...

By Tom O'Connor

Deputy Editor, National Security and Foreign Policy

0

Share

Newsweek is a Trust Project member

See more of our trusted coverage when you search.Prefer Newsweek on Googleto see more of our trusted coverage when you search.

As protests continue to escalate across Iran, questions surround the future of the Islamic Republic, beset by economic stagnation, the defeat of allies and threats from the United States and Israel.

A number of analysts remain hesitant to predict the imminent collapse of a deeply entrenched government with a long history of dealing with large-scale demonstrations. But should the systemic issues eroding popular support gain sufficient momentum, the situation may play out differently than hoped for the top opposition figures watching on from abroad.

Arash Azizi, a research associate and lecturer at Yale University who has written extensively on the inner workings of the Iranian system and potential challenges to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, argued that the "main difference" between the current protests and previous rounds of dissent "is that the regime is much more cornered now."

Read More on World

"It has lost much of its regional allies—not to mention [Venezuelan President Nicolás] Maduro, economically it has little cards to play," Azizi told Newsweek. "It knows it's vulnerable to attacks from the U.S. and Israel. The extent of discontent is also on a massive scale, including even many inside the regime. The regime really does feel like it's at the end of its ropes."

At the same time, he found that "the protesters still have the same problems they had in previous rounds," offering opportunities for insiders rather than outside figures to lead the way in the event of an overthrow.

"They don't have a unified leadership, they don't have organizations," Azizi said. "This means that it is still more likely for change to come from within the regime, perhaps with some figures organizing a transition by putting Khamenei aside and building a new order."

...

Iran's House of Cards

While Khamenei holds absolute authority in Iranian politics and policy, the country hosts a complex landscape of factions, largely divided between principlists and reformists.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian was elected last August on a platform aligned with the latter camp, having promised a greater focus on economic improvement and social inclusiveness following the death of his predecessor, hard-liner President Ebrahim Raisi, in a helicopter crash that May.

Yet Pezeshkian's efforts have been met with challenges both internal and external. Negotiations toward reaching a new nuclear deal that could lift crippling U.S. sanctions failed to produce a breakthrough last year and appeared to unravel altogether as President Donald Trump ordered direct strikes against Iranian nuclear sites during the so-called 12-day war between Iran and Israel.

That conflict, launched by Israel on the sidelines of the ongoing war in Gaza, not only devastated a number of Iranian nuclear and military sites but also killed scores of top military and nuclear officials. It was the latest and most direct blow to Iran and its Axis of Resistance allies after the Lebanese Hezbollah's longtime leader was killed by Israel, followed by the group signing a ceasefire, and Syrian President Bashar al-Assad was toppled by an Islamist-led rebel shortly afterward.

The perceived vulnerability of the Iranian government has raised questions regarding the balance of power in Iran, not simply between principlists and reformists but also among other influential stakeholders, including clerics, politicians and an influential military apparatus, including figures within the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and conventional armed forces, known as the Artesh. The insider intrigue looms as 89-year-old Khamenei remains without a successor.

The situation has also galvanized prominent opposition factions based abroad, notably Reza Pahlavi, son of the last shah of Iran who was deposed in the 1979 Islamic Revolution, and the National Council of Resistance of Iran, led by Maryam Rajavi's People's Mojahedin Organization of Iran, or Mojahedin-e-Khelq (MeK), a dissident group with a history of battling both the shah and the Islamic Republic as well as leaking alleged state secrets.

Azizi outright dismissed the likelihood of an MeK role given its divisive history and ideology but said that "Pahlavi is a different story."

"He has a significant and potentially growing base in Iran as evidenced by so many chanting his name in recent demonstrations and by many who responded to his call for demonstrations," Azizi said. "He has turned himself into the frontrunner in Iranian opposition politics (mostly because the others have failed to do much political organizing)."

At the same time, he pointed out Pahlavi "is also a divisive and not a unifying figure, whose "camp has practiced a noxious, chauvinistic politics that's anathema to many Iranians and repels them."

"Most importantly Pahlavi still lacks organizing networks and this limits his abilities," Azizi said. "For the regime to be overthrown, its opponents would need to do much more to get their act together and present a united front."

Still, Pahlavi continues to present himself as the only substitute for the Islamic Republic. A briefing shared with Newsweek by his office asserted that "there is no alternative leader within the regime that will guarantee stability."

"Even if they feign a change, they are loyal to Islamic government and will never be partners for America," the briefing stated. "They also won’t have the support from within and engaging them as alternatives will lead to infighting and chaos. Only [Pahlavi] can hold the country together."

As for the MeK, deputy director of the NCRI umbrella, Alireza Jafarzadeh, released a statement shared with Newsweek, arguing that "the slogans heard since Dec. 28 — 'Down with the Dictator' and 'Neither Pahlavi nor the supreme leader; freedom and equality' — are revealing."

"They are not calls for lower prices or factional reshuffling within the regime. They reject all forms of dictatorship whether past or present," Jafarzadeh said. "They express a clear demand for a future based on freedom, equality, and popularly elected sovereignty.”

The Venezuela Model

Another key factor at play is Trump's role. His warnings of potential intervention in the event that Iranian security forces were found to be killing protesters come fresh off the heels of the shocking U.S. Delta Force raid that seized Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, out of Caracas to face charges in New York of "narco-terrorism."

