Iran opposition sees opportunity at Friday prayers

Their top supporter in the clerical leadership - Ayatollah Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani - is delivering the sermon today for the first time since the disputed June 12 presidential election, and opposition activists intend to pack the hall to prove their movement remains vibrant despite a government crackdown.

Opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi said late Wednesday that he would attend the prayers, also for the first time since the upheaval over the elections erupted.

But hard-liners probably will attend, raising the prospect of a highly public confrontation during the prayers, which are broadcast live on national radio. In the past week, government supporters have been pressuring Rafsanjani to make clear his loyalty to the country’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in his sermon.

In a sharply worded letter made public this week, hard-line university students demanded that Rafsanjani “break his silence by defending the values of the revolution and clearing up the speculation surrounding him.’’

The opposition hopes the prayers will be a key moment to prove its staying power. Mousavi says he won the election and the results showing President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s victory are fraudulent. He insists Ahmadinejad’s government will be illegitimate.

Security forces crushed massive street protests in support of Mousavi, and the supreme leader has backed Ahmadinejad. Hard-liners in the clerical leadership have since been demanding that the public fall in line behind Khamenei, hoping to put behind them the biggest challenge to their rule in 30 years. They have depicted the opposition as radicals backed by foreign enemies and have kept the opposition voice out of state-run media, which reaches the widest audience around the country.

Friday prayers could poke a hole in that blackout, a prospect that clearly concerns authorities.

The prayers, held at Tehran University, could be an unpredictable moment. Opposition activists are planning a rally outside the university afterward, raising the prospect of friction with hard-liners.

Equally unpredictable is Rafsanjani, a mercurial politician and consummate insider in Iran’s clerical leadership. He is a bitter rival of Ahmadinejad’s, has tense relations with Khamenei, and is believed to support Mousavi behind the scenes. His daughter and four relatives who openly backed Mousavi were briefly detained during the protests. Still, many opposition activists mistrust him, seeing his top priority as power and survival.

Rafsanjani has not spoken out on the elections since the turmoil. He may not say anything against Khamenei in his sermon, but he could criticize Ahmadinejad.

Or he may say nothing. That Rafsanjani is finally delivering the sermon could signal he reached some accommodation with Khamenei not to cause trouble. The sermon usually rotates between Rafsanjani and three other clerics - mainly vehement hard-liners - but since the election, Rafsanjani’s turn has been skipped with no reason given.