View source for Fada'iyan-e Islam

{{Short description|Shia fundamentalist group/political party in Iran}}
{{Infobox political party
| name             = Society of Fadayeen Islam
| native_name      = جمعیت فدائیان اسلام
| native_name_lang = fa
| logo             = 
| caption          = 
| colorcode        = #009900
| general_secretary = [[Mohammad-Mehdi Abdekhodaei]]
| founder          = [[Navab Safavi]]
| founded          = 1946
| legalised        = {{start date|1989|07|02|df=y}}<ref name="Khorasan">{{cite web|url=http://www.parstimes.com/politics/legally_registered_parties.html|work=Khorasan Newspaper|title=List of Legally Registered Parties in Iran|publisher=Pars Times|access-date=21 August 2015|number=14759|page=4|date=July 30, 2000}}</ref>
| headquarters     = [[Qom]] and [[Tehran]]
| newspaper        = ''Manshoor-e-Baradari''
| ideology         = [[Islamism]]<ref name="iranica"/><br/>[[Islamic fundamentalism]]<ref name="iranica"/><br/>[[Islamic revivalism]]<ref name="iranica"/> [[Guardianship of the Islamic Jurist]]
| membership       = <100<ref>{{cite book|last1=Abrahamian|first1=Ervand|title=The Coup: 1953, the CIA, and the roots of modern U.S.-Iranian relations|date=2013|publisher=The New Press|location=New York|isbn=978-1-59558-826-5|page=42|quote=Although these and future assassinations gave the Fedayan much publicity, their inner core contained no more than a handful of zealots. Their total membership was less than a hundred. Most were young semiliterate apprentices in the Tehran bazaar.}}</ref>
| membership_year  = 1949
| position         = 
| religion         = [[Shia Islam]]
| slogan           = {{langx|fa|اسلام برتر از همه چیز است و هیچ چیز برتر از اسلام نیست}}<br/>"''Islam is above anything and nothing is above Islam''"
| website          = {{url|http://www.fadaeian.ir}}
| country          = Iran
| flag             = 
| footnotes        = 
}}

'''Fadayan-e Islam''' ({{langx|fa|فدائیان اسلام}}'';'' English; "[[Fedayeen]] of Islam" or "Redeemers of Islam"<ref name="Encyclopædia Britannica">{{cite web|url = https://www.britannica.com/biography/Ali-Razmara|title = Ali Razmara &ndash; Prime Minister of Iran|publisher = [[Encyclopædia Britannica]]|date = 25 August 2016|access-date = 12 December 2016}}</ref>) is a [[Shia Islam|Shia]] [[Islamic fundamentalism|fundamentalist]] group in [[Iran]] with a strong activist political and [[Terrorism|terrorist]] orientation.<ref name="iranica">FEDĀʾĪĀN-E ESLĀM. (1999). In Encyclopædia Iranica. Retrieved from  http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/fedaian-e-esla ''The Fedāʾīān’s importance in Persian politics was due to several related factors. First, they were exceptionally successful as a rebel organization''</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://web.mit.edu/taalebi/www/soscof/oilNationalization/ciaQuo/kazemzadehReview.html |title=Finding Mossadegh. (Reconstructing the story of a coup that changed history) |quote=The "terrorist group" that Kermit Roosevelt and Donald Wilber mobilized was the Fadaian Islam |publisher=Web.mit.edu |author=Masoud Kazemzadeh |date=4 January 2005}}</ref><ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=l_qful9qJ8AC&dq=nawab+safavi+and+fada+terrorist&pg=PR14 Iran: between tradition and modernity By Ramin Jahanbegloo]</ref><ref name=ostvar>{{cite thesis|url = http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/64683/1/afshon_1.pdf|title = Guardians of the Islamic Revolution: Ideology, Politics, and the Development of Military Power in Iran (1979–2009)|first = Afshon P.|last = Ostovar|type = Ph.D.|year = 2009|publisher = [[The University of Michigan]]|quote = The Fada'iyan-e Islam were the first Shiite Islamist organization to employ terrorism as a primary method of political activism |page = 35}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|chapter-url = https://books.google.com/books?id=5Dnb6E5s3HwC&pg=PA177|page = 177|title = Urban Unrest in the Middle East: A Comparative Study of Informal Networks in Egypt, Iran, and Lebanon|first = Guilain|last = Denoeux|publisher = [[SUNY Press]]|isbn = 9781438400846|series = SUNY series in the Social and Economic History of the Middle East|year = 1993|chapter = Religious Networks and Urban Unrest}}</ref> The group was founded in 1946, and registered as a [[political party]] in 1989. It was founded by a theology student, [[Navvab Safavi]]. Safavi sought to purify Islam in Iran by ridding it of 'corrupting individuals' by means of carefully planned assassinations of certain leading intellectual and political figures.<ref name="Taheri, 1985 p.98">Taheri, ''The Spirit of Allah,'' (1985), p. 98</ref> 

