You cannot own Iran.
You can only belong to Iran.

Those before you could not make Iran their possession, and those after you will not be able to do so either, because Iran is fundamentally more than this soil now wounded beneath your horses’ hooves.

Did Iran belong to Qutayba ibn Muslim, Chagatai, Hulagu, and Tughril—or to the people born of this land and culture, whose descendants included Ibn Sina, Suhrawardi, and Ferdowsi?

Iran is a land within the mental realm of Iranians, and a culture that Iranians have preserved throughout history. This Kangdez sometimes descends from the sky of thought onto the earth, but its higher place is in the Iranian mind; and this geography is far wider than the soil and geography you know.

The unconquerable stronghold of this people’s resistance is there.

Many killed, burned, and displaced, yet it was never conquered and will not be. If you do not come to belong to it, in the end you will remain only temporary rulers over this soil.

You will go, and Iran will remain.

Aydin Areta