, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

I really don't care much about this issue. But somebody's grandmother's paternal aunt's son is indeed a distant relative. They're not cousins as you say. Within the Iranian context, "relative" implies someone close like brother, sister, or cousin. We should be clear about the nature of the relationship, and not exaggerate it, specially with hostile politically-motivated rumors that have been out there for years that the two are "brothers", "first cousins", "in laws" and other similar nonsense meant to discredit Mousavi by associating him with Khamenei. In reality, the two were actually born in different cities, and had no family contacts whatsoever. According to Mousavi's own notes, the two had never even met until the days leading to the 1979 Iranian revolution. The source I used, is a reliable Reuters report ( a respectable news agency), which has more weight than the source originally used. I think your characterization of the relationship as not being "distant" is original research, when there are reliable sources characterizing the relationship as "distant". Here is another source calling him "a distant cousin of the supreme leader"[1]. Also, see [2]: "Moussavi's relative Majid Motameni, 82, a gentle old man with sparkly eyes, when asked about Moussavi's rumored family ties to the Supreme Leader, told TIME that Moussavi is the grandson of Khamenei's paternal aunt. Khamenei himself was actually born in Mashhad in the northeast, where his father had been studying at a seminary." --Kurdo777 (talk) 20:59, 23 June 2009 (UTC)
What is your basis for saying they are not cousins? We have a reliable source that says they are. I think you are not understanding the relationship correctly. We are not talking about "somebody's grandmother's paternal aunt's son" as you put it (that would literally mean the grandmother's cousin, expressed in a roundabout fashion) but rather Mousavi as the "grandson of the Ayatollah's paternal aunt," which is quite different and means the son of one of Khamenei's cousins, which in many cultures means that Mousavi and Khamenei are cousins, albeit once removed (I have cousins with kids and consider them my cousins as well, I have Iranian-American friends who feel the same way). You cannot simply say "they're not cousins," you need to provide a source for that. This was an issue in an earlier talk page section as well - instead of simply saying "that's wrong," please back up your claims.
You say, they "had no family contacts whatsoever" and that "the two had never even met until the days leading to the 1979 Iranian revolution." That's very relevant information if true and I would not be at all surprised, but again tell me where you got it from.
You are not going to be able to flip a claim of original research back onto me, sorry. We have one source that describes them as "cousins" and Mousavi as the "grandson of the Ayatollah's paternal aunt," and another source that says they are distant relations. I'm arguing for deferring to the previous source which is more specific about their relationship, rather than the latter which is quite vague. Both are reliable sources (you seem to imply that The Globe and Mail is not so reliable, but I don't know what would give you that impression), and in arguing to use one and not the other I'm clearly not engaging in anything like original research, just arguing for usage of what I take to be a better, more detailed source.
Your new source in the Khaleej Times would seem to be less reliable than The Globe and Mail given its small circulation and partial government ownership, though actually that's irrelevant since this is just a reprint of a Reuters story one week after the first one you cited, and thus it's hardly surprising they said the same thing again a week later (see here for the original, and please check the sources of your sources more carefully in the future).
If you don't care much about the issue then I suggest we leave it as is since the sentence "Mousavi is a relative of fellow Khameneh native Ali Khamenei: Mousavi's grandmother is Khamenei's paternal aunt" is sourced and accurate. If you want to alter it to emphasize in some fashion that they are not all that related, or did not know each other until much later in life, then provide some more detailed sources and I'll likely agree with you on including that. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 21:35, 23 June 2009 (UTC)
I edit conflicted with you adding this new source, but it hardly bolsters your case, indeed quite the contrary. You quote two sentences from the Time article but leave out the one that precedes it. That says, "In fact, Moussavi is not only from the same town as Khameini, but according to locals is actually related to the Supreme Leader." Related, not "distantly related." Furthermore it notes, "Another local relative said that when SAVAK, the Shah's intelligence service, had been chasing the revolutionary cleric, Khamenei had hidden at his aunt's place in Khameneh for one night." That would be Mousavi's grandmother's house, apparently. How this shows less of a familial connection between the two is beyond me. Also I'm not interested in nonsense that's been spread about them being "brothers" or what have you - clearly they are not - I'm interested in describing their relationship accurately, which I think we currently do. I'm open to refining that further if you have specific proposals, for example saying they did not meet until the 1970s, etc. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 21:42, 23 June 2009 (UTC)
You're using the word "cousins" loosely here. I still think "relative" is a strong word given the context of their relations, meaning of the word "relative" within the Iranian context, the rumors surrendering the subject etc, do you have a compromise wording in mind? How about we stick to the factual description that "Mousavi's grandmother is Khamenei's paternal aunt" without any further characterization of of their relations, and let the reader decide that part? --Kurdo777 (talk) 22:59, 23 June 2009 (UTC)
The last source you provided, the Time magazine article, says "relative," another source calls them "cousins," and even the Reuters story calls them "distant relatives." You may think relative is too strong a word, but reliable sources do not seem to think so. I'm quite certain that Iranian friends of mine (I have several and have for many years) would consider one of their cousin's kids a relative, so I'm not inclined to accept your assertion that, in an Iranian context, Khamenei and Mousavi are not "related." Again, according to the Time article you cited, local folks in Khameneh said the two are related—you are the only person who seems to be suggesting otherwise, and you are not a reliable source (nor am I). I'm all for compromise when editing, but not simply because one editor holds a belief that seems to go against sources and quite frankly the basic definition of the word "related" in the familial sense. And again, "the rumors surrendering the subject" (i.e. the false ones about them being brothers, etc.) are irrelevant since they are not in the slightest bit being replicated here—we don't dance around the truth because it's somewhat similar to rumored falsehoods. But if you want to emphasize that Khamenei and Mousavi did not know each other when they were younger (assuming that's true, and I don't doubt it) then find a source that says that and I'll be all for including it as part of the sentence we have now. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 23:31, 23 June 2009 (UTC)
This is not an important issue and I don't want to bother you with it. But if possible, please ask one of Iranian friends, how they would characterize their cousin's kid, a "relative" or a "distant relative"? That should put some light on what I meant by kinship within the Iranian context. Cheers. --Kurdo777 (talk) 01:46, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
The language that native english speakers would normally use for this would be first cousin once removed or maybe second cousin. Someone has to draw it out to check. Jeff Carr (talk)

