Fadayan-e Islam
Encyclopedia
Fadā'iyān-e Islam was an Iran
Iran
Iran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...

ian Islamic fundamentalist
Islamic fundamentalism
Islamic fundamentalism is a term used to describe religious ideologies seen as advocating a return to the "fundamentals" of Islam: the Quran and the Sunnah. Definitions of the term vary. According to Christine L...

 secret society founded in 1946, by a 21 year-old theology student named Navvab Safavi
Navvab Safavi
Navvab Safavi was a cleric responsible for founding of the Fadayan-e Islam group and with them the assassination of several leading Iranians, primarily politicians.-Early life:...

. Safavi sought to purify Islam in Iran by ridding it of `corrupting individuals` by means of carefully planned assassinations of certain leading intellectual and political figures. After a series of successful killings and the freeing of some of its assassins from punishment with the help of the group's powerful clerical supporters, the group was suppressed and Safavi executed by the Iranian government in the mid-1950s. The group survived as supporters of the Ayatollah Khomeini and the Islamic Revolution
Iranian Revolution
The Iranian Revolution refers to events involving the overthrow of Iran's monarchy under Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi and its replacement with an Islamic republic under Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the leader of the...

 of Iran.

Background

The group was part of a "growing nationalist mobilization against foreign domination" in the Middle East after World War II, and has been said to presage more famous Islamist
Islamism
Islamism also , lit., "Political Islam" is set of ideologies holding that Islam is not only a religion but also a political system. Islamism is a controversial term, and definitions of it sometimes vary...

 terrorist groups. Its membership is said to have been made up of youth employed in "the lower echelons of the Tehran bazaar." Its program went beyond generalities about following the sharia
Sharia
Sharia law, is the moral code and religious law of Islam. Sharia is derived from two primary sources of Islamic law: the precepts set forth in the Quran, and the example set by the Islamic prophet Muhammad in the Sunnah. Fiqh jurisprudence interprets and extends the application of sharia to...

 to demand prohibitions of alcohol, tobacco, opium, films, gambling, wearing of foreign clothing, the enforcement of amputation of hands of thieves, and the veiling
Hijab
The word "hijab" or "'" refers to both the head covering traditionally worn by Muslim women and modest Muslim styles of dress in general....

 of women, and an elimination from school curriculum of all non-Muslim subjects such as music.

Rise

Its first assassination was of a nationalist, anti-clerical, Iranian author named Ahmad Kasravi
Ahmad Kasravi
Ahmad Kasravi , was a notable Iranian linguist, historian, and reformer.Born in Hokmabad , Tabriz, Iran, Kasravi was an Iranian Azeri Initially, Kasravi enrolled in a seminary. Later, he joined the Iranian Constitutional Revolution...

, who was shot and killed in 1946. Kasravi is said to have been the target of Ayatollah Khomeini's demand in his first book, Kashf al Asrar (Key to the Secrets), that "all those who criticized Islam" are mahdur ad-damm, (meaning that their blood must be shed by the faithful). Secularist Iranian author Amir Taheri
Amir Taheri
Amir Taheri is an Iranian-born conservative author based in Europe. His writings focus on the Middle East affairs and topics related to Islamist terrorism. He gained international fame as the man behind the 2006 Iranian sumptuary law controversy.-Career:Taheri's biography at Benador Associates...

 argues that Khomeini was closely associated with Navab Safavi and his ideas, and that Khomeini's assertion "amounted to a virtual death sentence on Kasravi."

Hussein Emami, the assassin and a founding member of the Fadayan, was promptly arrested and sentenced to death for the crime. The Iranian intelligentsia united in calling for an example to be made of him. Emami, however, was spared the gallows. According to Taheri, he roused religious defenders and used his prestige as a seyyed
Sayyid
Sayyid is an honorific title, it denotes males accepted as descendants of the Islamic prophet Muhammad through his grandsons, Hasan ibn Ali and Husain ibn Ali, sons of the prophet's daughter Fatima Zahra and his son-in-law Ali ibn Abi Talib.Daughters of sayyids are given the titles Sayyida,...