The group executed a series of successful assassinations (author [[Ahmad Kasravi]], court minister (and former prime minister) [[Abdolhossein Hazhir]], the Prime Minister [[Haj Ali Razmara]], the former education minister [[Abdul Hamid Zangeneh]]) and attempted assassinations (the Shah of Iran, foreign minister [[Hossein Fatemi]]) and succeeded in freeing of some of its assassins from punishment with the help of the group's powerful clerical supporters. Eventually the group was suppressed and Safavi was executed by the Iranian government in the mid-1950s. The group survived as supporters of the Ayatollah [[Khomeini]] and the [[Iranian Revolution]].<ref name=Taheri-187/><ref name=Moin-224/><ref name="Taheri, 1985 p.107-8"/>

==Background==
[[File:Navvad Safavi.jpg|thumb|[[Navvab Safavi]], founder of the Fadayan-e Islam]]

The group was part of a "growing [[nationalist]] mobilization against foreign domination" in the Middle East after World War II, and has been said to presage more famous [[Islamism|Islamist]] terrorist groups.<ref>[http://www.meforum.org/article/304 Fundamentalist Islam at Large: The Drive for Power] by Martin Kramer,  ''Middle East Quarterly,''  June 1996</ref> Its membership is said to have been made up of youth employed in "the lower echelons of the Tehran bazaar." Its program went beyond generalities about following the [[sharia]] to demand prohibitions of alcohol, tobacco, opium, films, gambling, wearing of foreign clothing, the enforcement of amputation of hands of thieves, and the [[hijab|veiling]] of women, and an elimination from school curriculum of all non-Muslim subjects such as music.<ref>Abrahamian, Ervand ''Iran between Two Revolutions'', Princeton University Press, 1982, p. 259</ref>

==History==
In a 1945 declaration, Navvad Safavi stated:
{{blockquote|We are alive and God, the revengeful, is alert. The blood of the destitute has long been dripping from the fingers of the selfish pleasure seekers, who are hiding, each with a different name and in a different colour, behind black curtains of oppression, thievery and crime. Once in a while the divine retribution puts them in their place, but the rest of them do not learn a lesson. … Damn you! You traitors, imposters, oppressors! You deceitful hypocrites! We are free, noble and alert. We are knowledgeable, believers in God and fearless.{{sfn|Behdad|1997|p=45}}}}

===Rise===
Its first assassination was of a [[nationalist]], [[anti-clerical]] author named [[Ahmad Kasravi]], who was stabbed and killed in 1946. Kasravi is said to have been the target of Ayatollah Khomeini's demand in his first book, ''Kashf al Asrar'' (Key to the Secrets), that "all those who criticized Islam" are [[mahdur ad-damm]], (meaning that their blood must be shed by the faithful).<ref name="Taheri, 1985 p.98"/> Secularist Iranian author [[Amir Taheri]] argues that Khomeini was closely associated with Navvab Safavi and his ideas, and that Khomeini's assertion "amounted to a virtual death sentence on Kasravi."<ref>Taheri, ''The Spirit of Allah'', (1985), p. 101</ref>

