Baha'i leader demands halt to harassment, toture, killing

          
          American husband., Jimmy.
          “Our faith, from the beginning,
          said things that would annoy the
          (Iranian) authorities,” she began.
          Baha'is do not believe n clergy,
          which would appear to be
          I anathema in a country whose
          - political shots are called by the
          Islamic clergy.
          Women were accepted as equals
          in the early writings of Baha'i
          founder, Baha'u'llah. That state-
          ment and others earned the founder
          a lifetime in jail, according to a
          history of the faith. Baha'i women
          are not bound to wear the tradi-
          tional veil that has again become
          popular among Islamic women in
          Iran.
          Baha'js believe all world
          religious are divine in origin. Jesus,
          Buddha, Mohammed and
          Baha'n'llah are all prophets. There
          is no one, true prophet.
          In addition, because the founder
          Spent so much time in jail there,
          Haifa, Israel, holds one of the ma-
          jor shrines to the Baha'i faith.
          Israel and Iran share a relationship
          akin to that between water and oil
          — they don't mix.
          Earlier this month, 16 Baha'is —
          six men and 10 women, including
          three teenage girls — were ex-
          ecuted by hanging despite a per-
          sons! appeal for their lives from
          President Reagan.
          The Baha'i leader asked that the
          U.S. government push for the U.N.
          Commission on Human Rights to
          intercede with Iran on behalf of the
          Baha'is, and that immigration
          As a minority, and because they
          were different, Baha'is found
          themselves blamed, for epidemics,
          famines and other natural disasters
          throughout Persian history.
          The late Shah Mohammed Iteza.
          Pahlavj refused to reopen Baha'i
          schools that had been closed during
          the reign of his father. In 1955, his
          government announced the Baha'i
          religion had been banned.
          Historically, the Baha'i have Violent attacks on Baha'i years. ThehomeinTaq .ofB 'i
          been objects of religious persecu- followers and landmarks including founder Baha'u”liah was destroyed
          tion since the religion was founded, rape, looting, burning and murder and the land put up for sale. The
          Waltham Baha'i Henry Lawrence followed. International outcry shrine of another Baha'i prophet,
          likened the persecution waves as helped reinstate the Baha'i in Ira- Bab, was bulldozed over in 1979.
          appearing in five and ten year man society. It is the increasing scale of the
          cycles. ‘ •-• With --the coming of -the--latest persecutions that led Henry
          Ayatollah's Islamic Republic, Lawrence to add a postscript to his
          Baha'i were again barred from theory of cyclical persecutions of
          schools and, universities in the Baha'i. -
          September, 1981. For Mrs. For- “The fear is of genocide this
          sythe's brother Soroush, it meant time.” -
          the end of two years of medical After several minutes of careful
          studies, she said, thumbing, Mrs. Forsythe added her
          He was working in a factory own postscript, quoting the words
          before his disappearance, she add- of Baha'u'llah: “Every one of us
          ed. looks forward to the day when the
          Shrines of the faith have been earth will truly be one country and
          destroyed during the past two mankind its citizens.”
          Baha'i'lèàder-d-é'mands halt to.
          harassment, torture, killing
          WASHINGTON (UPI) — The
          leader of the Baha'i religion in the
          United States recently told the
          House Human Rights Caucus that
          Washington should take the lead in
          gaining worldwide condemnation of f
          the persecution of Baha'is in Iran. ‘ .‘ , , . , -
          The suffering of the Baha'i corn- - -* -
          munity in Iran could be reduced if (
          the public would “express its in-
          dignation and -demand .the cessa- ‘
          tion of terror against the innocent,”
          said Dr. Fritz Kazemzadeh, “ ‘ % ‘ ‘
          secretary of the National Spiritual
          Assembly of flaha'js in th United
          States. . .-
          Otherwise, “the Baha'is will be US President Ronald Reagan
          continue to b harassed, - h
          maltreated and killed in a country UPI file P oto
          where jail and the hangman's noose
          have become common instru ments
          of persuasion,” said Kazemzadeh.
          Shiite Moslems, the current
          rulers of Iran, believe that the
          Baha'i faith is a heres ' — that
          Islam, out of which Bahs'm partially
          developed, is the “final” religion
          and that Mohammed was the last
          prophet to appear on earth.
          The Moslem hatred of the Baha'i,
          Kazemzadeh said, “is further fed
          by Baha'i belief in the unity of
          mankind, the equality or races, the
          equality of sexes, universal peace,
          universal education and the har-
          mony of religion and science.”
          Kazemzadeh told the Human
          Rights Caucus that since last
          September's congressional ap-
          proval of a resolution condemning
          Iran's persecution, 27 more Bàha'is
          have been executed.
          BP000538
          rules be eased for Iranian Baha'i
          refugees.
          In the three years since the Ira-
          nian revolution that brought the
          Ayatollah Khomeini to power, more
          than 150 Baha'is have been ex-
          ecuted, thousands of Iranian
          Baha'is have lost their jobs, and
          thousands more Baha'i children
          have been deprived, of formal
          education, Kazemzadeh said.
          Moffarah and James Forsythe look at photo of Baha'i S am
          Haifa, Israel, i-ntheirhome, photobyArt li lman
          Earlier this month, l6Baha is — six men and
          10 women, including three teenage girls —
          were executed by hanging despite a
          personal app ealforthejr lives from -
          Pres. Ronald Reagan -