As tens of millions of individuals took to the streets to denounce Israel’s brutal assault on Gaza that has killed tens of hundreds of Palestinians, demanding justice and peace, help for Israel emerged from a stunning quarter: Iranian monarchists.
They are supporters of Reza Pahlavi, son of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, Iran’s final shah who was toppled by the Islamic Revolution of 1979. At pro-Israel rallies, they’ve waved the outdated Iranian flag and chanted reward of Israel and its chief, Benjamin Netanyahu.
Their confrontations with pro-Palestinian protesters, whom they accuse of being authorities proxies, reveal their stark divergence from the mainstream Iranian opinion, which has traditionally supported the Palestinian trigger.
Yet, the present Gaza struggle evokes complicated reactions in Iran, as many Iranians keep away from being related to the federal government’s unpopular international and home insurance policies which have brought on widespread discontent. Regardless, many Iranian civil society activists and dissidents attempt to steadiness criticism of their authorities with solidarity with Palestinians. The monarchists’ alignment with Israel, subsequently, raises questions on their motives and the way huge a portion of the opposition they symbolize.
Fractured opposition
The Iranian opposition motion contains varied factions, together with republicans and monarchists. However, their ideological variations have hindered their unity and led to bitter conflicts and splits amongst them.
In December, many Iranians celebrated the Nobel Peace Prize awarded to Narges Mohammadi, a distinguished ladies’s rights activist and political prisoner in Iran. Her twins, Kiana and Ali, and their father Taghi Rahmani, obtained the prize on her behalf and met with the king and queen of Sweden, who praised her braveness and work.
But a web based marketing campaign in opposition to Mohammadi and her household started from a number of accounts ostensibly belonging to Iranian monarchists.
They forged doubt on Mohammadi’s legitimacy and credibility whereas insisting that Pahlavi is the one true chief of all Iranians. Their feedback included, “Narges Mohammadi isn’t the consultant of Iranians,” and “Our actual consultant is King Reza Pahlavi.”
They flooded the social media pages of the Swedish royal household and the Nobel Peace Committee with such vitriol that feedback needed to be disabled.
This on-line marketing campaign in opposition to Mohammadi reached new heights in December, when Yasmine Pahlavi, Reza Pahlavi’s spouse, questioned the credibility of Narges Mohammadi on Instagram, questioning how Mohammadi might give an interview with Angelina Jolie from jail, implying that she was not an actual political prisoner, however a puppet of the Islamic republican authorities.
This got here as Mohammadi was getting ready to obtain the Nobel Peace Prize on December 10.
Narges mohammadi is a charlatan, and he or she isn’t our voice
Stop selling this charlatan
Our actual consultant is king reza Pahlavi@PahlaviReza
— mromid2222 (@Mrom2222) December 10, 2023
Mohammadi’s husband responded in a sequence of tweets outlining the perilous course of by which political prisoners in Iran talk with the skin world – a course of that, sarcastically, the monarchist motion additionally employs in Iran.
The root of this hostility lies within the deep political and ideological rifts between the Iranian monarchists and the Iran-based pro-democracy activists like Mohammadi. The monarchists, who regard Reza Pahlavi because the crown prince and the opposition chief, need the Iranian opposition motion to unite underneath his management. They additionally help a hardline US strategy in direction of Iran, together with elevated intervention and harsh sanctions.
Mohammadi, nonetheless, has a unique background and imaginative and prescient. She was a part of Iran’s reformist motion, and supported average and reformist candidates like Hassan Rouhani and Mir Hossein Mousavi in previous elections, together with many of the Iranian civil society and pro-democracy motion.
She additionally rejected sweeping sanctions that harm Iran’s economic system, telling the Washington Post in April 2022 that they “weakened Iranians economically greater than they weakened the Iranian regime” and “strengthened the Iranian regime and hardline people and teams within the nation, together with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. This didn’t profit democracy in Iran.”
These divergent views on the character and the way forward for the Iranian opposition have created a chasm between the monarchists and lots of different opposition forces, which has been exacerbated by the net assaults in opposition to Mohammadi.
