Iranian-American journalist and activist Masih Alinejad has said the latest protests in Iran should not be judged on whether they quickly topple Iran’s leaders, but by how steadily they are eroding fear across society.
Ms Alinejad, who was the target of two foiled assassination plots linked to Iran, has been relentless in her criticism of Tehran and is urging US President Donald Trump to support demonstrators. She told The National that the Iranian government will likely remain in power for now.
“The protests that led to the overthrow of the Shah took more than 12 months. This regime has imposed itself on the Iranian people for 47 years. It is foolish to think that after 10 days, the clerics are ready to throw in the towel,” she said. “Once a critical mass believes in the idea of change and overcome their fear, then the regime is finished.”
Ms Alinejad said both former presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden were so focused on striking agreements with Tehran over its nuclear programme that they sidelined popular demands for political change.
During the 2009 Green Movement, Ms Alinejad said, when millions protested against what they saw as a stolen election, the Obama administration sought reassurance from Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei rather than backing demonstrators directly.
“In 2009, we really had a chance for democratic reforms. But when the presidential election was stolen by Ahmadinejad, and millions turned out to protest, President Obama wrote secret letters to Ali Khamenei assuring him that the US wanted a deal,” she said. “Iranians calling for democracy became an inconvenience.”
Ms Alinejad, who left Iran in 2009 and has been living in the US since 2014, became an international phenomenon when she launched a Facebook page inviting Iranian women to post pictures of themselves without a hijab.
In her view, both Mr Obama and Mr Biden were prepared to overlook Tehran’s internal repression and regional influence – from Syria’s civil war to Lebanese politics – in pursuit of a deal.
“Both the Obama and Biden administrations wanted to make a deal with the ayatollahs and were prepared to turn a blind eye to the regime’s destructive nature at home and in the region,” she said.
“We’ve had five or six major uprisings since 2009,” she added. “And still, they thought they could make deals.”
Iran's government, Ms Alinejad argued, “only understands the language of force”, calling on the international community to draw “its red lines and stick to them”.
Protests have continued for more than 10 days despite mass arrests and a reported death toll of at least 42.
Alongside students, youths, women and workers, she said, Iran’s middle classes and merchants are now joining demonstrations, a sign that opposition is spreading beyond its traditional base.
Asked about Mr Trump’s warning to Iranian leaders not to kill protesters, Ms Alinejad said the message had a real impact because it was the first time a US president openly signalled that the lives of Iranians mattered.
“If they start killing people like they have in the past, I think they’re going to get hit very hard by the US,” Mr Trump said.
Ms Alinejad urged Mr Trump not to repeat what she described as Washington's previous failures of prioritising nuclear diplomacy over Iranian lives.
She said Mr Trump is unpredictable and has already crossed once-untouchable lines, including authorising the killing of Maj Gen Qassem Suleimani, commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Quds Force, and bombing Tehran's nuclear facilities in June last year.
“When President Trump issues a warning, people listen,” she said. “But Iranians are not going to wait for Trump to act. We make our own future.”
Mr Khamenei on Friday accused protesters of acting on behalf of Mr Trump.
The supreme leader warned that Tehran will not tolerate people acting as “mercenaries for foreigners”.
On what truly frightens Iranian authorities, Ms Alinejad pointed not to sanctions rhetoric but to social defiance.
“A woman’s hair is terrifying to this regime,” she said. “As is the sound of a woman singing or women attending a football stadium. These are all pretty scary to this regime.”
“The regime is truly afraid of its own population. And for 47 years, they have divided the opposition, killed dissidents, exiled and jailed those they couldn’t kill but the idea of freedom is a powerful one. Free people choose freedom. For 47 years, this regime has promoted Islamic values and denigrated Iranian values and yet Iranians are more nationalistic than ever,” she added.
Leadership remains a contested issue. Mr Trump dismissed on Thursday the idea of meeting Reza Pahlavi, signalling that Washington is not prepared to endorse the Shah's son as an alternative leader if Iran’s current government were to fall.
Ms Alinejad said some protesters are backing Mr Pahlavi, who has positioned himself as a possible alternative.
“From the videos that I have received, some sections of the crowd have called for Reza Pahlavi,” she noted.
She dismissed criticism from New York's Republican former mayor Rudy Giuliani, who on social media called the late Shah’s son a “nepo baby Shah” and of being aligned with the Mujahedin-e Khalq, a group widely despised inside Iran for siding with Saddam Hussein during the Iran-Iraq war.
Ultimately, Ms Alinejad said, legitimacy will come only from Iranians themselves.
She called on Europe and other powers to politically isolate Tehran, expel its diplomats and treat the Islamic Republic as a “malignant regime.”
“Iranian people want regime change. And if the regime engages in mass murder, then targeted military action is justified against those who order the killings.”
