If only he had been as clever as his neighbours, the north Tehran businessman sighed, he might still have his CNN. When he foolishly opened his door to three plain-clothes policemen one afternoon last month, they confiscated his satellite dish and fined him £200.
One neighbour had the presence of mind to lie on the floor when he saw the cops looking through the window and ignored the doorbell. Another realised what was happening when he pulled into his driveway, so he pretended to be a visitor, rang his own bell, looked at his watch, told the waiting cops that his friend was never on time, and drove away.
The conservative mullahs in Iran's Majlis (parliament) banned satellite dishes in 1994 to protect their compatriots from the "perfidious influence of the West". It was in hopes of reversing such rules, and the intrusive ways of the police, that at least 70 per cent of Iranians elected a moderate cleric, Hojatolislam Mohamed Khatami, as their president last May. The new Minister of Culture and Islamic Guidance, Mr Ataollah Mohajerani, would like to legalise satellite dishes, one of his advisers says. But Mr Mohajerani's posting was confirmed by a hair's breadth in August, and if he took such a daring step the Majlis might revoke his appointment.
So President Khatami's government continues its high-wire act, trying to fulfil election promises to liberalise the country while tip-toeing around the growling religious conservatives who were trounced at the polls. Mrs Shahla Lahiji, a publisher, is one of the impatient intellectuals who accuse Mr Khatami of wasting time. The Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance just censored 54 pages from her Farsi edition of Gabriel Garcia Marquez's short stories. "I told them it was terrible publicity for their New Iran," she says. "They said, `Please don't say we cut 54 pages; say we cut one story'." The tale in question, about an old woman who sells her granddaughter into prostitution, is still too risque for the Islamic Republic.
The US claims Mr Khatami is merely a figurehead, and that real power resides with the conservative Supreme Leader and Guide, Ayatollah Khamenei, and the former president, Hashemi Rafsanjani.
Messrs Khamenei, Rafsanjani and the former Foreign Minister, Ali Akbar Velayati, all called on Iranians to vote for the traditionalist Speaker of Parliament, Mr Ali Akbar NateqNouri last May; he won less than a quarter of the vote. A source close to Iranian intelligence says the results were dressed up to lessen the conservatives' humiliation, that Mr Khatami actually won more than 80 per cent of the ballot.
In the wake of the defeat, Ayatollah Khamenei gathered his allies around him in a sort of parallel government. The new post of President of the Expediency Council was created for Mr Rafsanjani, and Mr Velayati became the Guide's personal foreign affairs adviser. Some predicted that Mr Khatami would be paralysed by the conservatives. Yet his entire two dozen-strong cabinet was approved by secret ballot in the Majlis.
Furthermore, a European ambassador points out, Mr Khatami skilfully rid himself of the "terrible trio" of the former interior, foreign and intelligence ministers. The latter, Mr Ali Fallahian, had been implicated in assassinations abroad, and the Europeans were relieved to see him go.
The conservatives are still swallowing and digesting their defeat. It is too soon to say whether their reaction is a full-blown backlash, resistance, or the last gasp of the strict, fundamentalist lifestyle imposed for the past 19 years. This autumn they have mobilised mobs to attack the ageing Ayatollah Hossein Montazeri, who championed the political legitimacy of the ballot box over the religious legitimacy inherited from Ayatollah Khomeini.
Christian Armenians saw police raids on their clubs - where they have been allowed to dance and women are allowed to shed their hijab - as pique by the conservatives. The Guide controls the justice system, and that, too, is being used to harass the reformers. Several assistants to Mr Gholam Hossein Karbaschi, the Mayor of Tehran and an ally of President Khatami, have been imprisoned on apparently trumped-up charges of corruption.
BUT the balance of forces seems to favour Mr Khatami. Although 300,000 low-ranking militant mullahs support Ayatollah Khamenei, the hierarchy of Grand Ayatollahs opposes him. It feels the clergy should not be involved in the daily management of the country, because when things go badly the population turn against religion.
Eighteen months ago, Mr Khamenei lost his effort to be declared a mujtahed, a higher theological rank than he now holds, and his fellow ayatollahs cast aspersions on his theological qualifications. European diplomats also question whether ill-paid police and soldiers would side with the Guide against the population if it should come to blows.
Most important of all, Mr Khatami has "people power" behind him. Iranians saw a political message in the outburst of joy when Iran qualified for the World Cup on November 29th. Helicopters dropped flowers and pastries on the crowds. Young women twirled their mandatory headscarves in the air and danced in the streets.
"The people wanted to say to Khatami, `We are here if you want us, we will be with you', " Mrs Lahiji says. Most significant of all, 5,000 Iranian women disobeyed orders broadcast on television and radio not to go to the victory celebration at Azadi Stadium. The women shook the metal barriers until they were allowed to enter. They would no longer accept the old rules. The transformation within Iran is accompanied by a new outlook in foreign policy, best exemplified by the opening today of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference summit in Tehran.
European diplomats say the US tried frantically to prevent Arab leaders - who boycotted last month's Doha conference with Israel - from attending. The conference marks the end of Iranian attempts to export their revolution. Kings, princes and presidents who once feared Iran would destabilise them and replace them with revolutionary governments, are now sitting down at the table with the Islamic Republic, which will officially represent the entire Muslim world for the next three years. Watch out, said an editorial in Jomhuri Islami, a mouthpiece for the religious conservatives. The newspaper reminded its readers of Ayatollah Khomeini's old warning: "When enemies praise something we do, there must be something wrong in it."
