Muslim Student Followers of the Imam's Line

The Muslim Student Follower's of the Imam's Line were a group of 300-or-so College students that stormed the U.S Embassy in Tehran and took 52 American diplomats hostage for 444 days.The students were supporters of the Iranian Revolution who occupied the embassy to show their support for Ayatollah Khomeini and their outrage that the ex-Shah of Iran was admitted to the United States for cancer treatment, instead of being returned to Iran for trial and execution.

The organization comprised students from several major science and technology universities of Tehran, including the University of Tehran, Sharif University of Technology, and Tehran Polytechnic.

Amongst the students were Ebrahim Asgharzadeh, who concocted the original idea to seize the American embassy in September 1979, Mohsen Mirdamadi, Habibolah Bitaraf, and Masumeh Ebtekar, who was the group's spoksperson during the embassy hostage-taking and later became the vice president of Iran.

Their name refers to the Imam, that is, the leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, who was not informed of the occupation of the embassy in advance, but later supported and confirmed the action. Information from other sources suggests Ayatollah Khomeini not only knew of the plans ahead of time, but approved them as well.

The students actions caused outrage - especially in the US — and proved to the international community that the revolutionaries could not be trusted as Iran was already a mess after the Revolution. It led to the Prime Minster Mehdi Barzagran and his entire Cabinet resigning in protest (as their pleas to release the hostages were falling on deaf ears) and the United States severed diplomatic ties, put in place sanctions and seized extensive Iranian assets, which still exists even to this day.

The students didn't realize at first that their actions would ruined Iran's international reputation and no less than a year later, Saddam Hussein took advantage of this incident and Iraqi forces invaded Iran and caused a war that lasted 8 years that killed nearly a million Iranians and costed over $600 billion in damage, ruining their economy.

It is unknown what became of the group afterwards. It's presumed that they have long since disbanded and many members, including Ebrahim Asgharzaeh, have since regretted the hostage taking.