September 3, 2024, is the anniversary of the martyrdom of Rais-Ali Delvari, the great leader of the anti-colonial struggle in southern Iran. The day is named the "national day against British colonialism".
Rais-Ali Delvari was a freedom seeker and the leader of the uprising in the south of Iran in Tangestan County in Bushehr province against Britain's invading and colonizing forces in the First World War.
Rais Ali was born in 1882 in the port city of Bushehr. After the occupation of Bushehr in 1915, British expeditionary forces took over Delvar. His uprising in Tangestan lasted for nearly seven years, attempting to secure the independence of Iran.
Rais Ali Delvari was killed on September 2, 1915, at the age of 33.
Though Iran declared the state of neutrality in World War I, it became divided into northern and southern spheres of influence under the Anglo-Russian Treaty of 1907 as the country was deemed as a great source of interest due to its significant oil reserve and strategic geography.
The treaty, however, was widely viewed by Iranians as having made the nation into nothing more than a British and Russian protectorate, so countless local uprisings occurred against the British and Russian forces from north to the south.
In northern Iran, the Jangal Movement of Gilan was the main indigenous resistance against the foreign occupiers, and in southern parts, the Tangistani amongst other tribes constituted the main resisting power against the British Empire.
On the eve of World War I, Germany established the Intelligence Bureau for the East for the Central Powers, intending to promote and sustain anti-colonial movements and nationalist agitations in British India, Iran, and Egypt. Wilhelm Wassmuss led the bureau’s operations in Persia seeking the goal to free Persia from the Allied Powers’ influence and to create a wedge between Russia and the British forces.
That was the time when Delvari with the help of Wassmuss was formulating a general Anti-British uprising in Iran. The Iranian hero was, ultimately, killed by Anglo-Indian forces following months of bloody clashes.
Years after his death, his home turned into a museum and was registered as a national heritage. It displays the personal belongings and weapons of the hero of the anti-colonial struggle in southern Iran.
MNA