This article is part of a series from the New Anticapitalist Party-Revolutionaries (NPA-R) in France, looking back at the situation in the Middle East over the past year. Originally published Oct. 4, 2024.
Since October 7, Iran had remained aloof from the conflict in Palestine, in a balancing act between fear of a conflagration that would bring it into conflict with the United States and its hostile stance towards the State of Israel. His response of 300 missiles and drones after the assassination of the two generals was merely symbolic, and deliberately so. The United States had been warned. It was necessary to show muscles, notably by warlike declarations, without using them, by giving tokens of restraint. The gamble was to obtain a ceasefire from Biden, but the war in Lebanon is calling everything into question.
Like Israel, Iran is a regional power, even if it doesn’t deal directly with American imperialism – but it keeps in touch with the Western camp via countries like France and Germany. As such, it too is ready to maintain the social order should the need arise. As a regional power, it maintains links with organizations in IYemen, Syria and Lebanon, where Hezbollah was and remains without doubt one of its most important allies.
But Iran is probably not ready to call into question the entire balance of power in the Middle East in order to rescue Hezbollah, any more than it did Hamas in Gaza. Not only because Israel is backed by the United States. But also because the concern of the dictatorial Iranian regime is not the fate of the Lebanese or the Palestinians, but simply maintaining its own weight in the region, while avoiding the risk of a social explosion.
Make no mistake about it, Israel is not currently threatening the existence of the Iranian regime, let alone that of Iran itself, even if no one can rule out the possibility of the conflict spinning out of control and setting the whole region ablaze. Iran is a country of almost 90 million inhabitants, vast and urbanized, with a large and relatively well-equipped army. Bombing targets is one thing, occupying a territory is quite another, and would be an objective totally beyond the reach of the State of Israel – until now, the United States itself has not ventured to intervene directly in Iran!
The current situation does not therefore pose an existential risk to Iran, and this is why the regime is not directly threatened by the considerable weakening of Hezbollah. On the other hand, the Iranian regime is politically threatened… by its own population: the mullahs’ dictatorship is hated by the majority of the population, at least by the working classes, and it is from this point of view that the current situation weakens it.
What are the reactions inside the country?
For the past year, however, the regime has been sparing its social base, which is all the more precious as it is shrinking. In numerous posts, broadcasts, leaflets and letters to the general staff, the latter, nationalistic to the core, pushes for an attack on Tel Aviv and believes that Iran has the means to do so. These are groups that claim to be anti-imperialist and above all defenders of the regime, sometimes based in neighboring countries, or the “Students for Justice Movement”, some of whom are members of the Basij (paramilitary “security” forces), and therefore organically linked to the regime. Although they don’t represent many people, they are an instrument of the regime’s propaganda and ensure its popularity in the region. This explains why, despite its cautious stance, the Islamic Republic is showing testimonies on state television of Iranian men and women who say they want to retaliate against Israel. The demonstrations organized in several cities on September 27, which accompanied the five days of national mourning, serve to avoid alienating the sympathy of this small base and to maintain a certain credibility.
On the other hand, the opposition is strong, albeit diverse, and a warlike atmosphere could dampen any desire for protest. These include the pro-Israeli positions of royalists and petty-bourgeois democrats who would like to see the regime toppled in favor of a pro-NATO successor. There are also those disgusted with the regime, for whom “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.”
And then, more seriously for the regime, there was the sequence of popular uprisings, of which the Jina movement two years ago was the latest episode, which left its mark, as did the strikes of recent years. It is to these groups, who may feel solidarity with the oppressed in Lebanon or Palestine, that the regime must give a little change. Even if it is highly likely that many will see the official expressions of sympathy for Palestine as a n attempt to unite behind the regime (which they are).
So much so that the revolutionary left, repressed and hunted down, is perhaps somewhat alone for the moment in combining the firmness of support for the Palestinian people with that of the struggle against the Islamic Republic. But this situation could change with recent events in Lebanon and Netanyahu’s impunity. The greatest danger for both the Iranian regime and the United States would be if indignation against the Western powers were to turn into revolt.
