This past week PBS' Frontline ran a dispatch by Babak Sarfaraz, "The Hidden Imam and His Cult," which while showing flashes of astute analysis also makes a number of questionable statements about Mahdism in Iran.  For example, Sarfaraz claims that "the cult of Mahdi...had never become a full-fledged mass movement until the last 20 years."  He also refers to the "ultra reactionary millennialist Hojjatieh [sic] Society." Twelver Shi`ism--with its core belief in the occultation of the 12th Imam who will return as the eschatological Mahdi--has been the majority religion of Iran since the early 1500s, and mass movements motivated by a perceived imminent Mahdist arrival have occurred many times in the last 500 years (most notably during the reign of the Safavids, in the early 16th century; and during the outbreak of the Babi/Baha'i movement, during the late 19th century).  Working for Frontline (and being, presumably, Iranian) does not absolve one from knowing the history of the faith and region upon which one is reporting.  As for the Hojjatiyeh: that organization, if it still even exists in Iran, is neither “ultra reactionary” (a term that should be banned from liberal outlets like PBS for overuse) nor any more millennialist than Twelver Shi`ism in general. Anjuman-i Hujjatiyah was founded in the 1950s to reconvert wayward Baha’is to Shi`i Islam, and was dissolved by Ayatollah Khomeini in 1983 because of insufficient support for the vilayet-i faqih (“rule of the jurisprudents”). The organization is, if anything, less millennialist than mainstream Twelver Shi`ism. (As I explain here, in a lecture at the Hudson Institute in June 2010).

Most interesting are two allegations by Sarfaraz. The first is that "by 2008, the newspapers were replete with reports of self-procalimed "Mahdis" announcing their reappearance and offering various prophesies or end-of-the-world scenarios. Every week, someone claimed to be the Mahdi or to be in special communion with him." And the second is this: "What finally convinced Khamenei that the Mahdaviat movement had gone far enough was last year's presidential election and its aftermath. For instead of aligning closer to the Supreme Leader, the ungrateful and ambitious president has decided to become a major rival to his erstwhile benefactor." It would be nice to see some corroboration for the claims of multiple mutamahdis (“false mahdis”), but after going to Iran in 2008 I opined that such would be the case. As for the alleged Ahmadinejad-Khamenei rivalry: Western caricatures aside, it’s very likely that the President of Iran is actually more popular in his own country now than the Supreme Leader, and has been since last summer’s post-election disputes. Ahmadinejad’s popular Islam, his own personal popularity (especially among the lower classes and in rural areas) and his Iran-Iraq War veteran status may put in in a pivotal position should the Iranian military decide to assume power from the ayatollahs.

According to a story in the VOA yesterday "Insurgents Behead 6 Police in Afghanistan" (http://www1.voanews.com/english/news/NATO-Insurgents-Behead-6-Police-in-Afghanistan-98910339.html). 
This took place in northern Baghlan province, in the  country's northeast.  NATO "condemned the incident as 'brutal' and 'barbaric.'"  Yet, as is always the case with Muslim "insurgents" separating victims' heads from their bodies, no mention is ever made that the Qur'an mandates such a fate for "unbelievers" on the battlefield--as I explained at length, five years ago, in my Middle East Quarterly article "Beheading in the Name of Islam" (http://www.meforum.org/713/beheading-in-the-name-of-islam).  The Obama Administration can bury its collective head in the sand all it wants, but the hard fact will remain that according to scripture and tradition of the world's second-largest religion, decapitation of Islam's enemies is fully legitimate. 

SecState Clinton is "On the Record" with Greta Van Susteren (Fox News Channel) right now (evening of July 19).  She's repeating the conventional wisdom that Usama bin Ladin is somewhere in Pakistan and that someone in the Pakistani government knows his location.  What's that definition of insanity--doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result?  What's the syndrome when you say the same thing repeatedly, and hope that such ritual incantation will shape reality?  Either magic or propaganda, methinks. Or perhaps self-delusion.
Bin Ladin is in Iran, and likely has been for years.  But admitting that would require a whole new constellation of thought, and the ideologically-blinkered Obama administration is not about to go there. 

A nice Swedish chap, Mikael,  emailed me, providing a link about an Iraqi fellow, Hamid,  living in Stockholm who is, allegedly, the Mahdi (http://mikaellov.blogg.se/2010/june/the-mahdi.html).  It seems that this dispensation of the world will end with its last leader, Barack Obama, on December 21, 2012 and half the world will perish as a rogue red star approaches Earth, stops the planet's rotation and, presumably, causes dogs and cats to live together before both are irradiated to death.  My evangelical friends would note that the last line of the site mentions the "Luciferian knowledge" that the Mahdi's helper manifests. 
At least this Mahdi isn't the typical jihadist kind that Islamic history usually throws up.

This has absolutely nothing to do with Mahdism--but it's nonetheless irresistible:
"Taliban Trains 'Monkey Terrorists' to Attack U.S. Troops"
Afghanistan's Taliban warlords have developed a bizarre way to deal with foreign forces: they have trained monkeys who love to eat bananas and peanuts to be killers. Taliban forces have taught monkeys how to use the Kalashnikov, Bren light machine gun and trench mortars. They also teach them how to identify and attack soldiers wearing U.S. military uniforms....It is reported that these monkey soldiers are mainly composed of macaques and baboons hunted at an early age in the jungle and sold to the Taliban. These monkey babies who lost their mothers are sent to a secret Taliban training base one-by-one to become killer monkeys. Taliban militants use a series of rewards and punishments to gradually teach them how to use the lethal weapons....Apparently, the Taliban look on monkeys as "propaganda tools." "If a person who loves animals knows the monkeys may be injured in the war, they might pressure the government to force the withdrawal of western forces in Afghanistan," said one Taliban insider. (http://www.defence.pk/forums/world-affairs/63502-taliban-trains-monkey-terrorists-attack-u-s-troops.html)
This story may be bananas, but it if true it will certainly cause every American soldier and Marine to mutter, while on partrol, "I hate every ape I see/from chimpan-A to chimpan-Z." 
Perhaps the Pakistan Defence Forum--as well as the Chinese news site that originally "broke" the story--should stop monkeying around.  But if this is true, it could become the "blurst of times" for our troops there, as per this Simpsons video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V7__SWWSaGM
Here's a covertly-acquired picture of one of these Taliban monkey-trainers:

No word in the article on whether the simians were forced to convert to Islam for the training.