Involvement with terrorism in beirut

whoś Acording do this article from the cqpolitics, mousavi recruted Ali Akbar Mohtashemi-pur (embassador in Syria), and knew about everything. Please someone could get this two on the main page?

Mousavi, Celebrated in Iranian Protests, Was the Butcher of Beirut http://blogs.cqpolitics.com/spytalk/2009/06/mousavi-celebrated-in-iranian.html

and this:

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1613011,00.html —Preceding unsigned comment added by Echofloripa (talk • contribs)

The Time article linked to is by Bob Baer but had nothing to do with Mousavi - I can't find the piece he supposedly wrote on this in Time referenced in the cqpolitics.com post. That is a blog post and not really sufficient in terms of putting in very serious accusations about terrorism and the like into our article. There's a lot of information that seems to be bubbling up about Mousavi and his dealings with Lebanon in the 1980s, but it's pretty amorphous, cloak-and-dagger stuff at this point and we would need our sources to be pretty bulletproof. It would help if we knew who this "Jeff Stein" was who wrote the blog post - there's no information about his bona fides so we don't know if he's an expert or not. In general I don't think information about this should be included at this time, since we simply don't have adequate sources. Again, if folks have read books or academic articles about the leadership of the Islamic Republic during the 1980s, it would be great if they could look into some of these issues. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 03:31, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

I second Bigtimepeace's comment. By the way, Ali Akbar Mohtashami-Pur was the interior minster at that time. Traditionally, the interior minster, the foreign minster, and the intelligence minster are picked by the supreme leader (Khomeini at that time), and mainly answer to him. There are also many half-baked or sensationalist sources mistakenly or deliberately confusing Mousavi with Lebanese nationals with a similar surname or even with Mohtashami-Pur. In reality, Mousavi`s role in Lebanese affairs , was limited to Iran-Contra negotiations, which is already covered in the article. Additionally, Mousavi was actually a critic of Iran`s role in Lebanon, and he is on record criticizing Iran`s role in Lebanon in his resignation letter of 1988. --Kurdo777 (talk) 04:05, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

? Responsible for massacre - Butcher of Beruit - Link to Hizballah - Iran Contra ?

