When their soccer heroes scored a 2-1 triumph and thereby killed U.S. hopes in the World Cup, Iranians flooded into the streets and whooped and hooted until dawn. No "Death to America" this time. In fact, a few Cup-crazed fans raced their cars up and down Valiasr Street, Tehran's main drag, with the American flag fluttering out the window. One reveler even cried out, within earshot of the bearded morality police who kept a disapproving watch on the fun, "We love America!"
Playing in the international soccer championship, partying in the streets, putting old grudges to rest? Yes, outcast and uptight Iran is changing. Slowly, for sure, but certainly faster than anyone could have imagined just one year ago. Since the surprise 1997 election of Mohammed Khatami, who in Iranian terms is a moderate, a fierce internal battle has begun, with the stakes being the future of the mullah-led theocracy.
The turbaned former philosophy professor has set the country on a new course toward greater freedom, respect for the rule of law and "a dialogue of civilizations." He wants an Iran where the people, not just the Shi'ite Muslim mullahs, have their say. Small wonder that friends and foes alike refer to him as Ayatullah Gorbachev.
One hallmark of Khatami's campaign for change is his very tentative effort to create a less hostile relationship with the American "Great Satan." Last January he called for cultural exchanges aimed at breaking down the "wall of mistrust" between Tehran and Washington. When Secretary of State Madeleine Albright finally delivered a full-blown response to Khatami two weeks ago, calling on Iran to explore further confidence-building steps and draw a road map to "normal relations," it was the most conciliatory tone on Iran to come out of Washington since Khomeini's revolutionaries held 52 Americans hostage for 444 days in 1979-81.
But the old-line mullahs, led by the Supreme Leader Ayatullah Ali Khamenei, are determined to blunt the new President's reformist efforts. Conservative-controlled state radio immediately dismissed Albright's olive branch as nothing new, demanding that the U.S. apologize for a half-century of wrongs toward Iran. In a domestic power struggle that has intensified in the past month, the hard-liners have put the moderate mayor of Tehran on trial on corruption charges, ousted a key Khatami Cabinet minister and ordered the closure of a new liberal newspaper licensed under the President's pledge of greater press freedom. "What we are seeing," says Tehran University political scientist Nasser Hadian, "is a fight for the soul of Iran."
Khatami's problem is that while he won the hearts of the people with a remarkable 70% of the popular vote, hard-liners retained all the instruments of state power: control of the army, the police and the courts, as well as the terrorist elements that have caused mayhem abroad. The fundamentalists also continue to hold a majority in the 270-member Iranian Parliament.