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AP reported that "Dramatically hardening the U.S. reaction to Iran's disputed elections and bloody aftermath, President Barack Obama condemned the violence against protesters Tuesday and lent his strongest support yet to their accusations the hardline victory was a fraud. Obama, who has been accused by some Republicans of being too timid in his response to events in Iran, declared himself 'appalled and outraged' by the deaths and intimidation in Tehran's streets - and scoffed at suggestions he was toughening his rhetoric in response to the criticism. He suggested Iran's leaders will face consequences if they continue 'the threats, the beatings and imprisonments' against protesters. But he repeatedly declined to say what actions the U.S. might take, retaining - for now - the option of pursuing diplomatic engagement with Iran's leaders over its suspected nuclear weapons program." (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_obama)

The New York Times reported that "President Obama hardened his tone toward Iran on Tuesday, condemning the government for its crackdown against election protesters and accusing Iran's leaders of fabricating charges against the United States...Yet beyond muscular words, Mr. Obama has limited tools for bringing pressure to bear on the Iranian government, which for years has been brushing off international calls for it to curb its nuclear program. After the news conference, administration officials said there was little they could do to influence the outcome of the confrontation between the government and the protesters. And more so now than even a few days ago, they said, the prospects for any dialogue with Iran over its nuclear program appear all but dead for the immediate future, though they held out hope that Iran, assuming it has a stable government, could respond to Mr. Obama's overtures later in the year." (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/24/us/politics/24webobama.html?hp)

The Washington Post reported that "Iran's supreme leader told a group of lawmakers Wednesday that 'neither the system nor the people will submit to bullying' over the results of the disputed presidential election, which he has given a powerful supervisory body an additional five days to review. 'Everyone should respect the law. Once lawlessness becomes a norm, things will be complicated and interest of people will be undermined,' said Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has ultimate authority over political and religious life in Iran. 'We will not step an inch beyond the law: our law, our country's law, the Islamic Republic's law.' Hours later, witnesses said, security forces used clubs and tear gas to disperse demonstrators protesting the re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad...The Iranian government had stepped up pressure on its opponents Tuesday, setting up a special court to try detained protesters, carrying out new arrests and launching a campaign to publicly vilify those calling for a new vote." (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/24/AR200906...)

Reuters reported that "The House Appropriations Committee on Tuesday approved a $48.8 billion spending bill for U.S. foreign policy and aid efforts, and tried to apply more pressure on Iran after the violence that followed its disputed election results...Lawmakers adopted an amendment that would prohibit the U.S. Export-Import Bank from extending loans, credits or guarantees to companies that supply Iran with gasoline or help the country's domestic production. 'While students are murdered in the streets of Tehran, we should not use taxpayer money to bolster the Iranian economy,' said Republican Representative Mark Kirk of Illinois." (http://www.reuters.com/article/marketsNews/idUSN2336577220090623)

AP reported that "President Barack Obama remains publicly hopeful that Iran will emerge from its political crisis more open to international concerns about its nuclear ambitions, but the administration is preparing on several fronts for a darker outcome...Defense Secretary Robert Gates warned that any efforts by Iran to spread its growing nuclear technologies could be met by counterterrorism and interdiction operations...Gates laid out in stark terms what might be in store should Tehran's cleric-led government refuse to budge in its pursuit of a nuclear program. In remarks Tuesday to the military chiefs of several Persian Gulf states, Gates raised the specter of Iran's nuclear build-up, which officials fear is aimed at acquiring atomic weapons and could set off a regional arms race." (http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iNA_rjexLDy25bFct-7osZ...)

The Washington Post reported that "In the first days after Iran's disputed election, journalists covered it openly. Then, as government militias cracked down, they were told to stay in their offices. Now, many are being arrested -- so far, a Canadian Iranian reporter for Newsweek, a Greek reporter for the Washington Times and several dozen Iranian reporters, including a group arrested en masse at their office. It is unclear why the journalists were arrested or what, if anything, they will be charged with. The detentions could, some experts say, be a scare tactic. Or, as with so much of what is happening in Iran now, they could be the beginning of a new phase in which old rules don't necessarily apply." (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/23/AR200906...)

AP reported that "Mir Hossein Mousavi is still nominally the guiding force of the fury over Iran's disputed election. But there are ample signs his rebel stature is being eroded by his hesitation to shift from campaigner to street agitator as his supporters challenge security forces. The questions over Mousavi's standing are part of a larger debate over the direction of the unprecedented assault on Iran's Islamic leadership...'It's not really about Mousavi anymore,' said Ali Nader, an Iran specialist at the RAND Corp. 'The population has expressed its unhappiness with the system. You could argue that Iran has reached the point where the population has said: Enough is enough.'" (http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5irFQnr5TZ41eoqFJ384_FV...)

