Cinematic, musical, and theatrical guilds wrote an open letter to artists worldwide.
This letter has been published under the title “The Artist’s Duty is Not Just Watching!”
Iran’s Houses of Cinema, Theatre, and Music, representing Iranian filmmakers, theatre practitioners, and musicians, issued an open letter to artists around the world inviting them to use any means to protest the joint attack of the US and the Zionist regime on Iran.
The text reads:
Artists, thinkers, scholars, and peace-seekers of the world!
On the eve of the new millennium, some futurists predicted optimistically that a wise person would live a happier and more prosperous life by avoiding war.
But the sad reality is that the greater the desire for peace, tranquility, and dialogue among the peoples and civilizations, the more aggressively the forces of the evil empire pursue war to secure their interests and resources. Today, they have pushed the world to the brink of the abyss.
Although ancient emperors sought to conquer and rule vast lands and nations through politics and armed force, today, the evil empire is not content with subjugating ten, twenty or thirty nations; it thirsts for the entire world.
From Latin America to Greenland, from the shores of Gaza to the ancient land of Iran—The land that pioneered the concept of a state system; the civilization that formulated and implemented the first universal declaration of human rights and respect for humanity.
Today, the United States and the Zionist regime have imposed an illegal war on the Iranian nation, and it is still ongoing.
In this war—facilitated by their domination of global media— schools, hospitals, historical and cultural heritage sites, and residential areas have been redefined as military targets; demonstrating a complete disregard for international conventions. Any crime is justified under the pretext of “striking the government”.
The children who went to school, full of hope on the morning of February 28 did not return. Were they not part of “humanity”? What, then, is our definition of a “crime”?
We, the cultural and artistic community of Iran, stand in the midst of this chaos—witnessing the duality of crime and denial, and watching the silence of the world in bewilderment.
The war that the evil empire has launched against the Iranian nation will not be its last. Even under the impossible assumption that they could defeat our country, they would immediately move on to their next targets.
If you do not act to defend the oppressed today, tomorrow will be too late.
(ISNA)
