Iran president frames US tensions as existential war with 1982 symbol

President Masoud Pezeshkian signaled Tehran’s determination to maintain its position against the United States and Israel across the region by referencing one of Iran’s most powerful wartime symbols on May 24, a counterterrorism expert said.

The Iranian leader’s words came at a key moment in diplomacy; President Donald Trump said a deal to end the war with Tehran was “largely negotiated” and warned that the United States would either sign a “major and meaningful” deal or withdraw entirely.

While Iran signaled that a broad agreement had been reached with Washington on some issues, it said that a final agreement was not forthcoming and negotiations on the remaining details were still ongoing.

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One x post Celebrating the anniversary of the recapture of Hurramshahr from Iraqi forces during the Iran-Iraq War in 1982, Pezeshkian said, “Today, Hurramshahr is Iran, the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz,” adding that “resistance, sacrifice and repelling aggression are rooted in the culture of this land.”

Analysts claimed that Pezeshkian was deliberately referencing one of the Islamic Republic’s deepest ideological touchstones: war, which symbolizes national resistance, civilian sacrifice, and defiance against occupation.

“This is a reference to the Iran-Iraq War and the timing is what matters,” he said Dr. Omer MuhammadDirector of the Antisemitism Research Initiative Program on Extremism at George Washington University.

May 24 marks the anniversary of the 1982 liberation of the southwestern city of Khurramshahr, which Saddam Hussein captured early in the war and which Iranian forces retook after months of brutal urban fighting.

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An Iranian flag is placed among the rubble next to a destroyed residential building near Ferdowsi Square in Tehran on March 3, 2026. (Atta Kenare/AFP)

“This is one of the fundamental mythological moments of the Islamic Republic; civil resistance, mass sacrifice, repelling the ‘aggressive army.’ That’s roughly what the Great Patriotic War means to Russia. The rhetorical move is prolongation,” Mohammed told Fox News Digital.

“It matches the 1980-82 defensive war framework with the current conflict: Iran is attacked by an aggressor, ordinary citizens (‘battle-untested but brave’) are expected to stand up and fight, and ‘resistance, sacrifice, repelling aggression’ is used as the cultural default mode.”

Mohammed said some of the expressions also evoked volunteers and Basij fighters against a professional occupying army. The analyst stated that Pezeshkian’s “Hormuz line” comment reflected Iran’s standard escalation tactic.

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Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian and President Donald Trump stand together in an official setting. (Majid Saeedi/Getty Images)

“Invoking the strait within the framework of wartime mobilization – even rhetorically – is a deliberate signal, not a throat-clearing,” he added.

“The Hurremshahr framework is the deepest record the regime has. This is what they have reached to point to an existential war, not a managed crisis.”

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Muhammad explained that Pezeshkian’s X post framed the current conflict from the presidential account to send a “high-risk message.”

“This is also an expression of the internal stance: Khorramshahr simply means ‘we are occupied and we will not negotiate’,” he added.