The phone lines of Hamshahri newspaper were ringing all day with angry callers furious ‎after reading the daily's report that Tehran’s city council had passed a resolution to ‎donate 3 billion tomans [about 3 million U.S. dollars] in financial aid for the ‎reconstruction of Lebanon. ‎

A source in Hamshahri newspaper said, “Voicemails left on Hamshahri's public caller ‎line included some with profane words and insults directed at city council members and ‎the municipality. The reason is a report published in Monday's issue about Tehran city ‎council donating 3 billion tomans of its budget to aid the reconstruction effort in ‎Lebanon.” A spokesperson for the city council, Khosro Daneshjoo, announced that the ‎funds will be spent on providing software updates and management training, as well as ‎reviewing development plans and preparing related maps and documents. ‎

This source confirmed that the news was supposed to be confidential but a reporter was ‎able to view the contents of a confidential city council meeting file and published the ‎news. It has been heard that the city council president, Mehdi Chamran, has rebuked the ‎officials that carelessly displayed the contents of the confidential file to reporters. ‎

In the latest reaction to the publication of this news in newspapers, a reformist member of ‎Tehran's city council, Masoumeh Ebtekar, revealed on her personal blog that similar-‎sized funds were donated in the past for Lebanon's reconstruction effort, but were kept ‎secret at the time. ‎

Noting that according to existing laws all of a municipality's income must be spent on ‎that municipality, Ebtekar deemed the payment of 3 billion tomans by Tehran’s city ‎council to aid in Lebanon's reconstruction effort to be illegal. Ebtekar wrote, ‎‎“Apparently, during the previous term [2003-2007], Tehran's city council set aside an ‎amount larger than the present amount for this purpose. Because of the council’s ‎cohesion at that time, the funding did not meet any opposition and was not reported ‎either.” ‎