There are allegations that Mousavi was responsible for massacres on political prisoners committed in 1980-81, but in the text that this fact refers to it says nothing about this Mr. Moussavi. The only Mousavi that is mentioned there is Ayatolla Seyyed Ruhollah Mousavi Khomeini. Am I missing something? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.229.38.1 (talk) 08:24, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I am also wondering about this. Not that I trust a damn thing on Wikipedia, but it clearly appears in the article linked that Ayatolla Khomeini ordered the political executions of 1988, not Mousavi. 142.46.214.106 (talk) 05:17, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

This is one of several additions made by one "Amir Mousavi" which seem to be extremely biased and aimed at discrediting Mousavi. I would revert the changes if I could, but the article is semi-protected and I don't have the right. NobleHam (talk) 10:41, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

"Mousavi’s reputation for radicalism was undiminished. When he introduced his cabinet in 1985, he boasted that his interior minister, Ali Akbar Mohtashami, was a religious conservative who’d built his reputation while building Hezbollah, the Party of God, in Lebanon." These statement are strongly one- sided. The people should decide whether they think that mousavi is radical or not. Wikipedia is an Encyclopedia. There are no verifications at all, I have found many stupid comments in the text "the middle class don't like him". Please keep the article semi- protected and help to keep standarts. The whole article needs serious alternations --Englishazadipedia (talk) 15:34, 14 June 2009 (UTC)


He was Prime Minister at the time and as such, he had no power over the military other than ensuring orders from the Supreme Leader(s) were carried out. Needless to say, that's basically the "I was just following orders" defense and he was just as eager to help continue the Iran-Iraq War at the behest of the same clerical establishment. Would they really appoint someone that didn't agree with their methods? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.50.39.29 (talk) 00:59, 16 June 2009 (UTC)


These articles below reflect some aspects of Mousavi which the current WP article doesn't touch upon at all. Also, what are Mousavi's stances on Israel? That may be relevant, given the ongoing tensions in the region.

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1905477,00.html

http://blogs.cqpolitics.com/spytalk/2009/06/mousavi-celebrated-in-iranian.html

Mousavi "was appointed to the leadership council of Lebanon's Shi'ite militant group, Hizballah, in 1982. Due to his involvement with Hizballah, Mousavi held a prominent role in the Iran-Contra affair." http://www.biography.com/articles/Mousavi-Hossein-460468 Beegor (talk) 20:28, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Mousavi or Moussaoui?

the press has been spelling the name as Mousavi but phonetic translations from aljazeer show it to be Moussaoui. So how do you pronounce the name? phonetic please. 99.147.205.15 (talk) 16:27, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

The right pronunciation is Musavi. /v/ like visit. --M.Reza (talk) 21:20, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

of Jewish descent?

I was just wondering about the origin of the Moussavi people and would be interested to know if anyone knows the answer to this..

The Jews in Turkey are, as we all know, referred to in Turkish as 'Moussavis' on account of the Jews being followers of the Prophet Musa (and, Christians are called 'Isevis' on account of being followers of the Prophet Isa. We know that Iran has a large Turkish-speaking population who have a cultural association with or descent from Turkic tribes. So, are people in Iran known as 'Moussavi' because of Jewish ancestry?

It would explain alot of protests if Moussavi were Jewish. 76.241.189.242 (talk) 07:00, 23 June 2009 (UTC)


sigh, your anti-semitic comment doesn't really deserve a serious answer --Kurdo777 (talk) 15:12, 23 June 2009 (UTC)
Musavi, here, means a descendant of Musa, the 7th Imam of Shia Muslims. He has the title of Seyed which confirms this meaning is right. he is Musavi the same way as Khomeini was. --M.Reza (talk) 21:32, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Merge Mir-Hossein Mousavi presidential campaign, 2009 to this page?

  • Strongly support The campaign itself is part of the person. The person is more notable than the campaign. That side article is very small and needs severe work anyway. It's best to focus on making this article better. The Squicks (talk) 07:42, 17 June 2009 (UTC)
  • support Both articles are small and would be better together. Jeff Carr (talk) 09:25, 17 June 2009 (UTC)
  • Oppose Mousavi is a major political figure, and his article should not be entirely dominated by the recent campaign. The side article is small, granted, but could be much larger considering the importance of the campaign in Iranian politics. Check out the Farsi version of the campaign article (fa:میرحسین موسوی در انتخابات ریاست جمهوری ایران (۱۳۸۸)) to see how the campaign article could be expanded. Calliopejen1 (talk) 22:38, 17 June 2009 (UTC)
  • Oppose. Ultimately, no matter what happens in Iran, our article on Mousavi should be quite long. One section of this article will be about this year's campaign, and I think it makes complete sense to split that off into its own article as it is now and then write our section in this main article in summary style. For United States presidential elections, we have articles on the campaigns of very minor candidates, and there's no reason whatsoever that we should give less coverage to elections in Iran, particularly one as important as this year's and a campaign as important as Mousavi's. There will be thousands of pages (and probably even whole books) written just about Mousavi's campaign, and we'll have more than enough material for an in-depth article. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 20:24, 22 June 2009 (UTC)
  • Strong Oppose --Sina (talk) 00:47, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

