Southlanders Urgently Seek News of Kin

Aranak Tavassoli had spent the last 24 hours on the phone, desperate for news of her family in the aftermath of Iran’s disastrous earthquake.

Her relatives live in Tehran, which was not harmed by the quake, and in Manjil, a small city in northwestern Iran that she heard has been destroyed.

There is no answer at her father’s Tehran telephone. So, the 30-year-old emigre, who works as a microbiologist in Los Angeles, wonders: Was he in Tehran when the quake hit? Has he gone to Manjil to help the dozens of other relatives there? Or is he a victim, too?

“I don’t know,” she said Friday, her voice breaking.

As thousands in Southern California’s nearly half-million-strong Iranian community were frustrated in their efforts to get any information about the fate of their loved ones, dozens of Iranian community groups mobilized several efforts Friday to help their ravaged homeland.

The Iranian American Jewish Federation in Los Angeles quickly set up a fund to raise money. The Van Nuys-based Iranian Refugee Relief Organization scrambled to coordinate donations, and the Iranian Assn. of America in West Los Angeles hosted a four-hour meeting of Iranian-American community leaders to map out a relief effort. One of the Iranian television groups, Sima-Y-Ashena, scheduled a telethon for next Friday on Channel 18.

Although the Southern California Iranian community is often sharply divided by clashing religious, political and economic interests, many tried to set aside their differences as the enormity of the Thursday disaster became known. Leaders of the usually fractious 800-member Iranian Student Assn. at UCLA, for example, pledged their group’s help.

“For the first time, all Iranians are coming together,” said Youran Nassir, the student association’s president.

Along Westwood Boulevard, “all people can talk about is the earthquake,” said Kamrun Madanipur, proprietor of a small shop filled with items as varied as shish kebab seasonings and books on Iran’s late ruler, Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi. The boulevard in recent years has become known as Little Tehran because of its large number of Iranian restaurants and stores filled with Iranian spices, candies and books.

Madanipur’s radio was tuned to Saday-H-Iran Radio, which was carrying continuous coverage of the earthquake in Persian, the language of Iran. A few doors down at the Westwood Meat Co., Iraj Ghaffari had his radio on the same station and was already collecting emergency supplies, blankets and canned goods to send to Iran.

But because old suspicions lingered, differing opinions have emerged over where donations should be sent and which repository is “safest.”

Mohsen Sahebjame, an Iranian who lives in Long Beach, carried a cardboard box marked “Iran . . . Earth . . . Donation . . . Quake” into the Islamic Center of Southern California on Vermont Avenue, which was holding a “special prayer” for earthquake victims early Friday afternoon.

Sahebjame asked that checks be made out to “Bank Melli Iran, Iran Quake Relief Assistance Account No. 5000,” controlled by the Iranian government. The Iranian Interests Section, which represents Iran in Washington, is asking that donations be sent to that account, and the 32-year-old electronics engineer said: “I feel more comfortable with this. There might be different groups out there raising money and the money not reaching the hands of the people who need it.”

But Mohammad Shahdadi, an executive committee member of the Iranian Refugee Relief Organization, said: “We have talked to many Iranians, and they do not like to send money through the Iranian government. Whatever we collect will be channelled through the Red Cross.”

This sentiment was echoed by Pooya Dayanim, a writer with Javanan, a local Iranian magazine, who said late Friday that he knew of 17 different fund-raising accounts that had been set up. “All the funds should go to the Red Cross,” he said. “That’s the fastest, the easiest, the best and the safest.”

Estimates on the number of Iranians living in Southern California range from 300,000 to 500,000. The vast majority are Muslims of the Shiite sect. They also include Jews, Bahais and other minorities, most of whom came to this country after the overthrow of the shah by Muslim revolutionaries 11 years ago.

The largest concentrations of Iranian Muslims are in Palos Verdes and Irvine. Ethnic Armenians from Iran have migrated to Glendale, which has a large Armenian community. Iranian Jews, by and large, live on the Westside and in the San Fernando Valley.

UCLA sociologist Ivan Light, who has studied the Iranian community, describes the migration as unusual because of the number of “high-status immigrants,” including many doctors, lawyers, bankers and other professionals. Many are self-employed, with backgrounds in trade and manufacturing of apparel and jewelry.

The impact of the migration is especially evident in the Beverly Hills Unified School District, where one in every five students is Iranian.