Full Name
Nader Rahimi
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Nader Rahimi is a scientist, poet, translator, professor, and political activist. He is the author of Songs of Being and translator of The Scarlet Stone and Other Poems by the celebrated Persian poet Siavash Kasrai. His third collection of poetry, Water Lily Kingdom, is the winner of Moonstone Press’s 2025 Chapbook Contest. His other writings and translations appear in numerous anthologies from Moonstone Press anthologies and in Parsagon: The Persian Literature Review.
Recent Articles by Author
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The U.S.-Iran War Needs a New Theory of Victory
Wars are usually evaluated through the vocabulary of victory. Territory is seized or recovered. Military capabilities are destroyed. Governments are coerced. Leaders surrender or fall. Eventually, one side is declared the winner. But not every war ends that way. Some wars end in a less satisfying…
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Theocratic Fascism and the Emerging Political Order of the Middle East
This essay examines whether political mechanisms historically associated with fascism are necessarily dependent upon secular nationalism, or whether analogous mechanisms can emerge within a religious revolutionary state. The Islamic Republic of Iran provides a particularly important case because…
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Iran's Execution Machine: How the Death Penalty Became a Tool of State Power
In my previous article, I argued for an international ban on the death penalty, regardless of the crime alleged or the circumstances of the conviction. Iran offers one of the starkest demonstrations of why such a ban is necessary. Iran's extraordinary use of capital punishment is not simply a story…
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When Military Power Fails to Become Political Power
Nearly six months into the war with Iran, the conflict appears to be settling into a stalemate. Although the United States has demonstrated overwhelming airpower and has inflicted enormous damage on Iran’s military capabilities and civilian infrastructure, however the central problem for Washington…