How Israel and the US are exploiting Iranian protests

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How Israel and the US are exploiting Iranian protests
Iranian protesters participate in a pro-Government rally in Tehran, Iran, on 12 January, 2026 (Reuters)

Genuine rage over economic stagnation is being manipulated to serve Israel.

Tel Aviv thinks that the more regional chaos and confusion it generates, the faster the world will forget and move on from the Gaza genocide political ends

By Hamid Dabashi, Reposted from Middle East Eye, January 13, 2025

Since protests erupted across Iran late last year, more than 500 people have been killed, according to data from the US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA), which has been cited by major media outlets worldwide. 

[See a more recent report here. Also see this.]

The agency reports that most of the dead were protesters, alongside more than 45 members of Iran’s security forces.

While HRANA and Western media are not totally reliable sources in this regard, it has nonetheless become apparent that a significant new cycle of protest is unfolding inside Iran.  

BBC Persian in particular appears to be on a UK state-sponsored mission to exaggerate the extent of these protests. It systematically ignores a significant part of the Iranian population that both disagrees with state policies but refuses to take its cues from Israel or its unleashed stooge, Reza Pahlavi.  

This is yet another example of UK soft power in the service of Israel. BBC Persian’s obsessive coverage of the Iranian protests is deeply intertwined with its policy of pathologically ignoring Israel’s genocide in Palestine.    

While Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has publicly acknowledged the ongoing protests, he has noted that there must be a distinction between those who have legitimate economic grievances against the state and those who are taking advantage of the movement to promote other nefarious goals, such as regime change and the disintegration of Iran. That is the Israeli project.    

By all accounts, this new cycle of protests is both genuine and heavily manipulated at the same time.  

Economic crisis

On the first point, the protests are rooted in the deep economic crisis Iran has experienced for decades. These economic troubles are due to two complementary factors: internal state corruption and incompetence, and crippling external sanctions imposed by the US and other countries. As a recent Financial Times headline aptly summarised: “Iran’s currency ‘turns to ash’ as economy spirals”.  

At the same time, this particular crisis is mostly (but not entirely) a manufactured distraction led by Israel and the US. Once again, they are targeting a dysfunctional state – like Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, or Venezuela – to sustain themselves in power and distract global attention from the still-unfolding genocide in Gaza.  

Iranians have every right and reason to protest their harsh and untenable economic and political conditions. The impoverished and disappearing middle class has endured extreme hardships, as the working class breaks down under unfathomable deprivation.  

But Israel’s focus on Iran today is triggered by multiple factors. First and foremost, it is a diversionary tactic, aimed at shifting global attention from the ongoing Israeli genocide of Palestinians and the state’s systematic theft of what remains of the occupied West Bank. 

[Editor’s note: Israel has been targeted for decades. See this.]

Tel Aviv thinks that the more regional chaos and confusion it generates, the faster the world will forget and move on from the Gaza genocide.  

The second, related objective is the disintegration of Iran into smaller ethnic states, similar to Israel’s designs for other regional countries, such as Lebanon and Syria. Tel Aviv wants to remake the whole region in its own image – that of a garrison state. Its wicked recognition of “Somaliland” is a blueprint for this scenario.  

The issue of the Iranian nuclear programme is a red herring. There was a nuclear agreement between Iran and the outside world, crafted under the Obama administration. 

Israel consistently opposed that deal, including through its fifth column inside the US, AIPAC. Working against the best interests of both the US and Iran, President Donald Trump swiftly dismantled it upon taking office. Israel is thus primarily responsible for the absence of a nuclear deal between Iran and the outside world.  

Crippling sanctions

Meanwhile, the US remains chiefly responsible for using crippling sanctions as a weapon against Iran’s ruling elite and impoverished masses alike.  

Two reasons underpin the sanctions: trumped-up concerns about Iran’s nuclear programme, and American-European pressure on Tehran to assume a less belligerent and more pro-Israel stance in the region.  

The fact that Israel, while posing as the most ardent nemesis of Iran’s ruling Islamic Republic, is itself a nuclear power engaged in a multi-front battle against its neighbours – particularly against Palestinians, who are trapped in their own homeland – is of course missing from this reading of the region.  

Compared with past waves of unrest, the current protests have not yet reached the scale, significance, or authenticity of the 2022 Women, Life, Freedom uprising. That seminal and iconic event is still a matter of scholarly conversations, but the fact that it was an event of colossal significance, precisely because it was led by women, remains undisputed.

The current protests are exceptionally violent and are certainly not led by women. The Mahsa Amini uprising was perhaps the last genuine, homegrown, and authentic protest movement in modern Iranian history – one with global significance.  

In contrast, the latest protests are irredeemably polluted by Mossad agents, with mosques set ablaze to enrage and agitate, giving a pretext for Islamophobic commentary from the likes of JK Rowling.  

The protests are also marred by fake news, which Israel has long employed in an attempt to dismantle the Iranian government for its own ends. According to investigations by Haaretz, TheMarker, and Citizen Lab, Israeli hasbara is actively engaged in manufacturing support for Reza Pahlavi, the demented son of the last Pahlavi monarch. 

Top Israeli officials continuously encourage revolt against the Iranian state, even as such instigations discredit the resulting unrest. Still, aspects of the latest demonstrations are real and potentially consequential.  

State survival 

The Iranian state is now in survival mode. But wrestling with one crisis after another is in the DNA of the Islamic Republic; it basks in them. 

In the aftermath of the June US-Israeli attacks on Iran’s nuclear facilities and other civilian targets, the state will ruthlessly crack down on these protests, and it will not hesitate to bring the battle to US regional bases and directly to Israel. The first exchange of missiles in this context will suddenly and radically change the scenario.    

In the meantime, the protests appear to be unfolding in a blind fury. The state has either detained or forced into exile all legitimate and reasonable voices that could have led these demonstrations in the best interests of the nation.

In the absence of peaceful and legitimate options – figures like Mir Hossein Mousavi, Zahra Rahnavard, Mohammad Khatami, Mostafa Tajzadeh, or Abolfazl Qadiani – the space is open for illegitimate and opportunistic pro-Pahlavi monarchists and the Mojahedin-e-Khalq, neither of which has any meaningful popular base inside Iran.

And as western media outlets like the BBC and Wall Street Journal continue to manufacture a popular base for the Zionist stooge Pahlavi, the Iranian state is expecting an attack by the US, as Trump has threatened, or Israel, or both.

While the protests started at least in part from inside, former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is on record as saying that Mossad agents have been involved. It’s not clear whether this is genuine or a psy-op gimmick aiming to unnerve Iranian authorities; either way, it muddies the waters.    

At its core, this movement is not a revolution, but an attempted disinformation coup crudely masterminded by the US and Israel. Modelled on the CIA-MI6 coup of 1953 against an elected prime minister, the Americans can provide the military might, while the British, through outlets like BBC Persian, can supply the fake news.  

The uprising began for real and legitimate reasons, but Israel is trying to hijack it. Just as it stole Palestine to make room for its garrison state, and stole Judaism to justify Zionism, Israel is now attempting to steal another country’s social uprising. All it has achieved is to completely discredit otherwise legitimate protests grounded in the economic and political well-being of an entire nation.  

Hamid Dabashi is Hagop Kevorkian Professor of Iranian Studies and Comparative Literature at Columbia University in the City of New York, where he teaches Comparative Literature, World Cinema, and Postcolonial Theory.

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