Hussein Emami, the assassin and a founding member of the Fada'iyan, was promptly arrested and sentenced to death for the crime. The Iranian intelligentsia united in calling for an example to be made of him. Emami, however, was spared the gallows. According to Taheri, he roused religious defenders and used his prestige as a [[Sayyid|seyyed]], or descendant of the [[Islamic prophet]] [[Muhammad]], to demand he be tried by a religious court. Khomeini and many of the Shia clergy pressured the Shah to give Emami a pardon, taking advantage of the Shah's political difficulties at that time, such as the occupation of [[Azerbaijan (Iran)|Azerbaijan province]] by [[Soviet Union|Soviet]] troops.   Khomeini himself asked the Shah for the pardon.<ref name="Taheri, 1985 p.107-8">Taheri, ''The Spirit of Allah'', (1985), pp. 107–108</ref>

In November 1949 the group killed court minister (and former prime minister) [[Abdolhossein Hazhir]].<ref>{{cite book |author=Farhad Kazemi|editor=Said Amir Arjomand|title=From Nationalism to Revolutionary Islam|date=1984|page=163 |publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|location=London|isbn=978-1-349-06849-4|chapter-url=https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-06847-0|chapter=The Fadaˈiyan-e Islam: Fanaticism, Politics and Terror|doi=10.1007/978-1-349-06847-0 }}</ref> On 7 March 1951, the Prime Minister [[Haj Ali Razmara]] was assassinated, in retaliation for his advice against nationalizing the oil industry.<ref name=ostvar/><ref>{{cite web|title=Iran. Mossadeq and oil nationalization|access-date=21 April 2022
|url=http://www.workmall.com/wfb2001/iran/iran_history_mossadeq_and_oil_nationalization.html|publisher=The Library of Congress Country Studies}}</ref> Three weeks later the former education minister [[Abdul Hamid Zangeneh]] was assassinated by the group. Razmara's assassination was said to have moved Iran "further away from a spirit of compromise and moderation in relation to the oil problem" and "so frightened the ruling classes that concession after concession was made to nationalist demands in an attempt to pacify the intensely aroused public indignation."<ref>Zabih, Sepehr, ''The Mossadegh Era : Roots of the Iranian Revolution'', Lake View Press, 1982, pp. 25–26</ref> An assassination attempt on Shah [[Mohammad Reza Pahlavi]], on 4 February 1949, was carried out by Fakhr-Arai; Fakhr-Arai was first attributed to be a member of the communist [[Tudeh Party of Iran]],<ref>{{cite web |url=http://persepolis.free.fr/iran/personalities/shah.html |title=The Shah |publisher= Persepolis |access-date=18 June 2011}}</ref> but he was later found to more likely be a religious fundamentalist member of Fada'iyan-e Islam.<ref>{{cite book |last=Dreyfuss |first=Robert |title=Devil's Game: How the United States Helped Unleash Fundamentalist Islam |publisher=Owl Books |year=2006 |isbn=0-8050-8137-2 |url=https://archive.org/details/devilsgame00robe}}</ref><ref>Molavi, ''The Soul of Iran'', (2005), p. 323</ref>

In addition to Emami, [[Khalil Tahmasebi]], the assassin of Razmara, was also pardoned by the Iranian Parliament during the premiership of [[Mohammad Mossadegh]].<ref name=zabih>{{cite journal|last=Zabih|first=Sepehr|title=Aspects of Terrorism in Iran|journal=Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science|date=September 1982|volume=463|series=International Terrorism|pages=84–94|jstor=1043613|publisher=Sage Publications|doi=10.1177/0002716282463001007|s2cid=145391253}}</ref> [[Ayatollah Abol-Ghasem Kashani]], a powerful member of parliament and a supporter of the Fadayan, "arranged for a special Act to be passed quashing the death sentence on Tahamsebi and declaring him (Tahamsebi) to be a soldier of Islam,"<ref>Taheri, ''The Spirit of Allah'', (1985), p. 109</ref> to the further consternation of Iranian secularists. However, following the fall of Mossaddegh Tahmasebi was arrested again and tried in 1952.<ref name=zabih/> He was sentenced to death and executed in 1955.<ref name=zabih/> In addition, Ayatollah Kashani ended his alliance with Mossadegh and become close to the Shah after the assassination.<ref name=ostvar/><ref name=zabih/>