, or descendent of the Prophet Muhammad, to demanded he be tried by a religious court. Khomeini and many of the Shia clergy pressure the Shah to give Emami a pardon, taking advantage of the Shah's political difficulties — such as the occupation of Azerbaijan province
Azerbaijan (Iran)
Azerbaijan or Azarbaijan , also Iranian Azerbaijan, Persian Azarbaijan is a region in northwestern Iran. It is also historically known as Atropatene and Aturpatakan....

 by Soviet troops — at that time. Khomeini himself asked the Shah for the pardon.

In 1949 the group killed Court Minister (and former prime minister) Abdul-Hussein Hazhir. On March 16, 1951, they gunned down the Prime Minister, General) Haj-Ali Razmara, in retaliation for his advice against nationalizing the oil industry. Three weeks later the Education and Culture Minister Ahmad Zangeneh was assassinated by the group. Prime Minister Razmara's assassination was said to have moved Iran "further away from a spirit of compromise and moderation in relation to the oil problem" and "so frightened the ruling classes that concession after concession was made to nationalist demands in an attempt to pacify the intensely aroused public indignation." The Fada'iyan are also reported to have "narrowly failed" in an attempt on the life of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi
Mohammad Reza Pahlavi
Mohammad Rezā Shāh Pahlavi, Shah of Iran, Shah of Persia , ruled Iran from 16 September 1941 until his overthrow by the Iranian Revolution on 11 February 1979...

.

In addition to Emami, Khalil Tahamsebi, the assassin of Razmara, was also pardoned. Ayatollah Abol-Ghasem Kashani
Ayatollah Abol-Ghasem Kashani
Ayatollah Seyyed Abol-Ghasem Mostafavi Kashani was a prominent Twelver Shi'a Muslim cleric and former Parliament Speaker of Iran.-Early life:...

, a powerful member of parliament and a supporter of the Fadayan, "arranged for a special Act to be passed quashing the death sentence on Khalil Tahamsebi and declaring him [Tahamsebi] to be a soldier of Islam," to the further consternation of Iranian secularists.

Although the Fadayan strongly supported the nationalization of Iran's foreign-owned oil industry, they turned against the leader of the nationalization movement, Mohammad Mossadeq, when he became prime minister because of his refusal to implement the sharia
Sharia
Sharia law, is the moral code and religious law of Islam. Sharia is derived from two primary sources of Islamic law: the precepts set forth in the Quran, and the example set by the Islamic prophet Muhammad in the Sunnah. Fiqh jurisprudence interprets and extends the application of sharia to...

 law and appoint strict Islamists to high positions. The danger from the Fada'iyan "was one of the primary factors accounting for Mosaddeq's decision to move the prime minister's office to his own residence." Another assassination attempt on February 15, 1952 (25 Bahman 1330) badly wounded Hossein Fatemi
Hossein Fatemi
Hossein Fatemi was a scholar, journalist, and famous politician of Iran. A close associate of Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh, he proposed nationalization of Iranian oil and gas assets. Initially a journalist, he served as Foreign Affairs Minister of Iran from 1951 to 1953...

, "Mosaddeq's dynamic and capable aide" and foreign minister, left Fatemi "badly wounded and effectively disabled for almost eight months." This was planned by the group's second in command, Abolhossein Vahedi, and executed by a teenage member of the group.

Crackdown

In 1955, Navab Safavi and "other members of the Fedayeen of Islam, including Emami," were finally executed. The group continued on, however, according to author Baqer Moin
Baqer Moin
Baqer Moin is a BBC journalist and author. He has been described as "a specialist on Iran and Islam and is head of the BBC's Persian Service" and as "BBC's Central Asia specialist"...

