With war raging in the Middle East, we want to bring you as many trusted voices on the news as we can. One such voice is the Israeli journalist Amit Segal. Here’s Amit’s daily newsletter, It’s Noon in Israel, which we’re pleased to publish in The Free Press.
There’s a famous story about communism that often gets referenced as an illustration of the absurd. It goes like this. In 1937, after Joseph Stalin delivered a speech at a Communist Party conference, the hall erupted in applause. Party officials jumped to their feet and began clapping enthusiastically. But after a few minutes, an awkward problem emerged: Who would dare stop first? No one wanted to be the first to sit down and risk appearing disloyal. And so the applause continued—for 11 full minutes.
Dictatorships, in their rituals of loyalty, have a habit of slipping into the comic.
Iran had its own comedic moment this week when a life-size cutout of Mojtaba Khamenei, held together with tape, was carried onstage to roaring crowds at the Tehran allegiance rally in Revolution Square. State media broadcast regime loyalists hailing and swearing allegiance to a cardboard Khamenei.
According to Iranian state media, Khamenei sustained leg injuries in the initial U.S.–Israeli strikes on Iran. The injuries must be quite serious if a cardboard ayatollah cuts a more commanding figure than a wheelchair-bound Khamenei.
