Was Michael Jackson Killed By Iran?

"Section One
On the 25th June, 2009, the “King of Pop” - Michael Jackson - was found dead in his
L.A. mansion.
The coroner ruled it was “involuntary manslaughter”, caused by a lethal cocktail of prescription
drugs. But many - including his own daughter, Paris - dismissed this as a cover up.
The same day that Michael Jackson died, Iran experienced its most serious political unrest
in decades. The results of its Presidential election were widely contested. Hundreds of
thousands of protesters took to the streets, convinced the election had been rigged.
As The Telegraph newspaper reported, “The King of Pop’s death was perfectly timed
for the wobbling Iranian regime… Just as reports of its post-election clampdown were
provoking howls of protest in the West… Jacko’s death sucked media attention from
Persia to Bel Air.”
Spookily, the night before he died, Jackson told his son Prince, ‘They’re going to
kill me’. Could he have been talking about the Iranian government?
Did Iran Kill Michael Jackson?
On the 12th June 2009, two weeks before Jackson’s sudden death, Iran went to the polls to vote
for their next President. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the controversial incumbent, was battling
it out against three political challengers. Opposition leader Mir-Hossein Mousavi was
touted as a surefire win. But the results told a very different story.
Little more than an hour after polls closed, the government-owned Islamic Republic News
Agency reported that Ahmadinejad had won in a landslide, with 62% of the vote. This result
was so suspicious, Mousavi and his supporters said the government rigged the election.
In previous elections, authorities had been unable to call the result until the following
day. But this time, the state news announced the winner just two hours after polls had
closed. Columbia University Professor Gary Sick says it would have been impossible to
count votes in this time, as Iran does not use voting machines.
Soon, more incriminating information emerged. Pro-Mousavi websites had been blocked on election
day, and inexplicable anomalies occurred - like Ahmadinejad winning easily in Mousavi’s
own hometown, which supported a change in government. Journalist Laura Secor said, “There
can be no question that the June 12th, 2009, Iranian presidential election was stolen.”
Other countries accused the Iranian government of being corrupt and put pressure on Iran
to hold a second election. Critics included then U.S. President Barack Obama, who said
he was ""appalled and outraged"" by Iran's behaviour. Western media agreed with him.
According to the Pew Research Center, between the 22nd and 26th June, allegations that Ahmadinejad
stole the election took up 19% of all news coverage. Yet, within 28 hours of Jackson’s
death, this had radically changed, with 60% of coverage focused on his unlikely death.
As attention turned away from Iran, international pressure on its government to organise a second
election faded away.
It was not just news outlets that stopped pressuring the Iranian government. Social
media users also became distracted by Jackson’s sudden death, with the hashtag “Michael
Jackson RIP” replacing “iranelection” as the most popular on Twitter. Social media
played a crucial role in the Middle Eastern democratic movement known as the Arab Spring.
As The Telegraph reported, the media blackout of Iran’s election in the wake of Michael
Jackson’s death, “effectively killed off all hopes for a revolution.”
Hadi Ghaemi, spokesperson for the International Campaign for Human Rights, noted that this
reduced coverage had “a great impact on how the [Iranian] government treats the protesters.”
No longer being monitored, the government’s bloody violence against protesters increased
dramatically. An anonymous doctor in Tehran told The Guardian that casualties soared after
Jackson’s death. He said, “The official statistic is 20 dead – that's wrong. In
our hospital alone there were 38 riot deaths in the first week. Most died from gunshot
wounds… Now it seems Michael Jackson's death has made the world forget Iran.
The Iranian regime has a long and perturbing history of murder for political gain. As PBS
journalist Muhammad Sahimi writes, “The history of political assassinations in Iran
is almost as old as the nation itself”. This includes the infamous “chain murders”
where the country’s Ministry of Intelligence murdered over 80 dissidents and intellectuals
in a 10 year campaign that began in 1988. They therefore have the capabilities and experience
to kill Michael Jackson.
However, there is no direct link between the Iranian government and the King of Pop.
If he was murdered, there are a number of other candidates with much more obvious motivations
for doing so than the Iranian government. This includes Randy Phillips, the CEO of tour
group AEG Live. Michael’s son Prince Jackson said his father’s famous fear “they”
were going to kill him came after a conversation with Randy Phillips.
But even this theory is lacking serious evidence.
Jackson’s shocking death did effectively sideline other news for weeks. Given that
he was the 4th biggest selling artist of all time, with a music career spanning over four
decades, this is hardly surprising.
As it dominated headlines, former Pentagon official Michael Rubin stated, “It’s a
sad commentary that celebrity still trumps national security in news coverage, but that’s
the world we live in.”
Jackson’s death was unexpected. But both of the autopsy reports established the same
cause. Dr Conrad Murray administered the fatal dose of propofol to treat Jackson’s insomnia.
It could easily have been an accident. Murray had no connection to Iran or the Middle East.
Moreover, the Iranian government could not have foreseen the scale of protest that followed
the election. Planning the homicide of one of the most famous and protected celebrities
of all time on the other side of the world, would be a highly complex operation.
Iran’s intelligence agency is twice as large as the CIA. Yet, in the midst of political
uproar following Ahmadinejad's re-election, working out how to kill Michael Jackson was
unlikely to be a priority.
The evidence that the Iranian government killed Michael Jackson is very limited. The timing
is probably just coincidence. But Jackson’s death had a very real and disturbing impact
on Iran’s future. The more interesting question might be - as CNN asked - “Did Michael Jackson’s
death kill the Iranian revolution?”

Was Michael Jackson Killed By Iran?

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