'Show of strength'

Meir Javedanfar of the MEEPAS Center in Tel Aviv agrees that the Iranian government is trying to project an image of strength by carrying out the hangings.

"In all likelihood, this is a show of strength by the Iranian government because it feels weak and threatened by the strong reaction that the international community has shown towards the issue of human rights and now it wants to show strength elsewhere and the two accusations which the international community is not willing to resist is the issue of somebody being a Mossad agent or [belong to] the Mujahedeen," said Javedanfar.

Ali Nourizadeh of the Center for Arab and Iranian Studies in London stresses that there are major doubts about the government's claim that Siadat was a Mossad agent, since he was not a military man and had no access to military installations.

"I think that since [the government] had to postpone the execution of the Kurdish student and Ms. Sakineh Mohammadi [Ashtiani] they are just trying to say "we are in control, we are strong, we do whatever we want to do and nobody can prevent us and we are not going to make concessions because there is pressure by the Western organizations or governments," said Nourizadeh.

Former President Bani Sadr also points out that the government has been having so much trouble after its decision to cut subsidies for basic items such as gasoline and bread, that news reports say it's had to send agents out 740,000 times to investigate claims of price gouging.