In the photo above you can see me standing right next to Khomeini’s seat from where he addressed the Iranian nation and the world. This site is actually a Shia temple of lamentation and self-flagellation (“Husayniyyah”) in Jamaran, Tehran, right next to what was then the home of Khomeini (today he is buried in a Sassanian Majoosi-like mega-palace).
No one was allowed up there but security seemed to be asleep and I somehow climbed up the balcony lol.
The Basiji next to me in the photo was called Mohammad. He really looked after me and was very warm and polite to deal with, like many Iranians really, regardless of their religious affiliation. I could see in his eyes that he really loved Allah (SWT), His Messenger (S), and the eel of Muhammad (peace be upon them). He truly believed that the Iranian Revolution, Khomeini the Hindi, and his caliph Khamenei represent true Islam.
I became friends with him during my summer holiday at the time. Mohammad and his friends were so excited to even see a young religious Iranian, as most people in Iran (especially the youth) themselves are hardly religious, let alone the Iranians who come to visit from abroad.
Mohammad came from an influential religious family of senior IRGC members, but I only started to believe that until I saw the powers he held at that young age on an important day.
One day I told him that I really want to see my Imam (taghut Khamenei) and if he can arrange something. Mohammad was like “say no more my G” (well, not literally, lol).
In those days the “Ayyame Fatemiyyeh” was in full swing in Iran. Yes, even more mourning and wailing in which quite officially the death of Fatimah’s (R) is mourned and it is claimed that Umar (R) murdered her. Khamenei himself invites to this mourning ceremony and slander of the Sahabah every year.
When we arrived at Khamenei’s personal and famous wailing temple (named after his Imams, “Imam Khomeini Husayniyyah”) security almost laughed at me and told me that they can’t let a nobody like me through the special entrance where the VIPS go through. However, after they realized that I was with Mohammad, they suddenly changed their minds and a few minutes later I was sitting very near the first row. Rafsanjani, Khatami, Shahroudi, Khamenei, and other criminal Ayatullats were metres away from me. That’s when I knew he wasn’t bluffing and that he really did come from an influential family.
Mohammad also introduced me to other Basijis. All of them, myself included, were mushriks through and through, but what I was even shocked at was how often in greetings, goodbyes, etc. they always mentioned the imams, I mean constantly, in the presence of learned Shia clerics, more than I was already used to. It made me sick inside little by little to hear “May Ali be with you/May Ali protect you” all the time, much more so than in Europe (where Shias are an insignificant minority among Muslims).
Even at the famous big Friday prayers of Tehran that he took me to, prayers to the Imams could be seen everywhere on flags and posters hanging in “mosques” والله المستعان. A truly Imam-centric religion and society, except in the Sunni regions of Iran, where the Shias are quick to recognize that the Sunnis and Sunnism are God-centric and love the Ahlul-Bayt minus Rafidi Ghuluw.
I don’t know why, but I asked him and some Shia clerics about Sunnism, all I know is that they were clueless and at best misinformed. Retrospectively, I feel pity for them. None of them ever sat with a single Sunni in their life, let alone studied unfiltered information about Ahl al-Sunnah. Like most people in Iran, especially practicing Shia (a small minority, thanks to the shenanigans and khurafat the Shia clergy have been perpetrating for over 40 years), he had – as I did then – a very superficial understanding of Sunni creed. Whatever opposed Shiism was simply labeled and demonised as Wahhabism anyway. Most people there stop using their own minds and just blindly follow what their ancestors told them.
Mohammad and his friend treated me like an honored guest until the day I flew back to Europe. We stayed in touch via email for a few months, then I hadn’t heard from him for years. Until one day my grandmother told me that he was murdered by his Afghan employees. Mistreatment of Afghans in Iran is very common. I don’t know if he abused them, I was told he did. In either case, what I do remember is that one day I was with him and other Basijis and we passed by a group of Afghan construction workers (who have built many parts of Tehran!). Realising they are Sunnis, they started to curse Abu Bakr (R) and Umar (R), with the Afghans asking them kindly to stop. We drove off though and a few days later I flew back to Europe and that year, in 2003, I left Rafidism and promised to wage war with my pen against this vile Majoosi religion until I meet my Lord.
NOTE: Even before my last trip to Iran I had slowly begun to critically view Shiism, what concerned me the most was the Ghuluw with the Imams and the flimsy “proofs” for the Imamah concept. Cursing and vilifying the Sahabah in hypocritical-Khomeinist Iran (which supposedly stands for “Sunni-Shia” unity) was just the final push for me.
For more pictures and insight, check out the following article I wrote about my journey from Rafidism to Islam:
EBNHUSSEIN.COM 