Pictures

Please use this pictures in this article: File:6th Day - Fans of Mousavi.jpg File:6th Day - Mousavi's Stamp.jpg Thanks.God Save the Mousavi —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.198.7.23 (talk) 06:14, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

executed

WHY IT DOESN'T MENTION ANYWHERE ABOUT 50,000 PERSIAN that were executed by Mir Hossein Mousavi when he was prime minister of iran specially the 10,000 he executed in one week in 1988 ???? that's very odd fror islamic repucblic to forget such thing !!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Long Live IRAN (talk • contribs) 08:28, 13 December 2009 (UTC)

free potato?

towards the end of the page:

"He asked for Khatami's support in his campaign. He also welcomed Karoubi's presence.He also criticized giving free potato to people by the government and called it a violation of law and said "we have no money to do so". He claims that he campaigns with minimum fund raising possible."

is this something based on actual fact, or just vandalism? 75.119.226.122 (talk) 12:24, 6 May 2009 (UTC) vandalism? I think Iran is building the bomb but free potato no the people are a little better off then that. If potatoes were replaced giving of money for votes by the current president the maijlis has stopped some of this . check ROOZ for accurate news.---- Nate Riley 10:47, 22 May 2009 (UTC)---- Nate Riley 10:47, 22 May 2009 (UTC)---- Nate Riley 10:47, 22 May 2009 (UTC)N8riley

In sri lanka and thailand when i lived there it was common to see government trucks giving rice to farmers and throwing parties to gain support...One big campaign policy is claiming that they can drop the price of rice...Old delevoping world political trick. So believe it was done in iran.

Yeah!

AhmadiNejad gave people free potato (which taken back from Gazza) to vote for him. Mamylo (talk) 23:03, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

WHY IT DOESN'T MENTION ANYWHERE ABOUT 50,000 PERSIAN that were executed by Mir Hossein Mousavi when he was prime minister of iran specially the 10,000 he executed in one week in 1988 ???? that's very odd fror islamic repucblic to forget such thing !!! This statement, "There is however, a possibility felt by many, that the protests will ultimately lead to a victory of Mousavi supporters, and maybe even a radical change in Iranian politics." is pure speculation. I hope it happens, but offer proof. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Justinjuicebox (talk • contribs) 14:26, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

[3]

The Iranian government has blocked access to the social networking site Facebook amid political jockeying for the June 12 presidential elections, according to the semi-official Iranian Labour News Agency. Reformist candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi -- a former prime minister considered a threat to current hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad -- created a Facebook page for his campaign that has more than 5,000 supporters on the site. Those attempting to visit Facebook received a message in Farsi saying, "Access to this site is not possible," according to CNN personnel in Tehran. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Brianjohnsrud (talk • contribs) 08:25, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

DOWN WITH AHMADI, MOUSAVI, KHAMENEI, RAFSANJANI AND THE ENTIRE ISLAMIC FACIST GOVERNMENT, "LONG LIVE THE GREEN MOVEMENT"

WHY IT DOESN'T MENTION ANYWHERE ABOUT 50,000 PERSIAN that were executed by Mir Hossein Mousavi when he was prime minister of iran specially the 10,000 he executed in one week in 1988 ???? that's very odd fror islamic repucblic to forget such thing !!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Long Live IRAN (talk • contribs) 08:37, 13 December 2009 (UTC)

A Founding Member of Hizballah

I don't have the sources handy and I can't be bothered to find them but you're darn right I dispute the neutrality of this article. It's like Karl Marx writing the article about communism. 99.231.211.103 (talk) 00:39, 16 June 2009 (UTC)


No, he didn't. Hezbollah received support and training from Iran, but they were formed in Lebanon as a resistance party to counteract Israel. Also, if you "don't have the sources handy and...can't be bothered to find them", then why are you even bothering to post here besides a sad need to spew propaganda on the internets? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.50.39.29 (talk) 00:52, 16 June 2009 (UTC)


Yes, he did. Here is the link from Time:

[4]

"Was placed on the leadership council of Lebanon's Shi'ite militant group Hizballah by Ayatollah Khomeini when the group was founded in 1982."

