The regime’s supreme leader stated, “today, the enemies’ most important hope for striking a blow at the country is based on popular protests.
On Saturday, when delivering a wide-ranging speech to commemorate the death of his predecessor, Ruhollah Khomeini, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei painted most of his regime’s current crises with the same broad brush. Khamenei attempted to portray the Islamic Republic as the victim of a global conspiracy, with the regime’s “enemies” orchestrating events both within the country and around the world.
The regime’s supreme leader stated, “today, the enemies’ most important hope for striking a blow at the country is based on popular protests.” Throughout the month of May, the Islamic Republic has been engulfed in protests, beginning with teacher demonstrations timed to coincide with International Workers’ Day, and continuing with demonstrations over food subsidy cuts and the collapse of a building in the city of Abadan, which activists blame on government corruption.
Many of those activists have advocated for regime change as a solution to such issues, and Khamenei appears to have taken advantage of that message to claim that the public demonstrations are the work of foreign “infiltrators.” However, slogans such as “death to the dictator” and “we don’t want the mullahs ruling” have characterized several large-scale protests in the Islamic Republic in recent years, including at least eight movements since the beginning of 2018 that the leading opposition group, the People’s Mojahedin of Iran (PMOI/MEK), has dubbed “national uprisings.”
While some of these protests have gotten public support from places like the White House, those statements have been tepid at best, avoiding any explicit endorsement of regime change. There has been no evidence presented by Tehran or any other entity that suggests significant foreign investment in the protests, let alone a foreign source. Nonetheless, in an effort to delegitimize local organizing efforts, which the PMOI largely attributes to its own “Resistance Units,” Khamenei and others continue to rely on allegations of a foreign conspiracy.
Khamenei’s condemnation of “enemy” plots could also be seen as a public justification for the regime’s foreign confrontation and brinkmanship, which critics have long described as a key component of the regime’s power-holding strategy. The fact that the supreme leader’s speech included unusually forthright statements about one of the most recent outlets for his regime’s conflict with foreign adversaries added to this interpretation.
Khamenei’s condemnation of “enemy” plots could also be seen as a public justification for the regime’s foreign confrontation and brinkmanship, which critics have long described as a key component of the regime’s power-holding strategy.
Last month, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps boarded two Greek oil tankers in the Persian Gulf with the intention of “recovering” oil that had been “stolen” from Iran due to US sanctions enforcement. The statement contrasted with earlier statements from lower-level Iranian officials, who justified the seizures by implying that the tanker crews had broken some unspecified maritime rules.
These earlier statements were more in line with Tehran’s previous comments on similar tit-for-tat seizures, as well as other provocative acts like US warships transiting the Strait of Hormuz in close proximity. In other cases, such as the 2019 limpet mine attacks on several tankers and the 2021 attack on a tanker with ties to Israel, which killed two English crew members, Tehran has simply denied responsibility for incidents in the surrounding waters.
These earlier statements were more in line with Tehran’s previous comments on similar tit-for-tat seizures, as well as other provocative acts like US warships transiting the Strait of Hormuz in close proximity.
MEK Iran (follow us on Twitter and Facebook), Maryam Rajavi’s on her site, Twitter & Facebook, NCRI (Twitter & Facebook), and People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran – MEK IRAN – YouTu