Habib (Habibollah) Elghanian (1909-May 9, 1979) was a prominent Iranian Jewish businessman and philanthropist who served as the president of the Tehran Jewish Society and acted as the symbolic head of the Iranian Jewish community in the 1970s.
In 1959, Elghanian established Plasco, a plastics manufacturing factory in Tehran which later became the largest and most technologically advanced plastics manufacturer in Iran. He played a significant role in bringing Western technology to Iran in the 1960s and 1970s. A self made multi-millionaire, Elghanian was known for his entrepreneurial accomplishments in Iran and Israel.[1]
Shortly after the Islamic revolution, the new government of Iran arrested Elghanian and charged him with spying. The charges included "corruption", "contacts with Israel and Zionism", "friendship with the enemies of God", "warring with God and his emissaries", and "economic imperialism". He was tried by an Islamic revolutionary tribunal and sentenced to death. A report by Time magazine states:
Elghanian,who was convicted of spying for Israel, was said to have made huge investments in Israel and to have solicited funds for the Israeli army, which the prosecution claimed made him an accomplice "in murderous air raids against innocent Palestinians."[2]
On May 9, 1979, Elghanian was executed by a firing squad in Tehran sending shock waves through the closely knit Iranian Jewish community. He was the first Jew and one of the first civilians to be executed by the new Islamic government.[3] This prompted the mass exodus of the once 100,000 member strong Jewish community of Iran.
Amid the post-revolution chaos, the government with its many rival factions initially refused to release Elghanian's body to his family for burial. With the intervention of Chief Rabbi Yedidia Shofet and other prominent members of the Tehran Jewish community, his body was finally released and initially buried in an unmarked grave in Tehran's Beheshtieh Jewish cemetery. Out of fear of further retaliation, only a handful of people attended Elghanian's burial. A modest tombstone was later placed on his grave making no reference to his execution.[4]
Shortly after Elghanian's execution, the United States Senate passed a resolution authored by senator Jacob Javits to condemn his execution as well as that of other civilians as a violation of human rights in Iran.
In the aftermath of the Stuxnet worm that attacked Iran's nuclear facilities, there was speculation by security researchers working for Symantec that a number found in the Stuxnet code - "19790509" - which was used as a marker to identify computers that should not be affected, was a reference to his execution date.[5]