I've put in the appropriate sentence, under Premiership, with the citation above. Let's calm down on this one! :-) --ScottMorrison (talk) 17:19, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

This is inaccurate information, the policy says "exceptional claims require exceptional sources", and one single opinion piece does not qualify as "exceptional sources". Please keep in mind that this is the bio of a living person, so unless you have several academic sources supporting this claim, please do not add it back. --Kurdo777 (talk) 21:15, 16 June 2009 (UTC)
I agree, this is a mistake by TIME. The person who Khomeini put on Hezbullah's leadership council, was Ali Akbar Mohtashami-Pur, who was the interior minster of Mousavi, not Mousavi himself. --Wayiran (talk) 21:25, 16 June 2009 (UTC)
Kurdo and Wayiran, do you have sources for your claims? You can't simply say, "Time magazine is wrong" (though I would hardly be surprised if they were) you need your own sources that say this is wrong because neither of you are reliable sources for our purposes. Time is generally considered a reliable source (though, again, it might indeed be wrong in this case). Clearly given that Mousavi was PM at the time Hezbollah was created (whenever one wants to date that, be it '82 or later) he presumably had some dealings with them which may or may not be worth mentioning in this bio depending on how extensive those dealings were, and whether or not they were a notable aspect of his prime ministership (I would guess that they were not). If you have better sources on these issues please point them out. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 00:01, 17 June 2009 (UTC)
One can't prove a negative. So you can't seriously expect me to bring a source that "Mousavi was not X or Y" for every poorly-sourced accusation. The policy clearly states that "exceptional claims require exceptional sources", and this is a biography of a living person, and calling him a founding member of a terrorist group, is an exceptional claim. So you need more than a "Trivia facts" section of an opinion piece to make such liable claims about a living person. If he was indeed a founding member of that group, academic sources should be cited, such as history books, articles in academic journals etc, not opinion pieces or sensational news items from shady/iffy/partisan sources. My own opinion is that this author and the others who have come up with this fringe theory, are mixing up Mousavi with Al-Mousavi [5]. --Kurdo777 (talk) 04:05, 17 June 2009 (UTC)
I don't disagree with you that we would need better sourcing in order to discuss Mousavi vis a vis Hezbollah. I'm just asking if you have any sources that speak to these questions, which I assumed you would since you definitively said "this is inaccurate information." Again that would not at all surprise me, but how do you know that? I know that Mohammad Reza Pahlavi did not help form Hezbollah because he died in 1980, and I would assume you know something about Mousavi that leads you to conclude he was not on Hezbollah's "leadership council" (what that is supposed to mean exactly, I'm not sure). I'm just asking you to put forward sources (or, at the very least, a rationale for your argument) addressing the issue since Time and other (less reputable, though I don't think of Time as overly reputable) outlets like Newsmax (which is definitely not a reliable source for this kind of thing) have been reporting on this Hezbollah issue. You can put the question to rest with some good sources.
And it's not a question of "proving a negative" as you suggest (it's often quite easy to prove a negative, if not definitively, at least within reason which is good enough for our purposes, and which is something we do all the time on Wikipedia). There are any number of detailed accounts of the early years of the Islamic Republic and of the formation of Hezbollah, and no doubt some of these either discuss Mousavi and specifically mention he had little or nothing to do with Hezbollah, or discuss Hezbollah in detail but never mention him as being involved in any significant way, which is sufficient for me (i.e. there being no mention of Mousavi in a well-regarded and detailed book about Hezbollah strongly suggests that these rumors about him are incorrect). These are hardly esoteric issues, and I'm sure they've been written about it in detail. I'm just asking for more information from the two editors who say they are somewhat knowledgeable about these matters, and am not arguing for inclusion of the information from the Time article. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 04:57, 17 June 2009 (UTC)
Operating under the assumption that the Time article had bad information, I wonder if they might have been confusing him with Hussein al Musawi (sometimes rendered Hussein Moussavi) who was a leader of the Islamic Amal Movement and member of Hezbollah who, per our article on the Amal movement, "reportedly served as a member of its Consultative Council." Even more than with Abbas_al-Musawi, once can see the likelihood of someone confusing Mis-Hossein Moussavi with Hussein Moussavi. I'll look into this a little bit further.--Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 05:11, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Actually I think it unlikely that there is any identity confusion going on here. The Newsmax piece is problematic and should not be taken at face value, but it is written by Kenneth R. Timmerman who is knowledgeable about Iran (though I'm fairly certain I disagree with most everything he thinks about it), and some of the claims are sourced to Iranians and are clearly not just the musings of some random Newsmax writer. It's better than your average article on Newsmax, but still pretty dicey as far as being a reliable source for this article.

