Women in Iran

I also know that Iran’s women stand in the vanguard. For days now, I’ve seen them urging less courageous men on. I’ve seen them get beaten and return to the fray. “Why are you sitting there?” one shouted at a couple of men perched on the sidewalk on Saturday. “Get up! Get up!”

Another green-eyed woman, Mahin, aged 52, staggered into an alley clutching her face and in tears. Then, against the urging of those around her, she limped back into the crowd moving west toward Freedom Square. Cries of “Death to the dictator!” and “We want liberty!” accompanied her.

From Roger Cohen’s Op-Ed in the NYT (which is worth reading in its entirety), & via Andrew Sullivan. If you haven’t seen the photo of the woman who is becoming the trigger point for this revolution, you can see it on Sullivan’s blog. But I’m warning you, it’s hard to see. She died on the street.

I hope the Burmese can see what’s going on, I really do, just so they know they aren’t alone. June 19th was Aung Sun Suu Kyi’s 64th birthday, which she spent in jail. Their next elections are in 2010.