Is Israel aiming for regime change in Iran?

Air assault against weakened Iran throws into question Tehran government's grip on power

From left, US President Donald Trump, Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu each have differing agendas. AFP

As Israeli air strikes hammer targets across Iran, officially aimed at dismantling its nuclear and missile infrastructure, questions are being raised about whether the campaign marks the start of a broader push for regime change in Tehran.

The name of Israel's air assault – Operation Rising Lion – is a reference to the big cat on Iran's pre-revolutionary flag, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has repeatedly suggested Iranian citizens rise up against their government.

In an interview with Fox News on Sunday, he was asked whether regime change was a goal of the military operation. “It could certainly be the result, because Iran is very weak,” Mr Netanyahu said. “The decision to act, to rise up, at this time is the decision of the Iranian people.”

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He told Israeli journalists the next day that “this is a very weak regime that now understands how weak it is. We could see many changes in Iran.”

Reza Pahlavi, the exiled son of Iran’s last shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, has been urging Iranians to rise up, following years of anti-government protests that have been repeatedly met with brutal repression.

“The Islamic Republic has come to its end and is collapsing,” he said in video posted on social media. "What has begun is irreversible. The future is bright, and together, we will turn the page of history. Now is the time to stand up, the time to reclaim Iran. May I be with you soon."

Mr Pahlavi, who has lived in exile for decades, has long positioned himself as a potential transitional figure for a post-Islamic Republic Iran.

But “Pahlavi is not a politically significant individual”, said Ali Alfoneh, author of Political Succession in the Islamic Republic of Iran. “Because of his close association with Prime Minister Netanyahu, his public standing is in freefall in Iran, especially as we are seeing increased number of civilian casualties of the Israeli bombings.”

“Encouraging foreign powers to bomb Iran will not increase his popularity at home,” Mr Alfoneh added. “He should be asked, 'do you really want to be the king of a heap of ruins? Is this really what you want to be a king for?'”

French President Emmanuel Macron on Tuesday warned against any move to alter Iran’s leadership with force.

“We don’t want Iran to get a nuclear weapon,” Mr Macron said. “But the biggest error would be to use military strikes to change the regime because it would then be chaos.”

Mr Alfoneh said Israel’s end goal is not only the destruction of Iran's nuclear and missile programme, or regime change, but the “fragmentation of Iran as a state”.

“We are seeing tendencies towards the beginning of a civil war, with Iran's periphery regions rebelling against the centre,” he said. “It is also remarkable that Israel has also targeted mechanised and armoured divisions in north-western parts of Iran."

This amounted to a clear indication that Israel is trying to weaken the armoured divisions that would face any Kurdish insurgents.

“Therefore, I'm not expecting the Iranian middle-class to fight the regime at a time and circumstances when there is a very real risk of collapse of the central power in Tehran and a civil war breaking,” Mr Alfoneh said.

The people of Iran will all unite to preserve the country “in spite of the hatred for the regime”.

Smoke rises from the building of Iran's state-run television after an Israeli strike in Tehran. AP

Dennis Ross, former US Middle East peace negotiator under presidents George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton, said it remains difficult to predict who could lead Iran if the current regime collapses.

“There is no known leader of the opposition,” Mr Ross told The National. “And the Iranian opposition on the outside seem to have a very hard time ever agreeing on anything”.

“In theory if there is a split in the elite, with one part reaching out for public support and seemingly getting it, there might be the potential for a transitional leadership,” he added.

Israeli operations are designed to weaken Iran’s military capacity and destabilise its leadership, but regime change is not the explicit goal, a US-based Iran analyst told The National.

“The aim is to force a choice: Iran can maintain its regime or its nuclear programme, not both,” said Jason Brodsky, policy director at United Against Nuclear Iran. “I don’t think regime change is an explicit goal of this operation.”

Still, he noted, “depending on how events play out, it can result in regime collapse that could lead to regime change”.

A political member of an Iraqi armed faction dismissed the possibility of regime change in Tehran. “If the Israelis believe they can defeat 100 million Iranians, they’re delusional,” the official said.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Iran’s regional adversaries had steadily intensified their demands – from restricting its nuclear programme to now targeting its missile capabilities and openly discussing overthrowing its government.

“We’ve definitely noticed the escalation in the rhetoric of aggression towards Iran – from preventing it from obtaining nuclear weapons, to banning enrichment on Iranian soil, then banning enrichment altogether, then dismantling the entire nuclear programme, and now to denying Iran the right to missile capabilities and production – all the way to both veiled and open Israeli threats of regime change in Iran,” the official said.

Meanwhile, a political figure close to Iran-backed Hezbollah said Israel’s military actions against Iran could redefine regional conflict dynamics.

“The developments in the Israeli aggression against Iran may reveal the potential for a change in the rules of the game and how deeply any foreign actor becomes involved in the war, especially given the Israeli narrative of 'regime change',” the source told The National on condition of anonymity. “That could shift the entire equation.”

They denied Iran had sought military help from Hezbollah or allied groups, despite escalating hostilities.

“It’s a given that Hezbollah supports Iran politically, in the media and through public solidarity,” they said. “Tehran neither needs nor has asked for any military assistance from Hezbollah or any other resistance factions. It’s inflicting pain on Israel on its own, without any help.”

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader, waves during the 36th anniversary of the death of the leader of Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, at the latter's shrine in southern Tehran this month. Reuters