Taghi Rahmani, centre, with twins Kiana and Ali after signing the visitor e book on the Nobel Institute in Oslo, Norway, on December 9, 2023 [Frederik Ringnes/NTB/via Reuters]
Against this backdrop, Yasmine Pahlavi’s assault on Narges Mohammadi was certainly one of many examples of her hostility in direction of individuals with completely different political opinions.
She has a historical past of creating inflammatory statements on social media and expressing a staunch pro-Israel place. She additionally publicly demonstrated her help for Israel throughout the Gaza struggle, attending a pro-Israel rally in Washington, DC in November and waving an Israeli flag.
Indeed, because the outbreak of the Gaza struggle, the Iranian monarchist motion has proven robust help for Israel on-line and at pro-Israel rallies in Europe and the United States. Their often-aggressive ways have involved many pro-Palestinian activists, with pro-Pahlavi lobbying teams in Washington, DC, such because the National Union for Democracy in Iran (NUFDI), looking for to intimidate pro-Palestinians activists who’ve been essential of Iranian-American supporters of Israel, labelling them “supporters of Palestinian terrorist teams”.
Dubious alliances
Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, who dominated till 1979, had a cordial however complicated relationship with Israel, attempting to steadiness it with ties to the Arab world. He cooperated with Israel on power, safety, and regional stability, whereas additionally at occasions voicing help for the Palestinian trigger and Islamic and non-aligned actions — although he by no means absolutely embraced them and was decisively within the US camp within the Cold War.
He tried to maximise Iran’s strategic choices and leverage within the area whereas working to place it because the main Gulf state.
NUFDI Statement on Harassment Campaign Against Iranian-American Women pic.twitter.com/lEDtsv8275
— National Union for Democracy in Iran (@NUFDIran) November 28, 2023
His son, Reza Pahlavi, and his supporters, nonetheless, have been increasingly more overly supportive of Israel through the years, seeing it as a essential associate to their trigger and ignoring the home and regional implications of their stance.
Their pro-Israel stance grew to become rather more pronounced and vocal after Reza Pahlavi and his spouse visited Israel in April 2023, the place they had been warmly obtained and hosted by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his Intelligence Minister Gila Gamliel.
During their go to, the couple toured the nation with Gamliel and the self-proclaimed Iranian crown prince prayed on the Western Wall, avoiding the Al-Aqsa Mosque.
His spouse additionally tried to applicable the slogan of a well-liked protest motion in Iran that broke out after the loss of life of Mahsa Amini, a younger Kurdish-Iranian girl who died in custody after being arrested for allegedly violating the obligatory hijab regulation.
Yasmine Pahlavi posted a photograph of a feminine Israeli soldier in East Jerusalem, which is underneath Israeli occupation, with the phrases “Women, Life, Freedom!” – angering supporters of the Amini protests who didn’t need their trigger conflated with Israel’s occupation or therapy of Palestinians.
Pahlavi additionally introduced on the go to Amir Etemadi, his official adviser, and Saeed Ghasseminejad, a staffer on the pro-Israel, right-wing Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) suppose tank in Washington, DC.
اگر با “مرگ بر روسیه” که هم در جنبش سبز و هم بعد از خزرفروشی، در اعتراضات سر داده شد، مشکل ندارید اما با “مرگ بر فلسطین” مشکل دارید، دلیلش این است که هنوز حداقل به یکی از دو ویروس چپزدگی/اسلامگرایی مبتلایید. هر دو شعار، نشانهی بلوغ مردمیست که ریشه مشکلاتشان را فهمیدهاند.
— Amir Etemadi | امیرحسین اعتمادی (@amiretemadi) January 31, 2020
Translation: If you don’t have an issue with ‘Death to Russia’, which was chanted within the protests each within the Green Movement and after the Khazar sale, however you’ve got an issue with ‘Death to Palestine’, the reason being that it’s nonetheless contaminated with at the least one of many two viruses of leftism/Islamism. Both slogans are an indication of the maturity of people that have understood the basis of their issues.
Both are controversial males, identified for anti-Palestine views and hawkish stances on Iran’s political institution, calling for sanctions and army assaults. They have even tweeted “Death to Palestine”.
In Israel, Pahlavi additionally met Mark Dubowitz, head of the FDD, and has since been boosted by pro-Israel media and teams within the US.
