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On May 9, 2024, Kamal Kharrazi, the Supreme Leader’s foreign policy advisor and former Iranian foreign minister, said that Iran will consider a doctrinal shift to nuclear deterrence if Israel attacks Iran’s nuclear sites. Whilst there has been only a low-key “reprimand” by the US State Department’s Spokesperson to such a nakedly threatening statement, calling it “irresponsible,” the record indicates that neither of Iran’s public expressions of resorting to nuclear deterrence, nor its attempts at materializing this goal are new.
Biden administration would be very well advised to take this latest “statement of intent” by one of Supreme Leader’s own men all too seriously for it is being uttered in the context of Iran and Israel entering open conflict as of April 2024 after thirty-years of shadow wars.
Since the outbreak of the conflict between Israel and Hamas on October 7, Iran and its allied regional armed proxies militarily engaged Israel and the Western alliance on several fronts. Hezbollah began firing various daily barrages into northern Israel, whilst the Houthis started their incessant attack on international shipping lanes in the Red Sea, and Iranian armed proxies in Iraq and Syria each sent salvos of projectiles to US bases in the region and Israel. Matters came to a head when Israel and Iran clashed over Israel’s levelling of the Iranian Damascus’ consular annex that dispatched seven of the IRGC top brass. The result was an open and direct projectile warfare attack from Iran against Israel.
Eight days after the Israeli elimination of IRGC top brass in Damascus in early April, I stated in “Amid Serious Iran-Israel Tension, The Nuclear Elephant Is In The Room” that Khamenei’s regime could be considering resorting to nuclear deterrence despite its “religious” and “practical” disputations to the contrary. A few other analysts of note also identified this possibility shortly after my assessment was published on Iran International English.
Soon after Israel struck a radar site in Isfahan in retaliation for Iran’s failed barrage of projectiles, the IRGC commander, Brigadier Ahmad Haghtalab, in charge of the safety of nuclear sites in Iran, publicly declared that the regime may revise its present position vis-à-vis nuclear weapons and forge ahead to achieve full nuclear deterrence.
To date, the most unequivocal expression of preparedness for nuclear weaponization has been the February 2024 statement of the former Iranian Atomic Energy Chief, Ali Akbar Salehi, who not only did proclaim Iran’s ability to rapidly produce adequate amounts of fissile material to weaponize warheads, but also revealed that Iran had already manufactured all the parts required for the integration of weaponizable fissile material along with the requisite fuses, warheads, and missiles. In other words, he stated that Iran is almost ready to weaponize at moments notice.
Such statements that are being uttered with increased frequency may be dismissed as empty bravados and bluffs. There are some who argue that Russia and China, which have grave stakes in controlling a junior ally like Iran, may be loath to allow Iran to become a nuclear power. Others claim that even if Iran wishes to break out into full-fledged nuclear weaponization, it may not have the delivery platforms, nor may it have readily made fuses, not to mention that it first must leave the IAEA on Nuclear non-proliferation.
If history is any guide, the Islamic Republic of Iran has over thirty years of experience in developing projectile delivery devices, i.e., missiles, upon which nuclear warheads can be deployed. During 1990-1991, the IRGC and Iranian defense ministry missions visited North Korea to observe the launch of North Korea’s first intercontinental ballistic missiles. Such visits harbingered Iran’s Al’Qadir project, dedicated to developing missiles capable of deploying warheads of all kinds. Indeed, Iran and North Korea continue their decades-long cooperation on missile development including nuclear warhead technology.
Details on the will and progress of Khamenei’s regime to become a nuclear power is certainly available to President Joe Biden somewhere in the West Wing of the White House. The pressing question is why the present administration is not expressing the requisite serious alarm in the face of such nuclear weaponization bravados. Expression of such alarm would be especially warranted in the wake of Iran’s latest attempt at sending over three-hundred projectiles to Israel; projectiles that could have theoretically deployed nuclear warheads.
In the name of “de-escalation” and reducing tension in the region, Biden’s administration continues to conduct secret negotiations with Khamenei’s regime and has prevented the IAEA’s board of governors from censuring Iran for its hitherto refusal to cooperate with the IAEA monitoring and inspection teams. The most recent trips of the IAEA’s chief, Rafael Grossi, to Iran were nothing but a series of futile exercises in nuclear diplomacy that have led to no re-installation of surveillance equipment in the designated sites and no new timetable for further inspections.
Khamenei’s regime has engaged in double speak about many aspects of its ongoing difference with the US since President Donald Trump left the Iran Nuclear Deal in 2018 and the US introduced maximum pressure sanctions. On the one hand, the Iranian regime and its cohorts of apologists often claim that the sanctions have been hurting the Iranian people and demand their suspension. On the other, Iran constantly exclaims to the world that the sanctions have had little impact on the regime’s strength whilst the regime has committed unspeakable military grade brutal suppression of several popular uprisings from the 2019 Bloody November to the “Woman, Life, Freedom” 2022 uprising.
Similarly, the regime professes a “religious” and sacrosanct opposition to nuclear weapons, wrapped in the rhetoric of an anti-nuclear weapon’s “fatwa” since 2005. Based upon the secret documents that were brought to the attention of the world first in 2003, then in 2009 and later in 2018, the regime has been always pursuing a nuclear weapons program in secret. Despite their invocation of the anti-nuclear fatwa, regime officials have intensified their threats to embrace nuclear deterrence since 2018 when Trump left JCPOA. The frequency of such threats has just increased since February.