Although the Fada'iyan strongly supported the nationalization of Iran's foreign-owned oil industry, they turned against the leader of the nationalization movement, [[Mohammad Mossadeq]], when he became prime minister, because of his refusal to implement [[sharia]] law and appoint strict Islamists to high positions.<ref>Abrahamian, Ervand, ''A History of Modern Iran'', Cambridge University Press, 2008, p. 116</ref>  The Fada'iyan attempted to assassinate Mossadeq<ref>Abrahamian, ''Khomeinism'', 1993, p. 105</ref> and the danger from the Fada'iyan "was one of the primary factors accounting for Mosaddeq's decision to move the prime minister's office to his own residence."<ref name="Gasiorowski"/> Another assassination attempt on 15 February 1952 badly wounded [[Hossein Fatemi]], "Mosaddeq's dynamic and capable aide" and foreign minister. That left Fatemi "badly wounded and effectively disabled for almost eight months." The attempted assassination was planned by the group's second in command, Abolhossein Vahedi, and carried out by a teenage member of the group.<ref name="Gasiorowski">''Mohammad Mosaddeq and the 1953 Coup in Iran'', Mark j. Gasiorowski and Malcolm Byrne (Eds.), Syracuse University Press, 2004, p. 66</ref>

After the coup that removed Mosaddeq, Safavi congratulated the Shah:
{{blockquote|The country was saved by Islam and with the power of faith ... The Shah and prime minister and ministers have to be believers in and promoters of, Shi'ism, and the laws that are in opposition to the divine laws of God … must be nullified. … The intoxicants, the shameful exposure and carelessness of women, and sexually provocative music … must be done away with and the superior teachings of Islam … must replace them. With the implementation of Islam's superior economic plan, the deprivation of the Muslim people of Iran, and the dangerous class difference would end.{{sfn|Behdad|1997|p=50}}}}
In the years to follow, he enjoyed a close association with the government. In 1954, he attended the Islamic Conference in Jordan and traveled to Egypt. There he learned about Hasan al-Banna, the founder of Muslim Brotherhood ({{langx|ar|الإخوان المسلمين}}), who was killed by Egyptian government in 1949, and met [[Sayyid Qutb]].{{sfn|Behdad|1997|p=51}} <ref>Syed Viqar Salahuddin, ''Islam, peace, and conflict: based on six events in the year 1979, which were harbingers of the present day conflicts in the Muslim world'', Pentagon Press (2008), p. 5</ref> 
====Conflict with ulama====
Safavi was not supported by the ulama and the Shia Marja, Ayatullah [[Hossein Borujerdi]], rejected his ideas, questioning him about robberies that his organization committed on gun point. Safavi replied:
{{blockquote|Our intention is to borrow from people. What we take is for establishing a government based on the model of Imam Ali's government. Our goal is sacred and prior to these tools. When we established an Aliid government-like state, then we give people their money back.{{sfn|Khalaji|2009|pp=70–71}} <ref>رسول جعفریان، ”جریان ها و سازمان های مذهبی سیاسی ایران“، ص٢٧١ ، ١٣٩٤ شمسی</ref>}}
Fada'ian-e Islam launched a campaign of character assassination against the Marja and reportedly called for excommunication of Borujerdi and the defrocking of religious scholars who opposed the campaign of the Fada'iyan.{{sfn|Khalaji|2009|p=71}} Navvab safavi didn't like Broujerdi's idea of Shia-Sunni rapprochement ({{langx|fa|تقریب}}), he{{clarify|date=January 2024}}<!--Who? Safavi or Broujerdi?--> advocated Shia-Sunni unification ({{langx|fa|وحدت}}) under Islamist agenda.{{sfn|Bohdan|2020|p=247}}