Disconnect
Iranian monarchists seem to have little in widespread with the aspirations of the Iranian individuals, siding with hawkish and interventionist components in Israel and the US who search to overthrow the Iranian authorities, whatever the human and regional penalties.
This has remoted them throughout the Iranian opposition. Many activists inside and out of doors Iran, who’ve risked a lot for his or her trigger and constructed grassroots actions, have rejected the monarchists.
For instance, in November, 9 distinguished Iranian political prisoners launched a letter from behind bars denouncing Israel’s “bloodbath of the individuals in Gaza” and calling for solidarity with Palestinians.
Among them had been ladies’s rights activist Anisha Asadollahi; author and human rights defender Golrokh Iraee; labour activist Reza Shahabi; and journalist Arash Johari.
They criticised those that, underneath the banner of the “Woman, Life, Freedom” motion, sought “solely the backing of Israel and the West and, on this struggle, solely serve them”.
“These individuals are primarily searching for their share after the destruction of society’s infrastructure resulting from Western army assaults, as if they’ve realized nothing from the previous twenty years in Afghanistan and Iraq.
“Women, life, freedom means ‘supporting human dignity, and opposing discrimination and apartheid in any type, and counting on this slogan to confront spiritual fundamentalism in any type, whether or not Hamas or Israel,’” the letter continued.
Other Iranian activists have echoed this, akin to Reza Khandan, husband of main dissident lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh. He warned in a CNN interview final May that Reza Pahlavi and his supporters pose a hazard to the Iranian protest motion, saying they’re “opportunistic” and “disconnected from the Iranian individuals”.
As the Gaza struggle raged on, Mohammadi joined international requires a ceasefire. Her husband, additionally a veteran human rights defender, co-signed a letter denouncing makes an attempt to make use of the disaster as a pretext for struggle in opposition to Iran together with greater than 60 Iranian pro-democracy activists.
Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, centre, along with his spouse Yasmine Pahlavi, proper entrance, hearken to Brover Semion, left, throughout a go to to the Sorek Desalination Plant south of Tel Aviv, on April 19, 2023 [Jack Guez/AFP]
The signatories included: Ali Afshari, a former pupil chief and political activist who was arrested for his involvement in protests; Fatemeh Haghighatjoo, a former reformist member of parliament who resigned in protest in opposition to authorities crackdowns, and Mehrangiz Kar, a distinguished lawyer, author, and human rights activists who has defended Iranian ladies’s rights activists.
It warned that struggle would devastate Iran and hurt its individuals’s wrestle for democracy. It explicitly criticised those that used the phrase “slicing off the snake’s head” to justify bombing Iran, as NUFDI, the Washington, DC-based pro-Pahlavi foyer group has performed.
My enemy’s enemy isn’t my pal
The monarchists’ seeming unwillingness to compromise with others in Iran’s various and sophisticated society and the completely different opinions and views amongst its individuals, inside and out of doors the nation, has not helped its enchantment.
Reza Pahlavi’s motion has confronted widespread rejection, even by protesters in Iran who chanted throughout the Mahsa Amini protests: “Death to the oppressor, be it shah or chief [Ayatollah Ali Khamenei].”
Yasmine Pahlavi has a historical past of hostility in direction of individuals with completely different political opinions. Shown right here on April 19, 2023 [Jack Guez//AFP]
Other authorities critics and activists imagine the Iranian monarchists’ help from Israel and its right-wing allies within the US – evident of their shut ties with pro-Israel lobbies in Washington and their reliance on media help from Israeli-government-aligned retailers and influencers – isn’t a profit, however baggage. It has uncovered their lack of legitimacy and credibility, and their disregard for the Iranian individuals’s democratic aspirations.
As Sadegh Zibakalam, a former Tehran University professor who has been jailed and expelled from academia for criticising the federal government, noticed in regards to the monarchist assaults on Mohammadi in a December 25 Instagram publish: “The monarchists’ theories in opposition to her and their resentment and spite in direction of her stem from Narges’s ‘mental independence’.
“It is extra tragic that those that are powerless as we speak can not bear to see others and settle for rivals. How can they declare to be the champions of ‘rule of regulation,’ ‘freedom,’ and ‘democracy’ in the event that they seize energy tomorrow?”