Towards the Next Iranian Revolution ?
Gérard Vespierre & Nader Nouri
The Iranian regime is in crisis, especially since the "accidental" death of its president Ebrahim Raïssi. The record abstention in the 2024 elections and the uprising that was triggered in September 2022 demonstrated the domestic isolation of the Ayatollahs. Certainly, the bloody repression was able to extinguish the protest. But, for how long? What force could be capable of triggering the next uprising and overthrowing the Islamic Republic?
The aim of this book is to provide as many answers as possible based on the work of two of the best informed experts.
Gérard Vespierre, researcher and geopolitical analyst, is a graduate of ISC Paris and Paris Dauphine. He has collaborated for years with the Middle East Studies Foundation. A regular contributor to Tribune.fr, he is consulted by numerous media, particularly on Iran. He is the author of the site: le-monde-decrypte.com
Nader Nouri, a former Iranian diplomat stationed in Paris, is a political analyst and author of numerous articles on the situation in Iran and the Middle East. He is the Secretary General of the Foundation for Middle East Studies (FEMO).
Since October 7, 2024, the world has been confronted with a war that is taking on unpredictable dimensions. After months of conflict between Israel and Hamas and the bombings in Gaza, this war directly involved the mullahs' Iran. On the night of April 12 to 13, the Islamic Revolutionary Guards launched more than 350 drones towards Israeli territory, in response to a strike against the Iranian consulate in Damascus. The acts of belligerence can't seem to stop. Tehran is increasingly demonstrating its destabilizing role in the region. Many today agree with Iranian opponents that the head of the snake of warmongering and Islamist fundamentalism is indeed in Tehran.
What is the interest of the Iranian regime in provoking, through its proxies, a war that it cannot control? What does this regime fear to find interest in war-mongering? It is by looking at what is happening inside Iran that we can understand.
Since the arrival of Ebrahim Raïssi as president in June 2021, no elections have taken place in Iran. However, since this election, the country has experienced a very significant popular uprising, lasting several months, across the entire country. The death of the young Mahsa Jina Amini on September 16, 2022, for a trivial question of wearing a veil, had indeed acted as a spark in more than 270 cities. This widespread revolt, throughout Iranian society, is explained by the rupture between the power in place and society and above all the ordeal represented by the deep economic crisis that the country has been going through for many years, the result of the choices of successive governments. A bloody repression, mobilizing the regime's numerous repressive forces, was necessary to put an end to this uprising at the cost of more than 580 deaths, according to the UN, and several tens of thousands of arrests. The election of new members of parliament, the Majlis, on March 1, 2024, therefore constituted the first opportunity to truly measure the popularity of the religious regime, after 45 years in power, among the entire population. The Iranian people overwhelmingly abstained.
Two reasons motivate this disaffection, one political, the other economic. The Iranian people have gradually returned to opposition to the religious regime, since the major demonstrations of 2017 and 2019 against the high cost of living and unemployment. As one Iranian woman sums it up: "The system has done nothing to improve our lives."
Now, the people and the regime stand face to face. In the long term, this repressive religious regime—in power for 45 years, led by an 84-year-old man who has held his post for 35 years—is politically doomed. In the short term, we will witness actions taken against the regime, ranging from acts of revolt—from the tearing down of posters to the hurling of Molotov cocktails. Such acts emerged on election day, with ballot boxes seized from polling stations and thrown into the street. Members of the security forces were attacked with bladed weapons just 30 kilometers outside Tehran... The religious leadership has been preparing for this confrontation for many years. Consequently, the political leadership is surrounding itself with its most radical supporters—a factor that further heightens the risk of confrontation. Democracies must absolutely provide the Iranian people with all the assistance they need to regain their freedom. It is possible to initiate the designation of the Revolutionary Guards as a terrorist organization, and to bring the officials of the Tehran regime before international justice for their successive massacres—particularly the 1988 massacre of 30,000 political prisoners. France has never been one to stand idly by while a people fights for its freedom. The objective of this work is to trace the various facets of Iran's economic, social, and political situation. The country stands on the brink of explosion. Is Iran heading toward its next revolution?
TOWARD THE NEXT IRANIAN REVOLUTION?
Gérard Vespierre & Nader Nouri
Published June 7, 2024 | www.lesimpliques.fr
13.5 x 21.5 cm • 94 pp.
ISBN: 979-10-428-0110-6
€12