Street Scene in Isfahan0615 GMT: Ahmadinejad Watch. Jahan News has commented on the latest appointment of President Ahmadinejad’s son-in-law, Mehdi Khorshidi, as head of the Firouzabadi Hospital.
The previous designation of Khorshidi as Secretary of the Council of Presidential Advisors and Chief of the Standard Organization led to public objections from 42 MPs, who claimed Khorshidi was unqualified for the post. Jahan asks about the latest post, "Is the appointment of an inexperienced youth to the management of this hospital the meaning of meritocracy?”
(Hat tip to Eskandar Sadeghi-Boroujerdi of Al Monitor)
0600 GMT: We open with a snapshot that supports our general analysis of the primary threat to the stability of the Islamic Republic and the regime. Amid a pull-back on chatter of an Israeli airstrike on Iran --- primarily because of reports that Israel's Minister of Defense Ehud Barak has turned against the idea after a meeting with a senior US military commander --- Najmeh Bozorgmehr reports from Isfahan:
“I am struggling with so many miseries every day, like the increasing rent of my shop and my house, that I do not have time to think about an Israeli attack, let alone be prepared for it,” said Saeed, the owner of a grocery store....
Near the historic Naqshe Jahan Square, which is surrounded by magnificent mosques and a palace, Rozhin, a 30-year-old homemaker, says she lives “very near” to the Isfahan nuclear site. But she voices no concern about the danger of a possible attack.
“Food has become like gold,” she said. “Now I can afford to buy meat only for my daughter. That is what I am worried about, not a strike.”
Inflation and unemployment is perceived by Isfahanis to be far higher than is suggested by official figures, which put inflation at 23.5 percent and youth unemployment at 28.6 percent.
“Inflation is 100 percent, or maybe 200 percent,” said Razieh, a 27-year-old homemaker, as she walked through the 17th century Si-o-se Pol, one of the city’s most beautiful bridges.
State-run “television says prices of meat have come down. I suppose we should go and buy meat from the television,” she added....
Sahar, a 22-year-old student of psychology with a part-time job at an upmarket toy shop, said that Thursdays, the first day of the Iranian weekend, used to be very busy but that now “you hardly see anyone walking into this shop on a Thursday.”
“Only those families who are well-off now buy imported toys for their kids,” she said.
Posted via email from lissping
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