But the operation fell short of any prolonged military strikes or even a sustained regime change effort. Rather, Maduro's deputy, Delcy Rodríguez, assumed power and has already demonstrated a willingness to work with Washington despite her condemnation of Maduro's abduction.

"President Trump may just as well be pursuing a 'Venezuela model,' meaning leadership change without regime change," Ali Alfoneh, a senior fellow at the Arab Gulf States Institute, told Newsweek. "Such a solution may not be entirely unattractive to the Islamic Republic and could emerge if Iran’s de facto collective leadership (composed of the heads of the executive, judiciary, and legislature, along with representatives of the Revolutionary Guard and the army) chooses to sacrifice Ayatollah Khamenei, not necessarily by handing him over to the U.S., but by shortening his life) and reach an agreement with the United States."

"Such an agreement could pave the way for a deal with the United States involving sanctions relief, the return of U.S. oil companies, stabilization of Iran's economy and regime survival," Alfoneh said. "This model, however, is likely to be sabotaged by Israel, and it remains to be seen if the U.S. oil lobby prevails over the Israel lobby in Washington."

As of now, however, he assessed that "the regime is still not in the danger zone, as the regime has still not deployed the Revolutionary Guards, and there is still no sign of defection among the security forces."

Negar Mortazavi, a senior fellow at the Center for International Policy and host of The Iran Podcast, also looked at Venezuela as a potential precedent, calling Washington's role in the Iran protests "a wild card" that could "lead to fundamental change, not necessarily positive or negative."

"We also have to take into effect the stability of the region, and look at Iran's neighbors, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, and understand that aerial bombardment and more chaos can potentially have civil war erupting," Mortazavi told Newsweek, "or without a central government, there can be a lot of instability and violence and chaos unleashed in Iran, which is a big country, very populated, and this will impact others, also in the neighborhood, in the region. It won't just be contained to Iran."

"It depends on if the U.S. engages, and how they engage, whether they would go down the path of total change of the regime, or just a Venezuela model," she said. "And would they pick stability, as they did in Venezuela, then they let the system continue, or will they have a different approach."

Pezeshkian has also sought to de-escalate through introducing alleviative economic measures and engaging with demonstrators rather than unleashing the full weight of the security forces, including the IRGC. But unless the rallies subside, a tougher approach may yet manifest.

"We know the president is a moderate reformist," Mortazavi said. "He's talked about addressing the grievances, talking to the protesters, meeting with the leaders. So, there's been somewhat of a different approach, at least at the beginning."

"But now it looks like with the internet blackout and the images coming out of Iran, very violent clashes, I think they're shifting sort of to that iron fist approach," she added, "and really seeing this as an existential threat, no longer just a legitimacy threat, but an existential threat that's also combined with a real threat of military strikes from the outside."

In a statement shared with Newsweek, the Iranian Mission to the United Nations vowed strongly to thwart any foreign plots tied to the U.S. and Israel.

"The satanic plot hatched by the United States and the Zionist regime to fragment Iran and to engineer an internal civil war will be neutralized through the national solidarity of the Government and the people of Iran, the ignominy of which will remain upon them," the Iranian Mission said.

...

Law and Order

The prospect of prolonged instability or even open conflict erupting across Iran may temper even the U.S.'s willingness to expedite the fall of the government. In addition to civil protest groups, Iran hosts a variety of hostile armed groups, including Arab, Azeria, Baloch and Kurdish separatists, some of whom have been battling security forces for decades, as well as militant Islamist groups, such as affiliates of the Islamic State (ISIS), which has sought to exploit the state's vulnerability.

And despite Trump's warnings of possible action in the event of security forces killing protesters, he has also repeatedly suggested that at least some of the dozens of deaths reported by human rights groups may be attributed to "stampedes" as chaos grips major cities.

"It doesn't appear that Trump is looking to actively insert the U.S. considerations into the unrest in Iran," journalist and political commentator Hooman Majd told Newsweek. "He certainly could have when the first casualties were reported and he didn't."

"He is unlikely, in my opinion, to enter the fray unless there is some mass killing event that involves hundreds of demonstrators (as happened in 1978-9)," he said. "Given how he has responded to protests in the U.S., it seems he generally takes the side of law enforcement."

But even if the Iranian government should prevail, as it has many times before in the face of large-scale protest movements, such as the 2022-2023 demonstrations following the death of a woman held by police over violating the country's headscarf laws, Majd argued real change would need to take place to secure stability in the long term.

"I think the significance of these protests versus previous ones is that Iran is at an especially difficult point economically and politically," Majd said. "Where it once felt confident in its power and in its independence, it now is at a point where it has suffered a war that essentially halted, if not destroyed, its vaunted nuclear program; has lost or had diminished allies and support in Syria, Lebanon, Gaza and now Venezuela, and has no real plan to address the economic crisis it faces short of capitulating fully to Trump and the US' demands (which it cannot do)."

"It doesn't really have a good answer for its citizens who are desperate, in some cases feel that they have nothing to lose, and no real plan to alleviate their misery," he added. "So, while the protests may subside and while the government forces may be able to control the size and nature of the protests (attacking only the violent ones), there seems to be reckoning in the near future that we didn't really see in previous flare-ups."

View 0 Comments

Request Reprint & Licensing

Submit Correction

View Editorial & AI Guidelines