I certainly don't think we should claim, as the Newsmax article does by citing a former intelligence agent, that "Mir Hossein Mousavi was one of the founders of Hezbollah." It's possible if not likely that that is an exaggeration, though it's also possible that he was put on the "leadership council when the group was created," whatever that entailed (if so then the Time article would not really be wrong). What we really need here is more information on Mousavi's time as PM, about which we should say a great deal. Mentioning connections he may have had to Hezbollah may or may not be appropriate depending on what sources say, and the issue of undue weight will certainly play a role. Mousavi may have had peripheral connections to Hezbollah (as PM it would not be surprising), but if these were trivial and are just being hyped-up by certain folks for political reasons right now (for example, Timmerman is hardly an unbiased source as he has his own agenda) then it's not worth including. If those connections were in fact more substantial then it probably is worth including a sentence on it—we just need more information.

One things is certain: at least in the Newsmax piece, Mir Hossein is not being confused with Abbas_al-Musawi, as the latter is specifically mentioned in the article as being "a member of the extended clan" to which Mir Hossein Mousavi also belonged (Timmerman claims that Mir Hossein Mousavi's family was originally Arab rather than Iranian, which would be worth mentioning if we could verify it in more reliable sources). --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 06:54, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Thank you Bigtimepeace. Unfortunately, there are a lot of rumors, accusations, and urban myths about Mousavi (some created by Ahmadinejad's camp, others by MKO), which are being picked-up by some of the Western media outlets, and then cycled and re-cycled by others. We should not feed this cycle, and stick to reliable history books and journals (as oppose to commentaries, opinion pieces etc) about the subject, specially given his current situation in Iran, and his inability to communicate with the outside world and refute any accusations against him. --Kurdo777 (talk) 06:59, 17 June 2009 (UTC)
It should be pointed out that there are members of Hezbollah out on the streets today in Tehran who are beating Mousvai's friends and supporters almost to death. The Squicks (talk) 07:24, 17 June 2009 (UTC)
Yes, but Moussavi was in quite a different position 25 years ago vis a vis the dominant regime in Iran at the time (i.e. he was a part of it), and it's unclear to me what his relationship with Hezbollah was at the time and whether any such relationship is notable enough for this article, which is my point above. I'm still interested in suggestions for good sources on this issue and, more importantly, broader issues dealing with his time in office in the 1980s. If Kurdo777 or others have read books or learned articles that deal with Moussavi's time as prime minister, it would be great if they could list some of those sources here, or better yet just add some information to this section which is in dire need of expansion. --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 19:03, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

DOWN WITH AHMADI, MOUSAVI, KHAMENEI, RAFSANJANI AND THE ENTIRE ISLAMIC FACIST GOVERNMENT, "LONG LIVE THE GREEN MOVEMENT"

WHY IT DOESN'T MENTION ANYWHERE ABOUT 50,000 PERSIAN that were executed by Mir Hossein Mousavi when he was prime minister of iran specially the 10,000 he executed in one week in 1988 ???? that's very odd fror islamic repucblic to forget such thing !!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Long Live IRAN (talk • contribs) 08:41, 13 December 2009 (UTC)

Real mousavi

I am surprised how wiki is censoring the truth about Mousavi. Offcourse I would never rely on any information coming from Wiki but this has gone too far.

