At that day shall a man look to his Maker, and his eyes shall have respect to the Holy One of Israel.
Book of Isaiah 17:7 KJV
- On 22 January 1963, Khomeini issued a strongly worded declaration denouncing both the Shah and his reform plan.
- On the afternoon of ‘Ashura (3 June 1963), Khomeini delivered a speech at the Feyziyeh madrasah drawing parallels between the Caliph Yazid I, who is perceived as a “tyrant” by Shias, and the Shah, denouncing the Shah as a “wretched, miserable man”, and warning him that if he did not change his ways the day would come when the people would offer up thanks for his departure from the country.
- On 5 June 1963 (15 of Khordad) at 3:00 am, two days after this public denunciation of the Shah, Khomeini was detained in Qom and transferred to Tehran. Following this action, there were three days of major riots throughout Iran and the deaths of some 400 people.
- On 11 February [of 1979], as revolt spread and armories were taken over, the military declared neutrality and the Bakhtiar regime [last prime minister of Iran] collapsed.
- On 11 February (Bahman 22) [of 1979], Khomeini appointed his own competing interim prime minister, Mehdi Bazargan, demanding, “since I have appointed him, he must be obeyed”. He warned it was “God’s government”, and disobedience against him or Bazargan was considered a “revolt against God”, and “revolt against God is Blasphemy”.
- On 26 October 1964, Khomeini denounced both the Shah and the United States. This time it was in response to the “capitulations” or diplomatic immunity granted by the Shah to American military personnel in Iran.
- Initially, he [Ruhollah Khomeini] was sent [exiled] to Turkey on 4 November 1964 where he stayed in Bursa in the home of Colonel Ali Cetiner of the Turkish Military Intelligence.
- In a speech on 1 February 1979 delivered to a huge crowd after returning to Iran from exile, Khomeini made a variety of promises to Iranians for his coming Islamic regime: a popularly elected government that would represent the people of Iran and with which the clergy would not interfere. He promised that “no one should remain homeless in this country”, and that Iranians would have free telephone, heating, electricity, bus services and free oil at their doorstep.
- On 30 and 31 March 1979, a referendum to replace the monarchy with an Islamic Republic—with the question: “should the monarchy be abolished in favour of an Islamic Government?"—passed with 98% voting in favour of the replacement.
- Before the [rewritten] constitution [of the Islamic Republic of Iran] was approved, on 22 October 1979, the United States admitted the exiled and ailing Shah into the country for cancer treatment. In Iran, there was an immediate outcry, with both Khomeini and leftist groups demanding the Shah’s return to Iran for trial and execution.
- On 4 November, a group of Iranian college students calling themselves the Muslim Student Followers of the Imam’s Line took control of the American Embassy in Tehran, holding 52 embassy staff hostage for 444 days, an event known as the Iran hostage crisis.
- In a fury, Iranians clambered over the walls of the American Embassy in Teheran on Nov. 4, 1979, seizing diplomats, staff members and military personnel as hostages to trade in exchange for the Shah.
- On 23 February 1980, Khomeini proclaimed Iran’s Majlis would decide the fate of the American embassy hostages, and demanded that the United States hand over the Shah for trial in Iran for crimes against the nation.
- It was not until Jan. 20, 1981, Inauguration Day for Ronald Reagan, that the hostages were released, after 444 days.