I’ve been following the #iranelection Twitter feed all day and there is a firehose quatity of information and disinformation coming out of Iran and the Iranian diaspora. This isn’t the Orange Revolution or the Velvet Revolution. This is the Twitter Revolution.
Tomorrow at 4pm, there will marches in 20 Iranian cities. Mousavi has applied for permits in Tehran, but if the Interior Ministry denies those permits, he will lead a procession to the Ayatollah Khomeini’s shrine. On Tuesday, there will be a general strike. Mousavi’s supporters will not open their businesses and they will not go to work.
There are many unconfirmed reports of violence, but so far, few reports of any deaths. The real showdown will begin tomorrow. The government is very aware that creating martyrs will be counterproductive and lead to the same escalation of mourning and protesting that brought down the Shah. For this reason, the police are beating on people but refraining from killing them. That strategy is solid, but may be difficult to maintain tomorrow and the next day.
Observing the Twitter feeds, this has already morphed from a protest about an election to a revolutionary threat to the regime.