What happened to the fanatic Mousavi?. No trace of him here. As if he never existed! Worst of all, wiki has protected the article so the truth so the truth would never be revealed to its readers. I wonder why? You want to know about real mousavi read the following articles.
http://middleeast.about.com/od/iran/p/mir-hossein-moussavi-profile.htm
http://covertress.blogspot.com/2009/07/robert-baer-dont-forget-mousavis-bloody.html
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/06/forgive_mousavi_but_never_forg.html

WIKI, stop protecting Mousavi! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.233.195.244 (talk) 11:47, 21 December 2009 (UTC)

"it's" correction

In the second paragraph of the article, the third-to-last word should be corrected to "its" DeBoisbaudran (talk) 17:36, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

Azeri origin

Mir Hussein Moussavi is of Azeri ethnic origin or not? This article is not clarifiyng this issue at all ! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.105.123.228 (talk) 18:30, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Yes. President Mousavi is from Azerbaijan, a city of azeries. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Amir.Hossein.7055 (talk • contribs) 12:56, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

Orphaned references in Mir-Hossein Mousavi

I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Mir-Hossein Mousavi's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "abc":

  • From Timeline of the 2009 Iranian election protests: "Election Battles Turn Into Street Fights in Iran". ABC News. June 13, 2009. Retrieved June 13, 2009.
  • From Reuters: "Baroness de Reuter, last link to news dynasty, dies". ABC News (Australia). Reuters. 2009-01-26. Retrieved 2009-02-21.
  • From Iranian presidential election, 2009: "Election Battles Turn Into Street Fights in Iran". ABC News. 13 June 2009. Retrieved 13 June 2009.
  • From 2009 Iranian election protests: ABC News (13 June 2009). "Election Battles Turn Into Street Fights in Iran". ABC News. Archived from the original on 2009-07-28. Retrieved 13 June 2009. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)

Reference named "defeated":

Reference named "recount":

Reference named "AJE1":

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT⚡ 09:16, 4 February 2010 (UTC)

Marriage and more

Please can someone write up about his marriage, and make use of this other substantial material, from The New Republic. Earthlyreason (talk) 15:32, 8 March 2010 (UTC)

He is Azeri

Someone write that he was an ethnic Azeri. And insert the link where he [|talks to Azerbaijan, here's a link]. Insert the Azerbaijani version of his name ((lang-az | Mir Hüseyn Musəvi)) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.141.147.207 (talk) 09:16, 23 May 2010 (UTC)

He's an Azeri from Iran, so that version of his name does not apply to him. We have our own alphabet, and you use a completely different alphabet. I don't know why you think adding his name in the North Azeri script is even relevant, because he has no relation to that country at all. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.194.5.148 (talk) 14:01, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

Moussavi or Mousavi?

Just a simple question. The New York Times is spelling his name with two 's's. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 141.214.17.5 (talk) 18:51, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure, I've seen "Moussavi" more often than not, and our best bet is probably to go with what is being used most often by the press if we don't have a definitive answer (obviously both are just an Anglicization of a Farsi name anyway). --Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 19:29, 15 June 2009 (UTC)


The Iranian site PressTV uses "Moussavi", so it's a safe bet that's the proper spelling as far as a Latin alphabet version goes. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.50.39.29 (talk) 00:55, 16 June 2009 (UTC)


Mousavi is a popular name in Iran and it has nothing to do with Jews. It also has nothing to do with language because Iranians from all over Iran carry this name. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.194.5.148 (talk) 14:03, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

WikiLeaks Information regarding Mousavi (Musavi) (nuclear ambitions)

There is some interesting information in the CableGate section of wikileaks.org that could be interesting to include in section 4.4 (Presidential election candidacy: Platform) after the paragraph currently there that says,

'The BBC reported that Mousavi 'called for greater personal freedoms in Iran and criticized the ban on private television channels', but 'refused to back down from the country's disputed nuclear programme, saying it is 'for peaceful purposes'".

I would add this: "But others in the region have said that they did not believe Mousavi posed any less of a threat of nuclear attack than Ahmadinejad himself."[1]


In this wikileaks cable, in paragraph 7, Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al Nahyan (MBZ) states his opinion of Musavi (and Ahmadinejad): "Regarding the recent election in Iran, MBZ cautioned that Mir Hossein Musavi is no different than Ahmedinejad when it comes to their nuclear ambitions, 'same goal, different tactic.' In this respect, he regards Musavi as more dangerous than his competitor, as at least Ahmedinejad was 'an open book.' He reminded Secretary Geithner that Musavi and his advisors are part of the same group that took the U.S. Embassy in 1979. "



Majorsheisskopf (talk) 08:11, 1 December 2010 (UTC)

Azerbaijani name

why is there an azerbaijani version of his name in the title? he is an azari from iran, completely different alphabet and this section should be removed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.192.70.173 (talk) 00:02, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

  1. ^ http://cablegate.wikileaks.org/cable/2009/07/09ABUDHABI736.html#par7
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