Revolution is in the Iranian air

There are increasing signs that the reform movement is turning more radical. There were widespread demonstrations at Iranian universities on Student Day, Dec. 7. As Ilan Berman observes on the facing page, the Student Day demonstrations had a harder edge than the protests in June. Last summer, the main focus was the disputed outcome of the presidential election. Now Iran’s young voices are calling for fundamental change. Student marchers in Tehran burned portraits of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei and carried Iranian flags from which they had cut the emblem representing Allah. The protests in June were reformist; Student Day verged on the revolutionary. [bron]