, turning to Ayatollah Khomeini for a new spiritual leader, and reportedly being "reconstructed" by Khomeini disciple and later controversial "hanging judge," Sadegh Khalkhali. It is thought to have executed the assassination of Iranian Prime Minister Hassan Ali Mansour in 1965. Mansour is reported to have been "tried" by a secret Islamic court made up of Khomeini followers Morteza Motahhari
Morteza Motahhari
Ayatollah Murtaza Motahhari was an Iranian scholar, cleric, lecturer, and politician.Motahhari is considered among the important influences on the ideologies of the Islamic Republic, and was a co-founder of Hosseiniye Ershad and the Combatant Clergy Association...

 and Ayatollah Mohammad Beheshti
Ayatollah Mohammad Beheshti
Ayatollah Dr. Seyyed Mohammad Hosseini Beheshti , was an Iranian scholar, writer, jurist and one of the main architects of the constitution of the Islamic Republic in Iran. He was the secretary-general of the Islamic Republic Party, and the head of Iran's judicial system...

 and sentenced to death "on a charge of `warring on Allah` as symbolized by the decision" to send Khomeini into exile. The three perpetrators of the "sentence" - Mohammad Bokara'i, Morteza Niknezhad and Reza Saffar-Harandi - "were arrested and charged as accomplices," but the story of the trial and sentence was not revealed until after the revolution.

Revolution and Islamic Republic

During the 1979 Iranian Revolution
Iranian Revolution
The Iranian Revolution refers to events involving the overthrow of Iran's monarchy under Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi and its replacement with an Islamic republic under Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the leader of the...

, Fadayan members served as foot soldiers for Khomeini and formed part of the fundamentalist wing of the revolutionary base, pressuring Khomeini to implement rule of Islam immediately. They called for a "wholesale introduction of Islamic legal and social codes including a ban on music, alcohol, the cinema, usury, women working outside the home and compulsory veiling." Many of its members went on to serve in the Islamic Republic regime.

In late 1998, after concern was raised about a series of killings of Iranian dissidents, (known as the Chain Murders
Chain murders of Iran
The Chain Murders of Iran , or Serial Murders, were a series of murders and disappearances from 1988-1998 by Iranian government operatives of Iranian dissident intellectuals who had been critical of the Islamic Republic system in some way.The victims included more than 80 writers, translators,...

), a statement was issued in Tehran by a previously unknown group with a name similar to Fadayaan-e Islam, taking credit for at least some of the killings. The statement by a group calling itself "pure Mohammadan Islam devotees of Mostafa Navvab," (Fadayaan-e Islam-e Naab-e Mohammadi-ye Mostafa Navvab), said in part:
"Now than domestic politicians, through negligence and leniency, and under slogan of rule of law, support the masked poisonous vipers of the aliens, and brand the decisive approaches of the Islamic system, judiciary and responsible press and advocates of the revolution as monopolistic and extremist spread of violence and threats to the freedom, the brave and zealous children of the Iranian Muslim nation took action and by revolutionary execution of dirty and sold-out elements who were behind nationalistic movements and other poisonous moves in universities, took the second practical step in defending the great achievements of the Islamic Revolution ... The revolutionary execution of Dariush Forouhar
Dariush Forouhar
Dariush Forouhar was a founder and leader of the Hezb-e Mellat-e Iran , a pan-Iranist opposition party in Iran and served as Minister of Labor in the Provisional Revolutionary Government of Mehdi Bazargan in 1979...

,
Parvaneh Eskandari, Mohammad Mokhtari
Mohammad Mokhtari
Mohammad Mokhtari was an Iranian writer who was murdered on the outskirts of Tehran in the course of the Chain Murders of Iran. He left his residence at five o'clock in the afternoon of December 2 1998, reportedly to buy light bulbs on Jordan Boulevard in north Tehran...

 and Mohammad Jafar Pouyandeh
Mohammad Jafar Pouyandeh
Mohammad Jafar Pouyandeh, was an Iranian author and "one of the active translators of the country" who is most famous for being one of the victims of the Chain murders of Iran....

is a warning to all mercenary writers and their counter-value supporters who are cherishing the idea of spreading corruption and promiscuity in the country and bringing back foreign domination over Iran..."


It is not certain what the connection of the group was to the murders.
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