===Crackdown===
In 1955, Navvab Safavi and "other members of the Fedayeen of Islam, including Emami," were finally executed.<ref>Taheri, ''The Spirit of Allah'', (1985), p. 115</ref> The group continued however, turning, according to author [[Baqer Moin]], to Ayatollah Khomeini as a new spiritual leader,<ref name=Moin-224>Moin, ''Khomeini'' (2000), p. 224</ref> and reportedly being "reconstructed" by Khomeini disciple, and later controversial "hanging judge", [[Sadegh Khalkhali]].<ref name=Taheri-187>Taheri, Amir, ''Spirit of Allah : Khomeini and the Islamic Revolution'', Adler and Adler 1985, p. 187</ref> It is thought to have carried out the assassination of Iranian Prime Minister [[Hassan Ali Mansour]] in 1965. Mansour is reported to have been "tried" by a secret Islamic court, made up of Khomeini followers [[Morteza Motahhari]] and [[Ayatollah Mohammad Beheshti]], and sentenced to death "on a charge of 'warring on Allah' as symbolized by the decision" to send Khomeini into exile.  The three men who carried out the "sentence" – Mohammad Bokara'i, Morteza Niknezhad and Reza Saffar-Harandi – "were arrested and charged as accomplices", but the story of both the trial and the sentence was not revealed until after the revolution.<ref>Taheri, ''The Spirit of Allah'', (1985), p. 156</ref>
===Khomeini===
The organization dispersed but after the death of Ayatullah Borujerdi, the Fada'ian-e Islam sympathizers found a new leader in Ayatullah [[Ruhollah Khomeini]] who appeared on political horizon through the [[1963 demonstrations in Iran|June 1963 riots]] in Qom.{{sfn|Behdad|1997|p=60}} In 1965, prime minister [[Hassan Ali Mansur]] was assassinated by the group.{{sfn|Behdad|1997|p=61}}
===Revolution and Islamic Republic===
After the 1979 [[Iranian Revolution]] and establishment of the Islamic Republic of Iran, there were "three abortive attempts" made by "old members or sympathizers" of the Fada'ian to restore the organization.<ref>Y. Richard, “Ayatollah Kashani: Precursor of the Islamic Republic?” in N. Keddie, ed., Religion and Politics in Iran: Shiism from Quietism to Revolution, New Haven, 1983, pp. 76–79. cite from {{cite book |last1=Kazemi |first1=Farhad |title=FEDĀʾĪĀN-E ESLĀM |date=1999 |url=https://iranicaonline.org/articles/fedaian-e-esla|publisher=Encyclopaedia Iranica}}</ref> 
# by Ṣādeq Ḵalḵālī with ʿAbd-Allāh Karbāsčīān; 
# by Moḥammad-Mahdī ʿAbd-e Ḵodāʾī, Shaikh Moḥammad-ʿAlī Lavāsānī, and Jawād Wāḥedī; 
# by Abu’l-Qāsem Rafīʿī, a former security chief of the Fada'ian.

According to Farhad Kazemi of Iranica, "the main carriers" of the Fedāʾīān’s legacy in the Islamic Republic, are the Coalition of Islamic Associations, which "grew from the former members and sympathizers" of the Fedāʾīān who have developed connections to "Ayatollah Khomeini and his lieutenants since 1963".<ref name=iranicaonline>{{cite book |last1=Kazemi |first1=Farhad |title=FEDĀʾĪĀN-E ESLĀM |date=1999 |url=https://iranicaonline.org/articles/fedaian-e-esla|publisher=Encyclopaedia Iranica}}</ref>

