It was in April and May of 1955, during the month of
Ramadan, the Muslim month of fasting, that the popular preacher Shaykh
Muhammad-Taqi, known as Falsafi, began to preach against the Baha'is in a Tihran
mosque. These speeches were broadcast nationally by the Government radio and
became more fierce and vituperative each day. Throughout the entire country,
the passions of the rabble were aroused and further fanned by local religious
leaders. The police and the army took over the National Baha’i headquarters in
Tihran and destroyed the dome of the building. On 17 May, the Minister of the
Interior announced in Parliament that the Government had issued orders for the
suppression of the 'Baha'i sect'. Thus the effects of the inflammatory words of
the religious leaders compounded by the encouragement given by the Government
precipitated an avalanche of persecution: Baha'i holy places were occupied and
ransacked, homes and farms looted and burned, Baha'i cemeteries desecrated;
adults were beaten, young women abducted and forced to marry Muslims, children
expelled from schools, and many dismissed from their employment. Throughout the
whole of that summer, the persecutions continued across the entire country. Not
only was it entirely unchecked by the Government or police, but, in many areas,
it was Government officials who instigated and led the attack on the Baha'is.
- Moojan Momen (Forward to ‘The Seven Martyrs of Hurmuzak’, by Muhammad Labib,
translated by Moojan Momen)
