Iran-Iraq 1980-1988

Iranian stamps

The IISH purchased a collection on the Iran-Iraq War from Ms Eefje Blankevoort.
The Iran-Iraq War was one of the longest and bloodiest conflicts since the end of World War II. An estimated 1 million people were killed and 2 million injured. On 22 September 1980 Iraqi troops invaded Iran, starting a war that lasted 8 years. In 1982 the Iranian regime launched a counter offensive that brought the war onto Iraqi territory.
Ms Blankevoort spent four months conducting research in Iran for her MA thesis on visual war propaganda and the commemoration of the Iran-Iraq war. The material includes photoalbums and photographs of murals, posters and postage stamps.

The Iranian war propaganda captured the war in spiritual terms: rather than a territorial dispute, it was a war between the Islam and the unbelievers. The declaration of a holy war and corresponding glorification of martyrdom surfaces in much of the propaganda material from the collection. The metaphysical dimension that the Iranian regime and especially the Supreme leader Ayatollah Khomeini attributed to the war was an obstacle to peace agreements. On 18 July 1988 finally Ayatollah Khomeini announced that he was accepting UN Resolution 598 and thus ended the war.

Text was taken from On the Waterfront -
newsletter of the Friends of the IISH
Issue 11 (pdf, 1,91 Mb)