AFP reported that "Iranian opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi's campaign office said on Tuesday it would soon release a full report on "fraud and irregularities" in the June 12 presidential election. A Mousavi campaign committee 'will soon release a full report of electoral fraud and irregularities to the people,' a statement posted on Mousavi's official website Kalemeh.ir said. The statement came after the Guardians Council ruled out annulling the results of the election, which showed Mousavi losing heavily to incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad." (http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5i30Wbp3eRT-xz63x2Z0PY...)

The Financial Times reported that "With the regime leaving no doubt that it will stamp out all forms of dissent, the city has, on the surface at least, looked calmer since Sunday. But no one knows what will come next - more defiant, but smaller protests and sit-ins or other types of civil disobedience. Several residents contacted by the Financial Times described a mounting sense of fear, combined with a collective depression setting in on the capital...'We're in a state of shock, uncertainty, extreme depression and extreme rage,' says one young businessman. 'You can't kill a few people and expect things to go back to normal.'" (http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/4ef2c51e-6013-11de-a09b-00144feabdc0.html)

Reuters reported that "European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana condemned on Tuesday violence that followed elections in Iran and said he was concerned about the situation. 'We have seen violence that we have to condemn,' he told a news conference after talks with Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt. 'We expected that the election process would be something clearly positive for the international community. Unfortunately what we have seen today is something very different.'" (http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSLN885348)

AFP reported that "US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton discussed the situation in Iran in telephone conversations with her French, British and German counterparts, State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said. The top US diplomat, who withdrew from the upcoming G8 summit in Trieste after breaking her arm, called British Foreign Secretary David Miliband and German Foreign Minister Frank Walter Steinmeier on Monday, Kelly told reporters at a press conference." (http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5g4z5vSZxrZ8OGI59ZD9P1...)

Reuters reported that "Britain said on Tuesday it was throwing out two Iranian diplomats in response to Tehran's expulsion of two British diplomats as relations hit a new low following Iran's disputed presidential election." http://www.reuters.com/article/GCA-Iran/idUSTRE55M5RX20090623)

Edward Luttwak wrote in today's Wall Street Journal that "At this point, only the short-term future of Iran's clerical regime remains in doubt. The current protests could be repressed, but the unelected institutions of priestly rule have been fatally undermined. Though each aspect of the Islamic Republic has its own dynamic, this is not a regime that can last many more years...What has undermined the very structure of the Islamic Republic is the fracturing of its ruling elite. It was the unity established by Ayatollah Khomeini that allowed the regime to dominate the Iranian people for almost 30 years. Now that unity has been shattered: The very people who created the institutions of priestly rule are destroying their authority." (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124580553688545019.html)

David Ignatius wrote in today's Washington Post that "On one side you have all the instruments of repression in Iran, gathering their forces for a crackdown. On the other you have unarmed protesters symbolized by the image of Neda Agha Soltan, a martyred woman dying helplessly on the street, whose last words reportedly were: 'It burned me.' Who's going to win? In the short run, the victors may be the thugs who claim to rule in the name of God...But over the coming months and years, my money is on the followers of the martyred Neda. They have exposed the weakness of the clerical regime in a way that Iran's foreign adversaries -- America, Israel, Saudi Arabia -- never could." (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/23/AR200906...)

Roger Cohen wrote in today's New York Times that "Iran's 1979 revolution took a full year to gestate. The uprising of 2009 has now ended its first phase. But the volatility ushered in by the June 12 ballot-box putsch of Iran's New Right is certain to endure over the coming year. The Islamic Republic has been weakened...All the fudge that allowed a modern society to coexist with a theocracy inspired by an imam occulted in the 9th century has been swept away, leaving two Irans at war." (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/24/opinion/24iht-edcohen.html?_r=1&scp=1&...)

Saad Eddin Ibrahim wrote in today's Wall Street Journal that "The hotly contested presidential election in Iran between Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is still unfolding, with uncertain results. But regardless of the outcome, the events in Iran are symptomatic of a larger change in the political landscape of the Middle East -- the revival of a regional freedom movement, which stalled in 2006 after the election of Hamas in Palestine." (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124580498089244981.html)

Robert Kaplan wrote in today's Washington Post that "The Middle East has entered a period of deep flux, to be further amplified by elections in Iraq later this year and the seating of a pro-Western government in Lebanon. Because of its central geographic and demographic position astride the energy-rich Middle East -- not to mention the attractive force of Persian culture seeping far into Central Asia -- Iran, ironically, has a better chance to dominate the region under dynamic democratic rule than it has ever had under its benighted clerisy. And that could be very good for the United States." (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/23/AR200906...)