== Members of the group ==
These persons are main member of the group:<ref>{{cite web | url=http://iranmehr1.tripod.com/1Reform/RfBygone21Mar02BayganiP.html | title = 8 Steps to Solidarity | access-date=18 January 2016}}</ref>
* [[Navab Safavi]], leader of the group Fadayan-e Islam
* [[Mozafar Zolghadr]]: He was from [[Karasf]] city, in the [[Khodabandeh County]], [[Zanjan Province]]. Mozafar was born in a rural and religious family. Mozafar Zolghadr decided to murder [[Hossein Ala']] but his gun did not fire. After that he arrested and executed.<ref>{{cite web | url=http://www.dana.ir/news/216457.html | title=یکی ازافتخارات خدابنده،شهید ذوالقدر است/تصویر | publisher=www.dana.ir | access-date=18 January 2016 | archive-date=19 January 2015 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150119230251/http://www.dana.ir/News/216457.html | url-status=dead }}</ref><ref>{{cite web | url=http://www.farsnews.com/newstext.php?nn=13931024000347 | title=روی کفن مظفر ذوالقدر چه حرفی برای نخست وزیر نوشته شده بود | publisher=Fars News Agency | access-date=18 January 2016 | archive-date=5 July 2015 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150705222432/http://www.farsnews.com/newstext.php?nn=13931024000347 | url-status=dead }}</ref>
* [[Seyyed Muhammad Vahedi]]
* [[Khalil Tahmasebi]], the member of Fada'iyan-e Islam who assassinated Iranian Prime Minister [[Haj Ali Razmara]] in March 1951.<ref name="Encyclopædia Britannica"/>  He was described as a "religious fanatic" by ''[[The New York Times]]''<ref>{{cite news|newspaper = [[The New York Times]]|url = https://www.nytimes.com/1951/03/08/archives/premier-of-iran-is-shot-to-death-in-a-mosque-by-a-religious-fanatic.html|title = Premier of Iran Is Shot to Death In a Mosque by a Religious Fanatic; Premier of Iran Slain in Mosque, Cabinet in Emergency Session, Victim of Assassin |agency = Associated Press|date = 8 March 1951|access-date = 12 December 2016}}</ref> and was executed in 1955.<ref>{{cite journal|last = Zabih|first = Sepehr|title = Aspects of Terrorism in Iran|journal = [[The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science]]|year = 1982|volume = 463|issue = 1|pages = 84–94|jstor = 1043613|doi = 10.1177/0002716282463001007|s2cid = 145391253}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url = http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,817453,00.html|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20101125203537/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,817453,00.html|url-status = dead|archive-date = November 25, 2010|title = Iran: Time of the Assassin|date = 1 December 1952|access-date = 12 December 2016|newspaper = [[Time (magazine)|Time]]}}</ref>
* [[Jafar Shojouni]]
* [[Seyyed Mehdi Tabatabaei]]

==See also==
{{Portal|Iran|Islam}}
* [[Terrorism in Iran]]

==References==
{{Reflist}}

===Works cited===
* {{Cite journal |last=Behdad |first=Sohrab |date=Jan 1997 |title=Islamic Utopia in Pre-Revolutionary Iran: Navvab Safavi and the Fada'ian-e Eslam |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/4283846 |jstor=4283846 |journal=Middle Eastern Studies |volume=33 |issue=1 |pages=40–65 |doi=10.1080/00263209708701141|url-access=subscription }}
* {{Cite journal |last=Bohdan |first=Siarhei |date=Summer 2020 |title='They Were Going Together with the Ikhwan': The Influence of Muslim Brotherhood Thinkers on Shi'i Islamists during the Cold War |url=https://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/mei/mei/2020/00000074/00000002/art00005;jsessionid=3669aj37j07cl.x-ic-live-03 |journal=The Middle East Journal |volume=74 |issue=2 |pages=243–262 |doi=10.3751/74.2.14 |s2cid=225510058 |issn=1940-3461|url-access=subscription }}
* {{Cite journal |last=Khalaji |first=Mehdi |date=November 27, 2009 |title=The Dilemmas of Pan-Islamic Unity |url=https://www.hudson.org/research/9859-the-dilemmas-of-pan-islamic-unity- |journal=Current Trends in Islamist Ideology |volume=9 |pages=64–79}}

==Further reading==
* {{EI3|last=Katouzian|first=Homa|title=Fidāʾiyyān-i Islām|year=2013|url=https://referenceworks.brillonline.com/entries/encyclopaedia-of-islam-3/fidaiyyan-i-islam-COM_27121?s.num=36&s.f.s2_parent=s.f.book.encyclopaedia-of-islam-3&s.start=20&s.q=Iran}}

{{Iranian political parties}}

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