The Iranian state silenced protests with brutality. What now for Iran’s opposition? | Iran

TJapanese writer Haruki Murakami may have foreshadowed the great and indelible separation that Iranian society is about to experience in his novel 1Q84. “Those who do this can always rationalize their actions and even forget what they did. They can turn away from things they don’t want to see. But surviving victims can never forget. They can’t turn away. Their memories are passed down from parent to child. After all, that’s what the world is: an endless battle of opposing memories.”

In Iran, the general propaganda of Iranian state television depicting protesters as drug addicts or pawns of a foreign power caught up in a violent culture of terrorism reminiscent of the Islamic State brings conflicting memories into even sharper light and makes them more traumatic.

But underlying this narrative struggle lies a broader political challenge for opponents of the Iranian government at home and abroad.

Faced with a rebellion, the Iranian state once again silenced it by resorting to overwhelming repression and state violence. Reformist president Masoud Pezeshkian’s initial promise to listen to protest voices as long as the complaints were legitimate proved hollow or was quickly rescinded. The idea that reformist governments could or would want to control the security apparatus or suppress the prejudices of the religious leader has disappeared.

Arash Azizi, author of What Iranians Want and a supporter of the Republic of Iran, says the scale of this pressure is unprecedented. “The effect was catastrophic and numbing. We are still trying to process it. We are talking about the most brutal acts of the Islamic Republic since the 1980s. The vast majority of Iranians do not remember anything like this. It has now become clear that almost all of us know someone who was killed.”

The need to collectively address such a tragedy in Iran is made even more difficult by a week-long communication blackout. It leaves the opposition dejected, in disarray and still bitterly divided over the wisdom of a foreign-backed rebellion and how change can be achieved.

Some are clinging to the hope that Donald Trump and Sen. Lindsey Graham will still fulfill their promises to help the revolution and that any future aid has been delayed. Others accuse Trump of betrayal and offering false hopes, encouraging protesters to take to the streets only to be killed themselves. Trump is clinging to the worn-out excuse that the regime promised not to execute protesters.

The investigation will center around the role of Reza Pahlavi, the exiled 65-year-old son of the former Shah of Iran. Even opponents of the monarchy admit that slogans for the Shah’s return feature strongly, although they differ on the depth and meaning of support. In the words of Mehrdad Khamenei, writing on the Akhbar Rooz news site, “This is a paradox of the opposition failing to produce liberation. [it] has taken refuge in the reproduction of the past.”

For many Iranians born after the Shah’s oppressive rule, Pahlavi was little more than a convenient blank slate, says Rouzbeh Parsi, an adjunct lecturer at Lund University in Sweden. “Calls for the return of a ruler are a sign of the desperation of some protesters who, under pressure from the Islamic Republic, cannot rally around a single political figure within the country.”

One of the striking aspects of Pahlavi is that he is always polite in interviews, circumspect to the point of robotic, and seemingly unexceptional in his centrist ambitions to help establish a modern Iran, ideally through a referendum. They have three daughters who grew up in the West; the largest of these, Noor, cultivates Instagram accounts with 1.3 million followers, balancing images of a luxurious, modern lifestyle with open calls for her father to be given the chance to restore Iran’s freedom.

In the interview, Pahlavi refrains from criticizing his father’s rule, which ended with the 1979 revolution. He says his father took on a lot of responsibility under pressure, but Iran is on its way to becoming South Korea rather than resembling North Korea.

In contrast, some of Pahlavi’s closest supporters appear, at least online, intolerant, right-wing and vindictive. This is perhaps not surprising after half a century of bloodshed and sacrifice. Iranian exiles are inevitably deeply invested in one way or another, and Pahlavi has become the epitome of everything that remains unresolved about Iran should the current regime collapse.

Azizi, who has long opposed a return to monarchy, argues that Pahlavi and his advisors have much to explain. He said: “He’s facing a huge credibility issue right now. He asked people to come out and they did, but he didn’t seem to have a plan to implement. He called for strikes, which didn’t materialize. He repeatedly promised Trump to intervene, but not only did that not happen, Trump refused to meet him and openly cast doubt on his chances, even though he said some nice things about him personally.”

Pahlavi had also courted Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who visits Israel in 2023, but now Israeli officials are briefing Netanyahu on Pahlavi’s credentials and doubts about his leadership skills.

Tensions over Israel’s refusal to intervene are evident among some of his closest advisors, such as Saeed Ghasseminejad. On January 15, he wrote in [a proposed peace agreement] A place where the sky is the limit for economic, security and military partnership will emerge. “The regime’s back is against the wall, Israel will make the decision and this will determine Bibi’s legacy.”

Pahlavi’s allies want revenge not only on the Iranian state, but also on those who call for negotiations with this state.

Another advisor, Amir Etemadi, wrote: “The architects of the massacre of the Iranian people are Khamenei, his subordinates, and his mercenaries; their accomplices are the apologists who, under the guise of analysts and journalists, have repeatedly whitewashed the reformist arm of the Islamic Republic, enabling the worst atrocities to occur during the Rouhani and Pezeshkian eras. You are done. Each and every one of you – wherever you are in the world.” Others promised that the “Reza boys” would come to pick off the regime’s defenders.

During the 1979 revolution, many streams of opposition came together to form a powerful river that would defeat the Shah. This time, the arms inside and outside Iran remain separate.

It has been a perennial problem since the late 90s. As Iranian elites began to fragment and protests grew, Pahlavi made several attempts to form opposition coalitions, including the National Free Electoral Council of Iran, formed in 2013. Many were plagued by internal disagreements. The diversity coalition formed at Georgetown University during the “women, life, freedom” movement in February 2023 quickly disintegrated. Canada-based activist Hamed Esmaeilion, one of the six powerful council members, wrote without naming Pahlavi: “Imposing ideas is undemocratic, and consensus of members of a group, not a single member, is a prerequisite for a democratic movement.”

Pahlavi’s critics also challenge his personal capacity for leadership, saying he has been indecisive about his projected role and the need for outside intervention.

For the most part, Pahlavi describes himself as an honest broker beyond the fray, promising to act with absolute impartiality to secure passage. But at other times, his aides insist that only they can lead the protests and act as if he aspires to be a ruling monarch following the example of his Pahlavi father.

Pahlavi has also been criticized for calling Iranians to the streets without a realistic plan. Emphasizing that he was ready to die for freedom, he said: “All institutions and devices responsible for the regime’s false propaganda and disruption of communication are considered legitimate targets.” The option of layered, nonviolent resistance was rejected.

Asked on January 12 whether CBS would take responsibility for the deaths, he replied: “This is a war, and there are casualties in war” – these words alone sound callous. Pahlavi’s claim Optimism was also evidenced by the fact that 50,000 members of the security services were preparing to escape. He revised the claim as follows: “Thousands of soldiers and police did not go on duty to avoid participating in the repression.”

Azizi hopes that as Pahlavi’s failures become more apparent, “the moral authority of people like Nobel laureates Narges Muhammadi and Mustafa Tajzadeh, who are imprisoned in Iran, will increase.”

Azizi claimed: “The so-called Republicans will now somehow put the blame on us. It is our turn to organize a serious, credible alternative to the regime, something we have so far failed to consistently achieve.”