In view of PM Netanyahu’s defiant stance vis-à-vis President Biden’s threat that the US would refuse bombs to Israel should Israel attack Rafah, the US administration must be acutely aware the Islamic Republic of Iran may get a wrong signal from the US-Israel quarrel over Hamas and Gaza. Iran may in fact have been preparing itself for a nuclear breakout for quite a while and such squabbles can hasten it. There is not doubt that if Israeli intelligence confirms to any Israeli cabinet that Iran is approaching five minutes to midnight for nuclear warhead deployment, Israel may not hesitate to act to destroy whatever Iranian nuclear facilities that it can.
Biden cannot count on Russia and China to prevent Khamenei from resorting to nuclear deterrence. If Russia and China did ever truly have such intentions to ensure that nobody else would ever join the nuclear club of the Permanent Members of the UN Security Council, they would have “actively” stopped India, North Korea (especially since the late 1990s), and Pakistan from achieving nuclear weapons, and they did not. In fact, scholarly surveys do offer that China and Russia have been both “a cause” and “a contributor” to “nuclear” and “missile” proliferation in Asia. Hence, at a time that both Russia and China are at logger heads with the United States (be it under Trump or Biden), not only is there no incentive for them to deny Khamenei his nuclear weapons’ ambitions, but they may be motivated to check the US-leaning emerging Arab-Israel entente by a nuclear armed Iran.
Long before Russia declared that it treats the introduction of F-16sto the Ukrainian Air Force as a nuclear threat, Russia and Iran have been solidly united in one camp. In defiance to extensive Western sanctions, Iran has become an indispensable source of cheap oil for China, whilst being a major supplier of suicide drones, missiles, and bombs to Russia since 2022. Russia, China, and Iran have been constantly and notoriously testing the West’s resolve over the past year at every tactical, economic sanction, and military strategic juncture and the West’s restraint and caution has been interpreted as hesitation by them all too clearly.
Let us not forget that the US and Western alliance declared once that if Iran would cross the red line of enriching 60% plus uranium, they would activate “the trigger” stipulation of the UN Security Council Resolutions. It is true that Iran was in formal compliance of the JCPOA when President Trump abruptly pulled out of it, however, Iran’s mass uranium enrichment ever since has been on a scale that brings it dangerously close to weapons’ capacity and constitutes a clear and present threat to world peace that has so far been left unaddressed. In other words, the West has not reacted to Iran crossing the high-level nuclear enrichment redline.
Furthermore, Biden’s most recent squabble with Netanyahu only convinces the Iranian regime that he is too concerned with winning the Arab American and Muslim American vote for re-election and would not dare to act against an Iran that would be on the threshold of becoming a nuclear weapons’ state.
If Biden continues to dither and Iran breaks out towards nuclear warheads, whether Bibi Netanyahu is at the helm or not, Israel will not shrink from action. And if such eventuality ever materializes, the world must brace itself.
Tehran’s citizens swiftly demanded the municipality stop the building of the mosque with a petition that circulated on social networks, garnering over 147,000 signatures within just a few days.
But, this all transcends the mere building of a mosque in Qaytariyeh Park in the north of Tehran.
Since 1979, the Islamist regime has escalated the count of mosques in Iran from approximately 25,000 to roughly 75,000 presently. Yet, as stated by a senior cleric within the regime, around 50,000 of these mosques remain shuttered, devoid of congregants for prayer.
Various polls converge on a singular explanation: the remarkable and rapid transformation of the Iranian populace towards irreligiosity and apathy towards religious rituals over the past four decades.
Last year, in a government study titled the National Attitude Survey of Iranians, respondents were asked about the change in the level of religiosity among the people compared to five years prior. 85% of respondents stated that, based on their observations, the level of religiosity among Iranians had decreased, while only 7% reported an increase.
So, why does the Islamist regime insist on building mosques that are likely to remain empty?
First: New mosques are constructed in areas where Basij bases and repression centers are absent or few, and the government uses the mosques as cover to expand its social and political control.
The Basij, which plays a significant role in quelling dissent, is a paramilitary volunteer militia force that operates under the Islamic Revolutionary Guards (IRGC).
In the past, the country's mosques have indeed been used to mobilize forces during street protests, and protesters have even been shot by Basiji snipers from rooftops. The government also seeks to establish a surveillance and information-gathering infrastructure within neighborhoods, without paying the price associated with public intimidation.
Second: The mosques are a base for gathering and recruiting for the regime's repression organizations. Today, the Islamist regime is desperately seeking to expand the network of Basiji forces and its plainclothes forces. In the past, these forces were the ones who assassinated the opposition figures. There were mosques with Imams such as Mojtaba Tehrani and Azizullah Khushvaght who were accused of issuing fatwas for killing dissidents and writers.
The attendees of their mosques were mostly working for the Iranian security agencies. The assassin who shot Saeed Hajjarian, an advisor to former President Mohammad Khatami, in the head, was affiliated with one of the politicized mosques.
Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has filled his security, military, and paramilitary apparatus with worshipers of the same type of mosques.
Third: The state-controlled mosques have become centers of brainwashing and political propaganda. These mosques host kindergartens and indoctrination classes that propagate anti-Semitism, anti-Westernism, anti-Americanism, and political Islam.
All of the aforementioned objectives are centered around security and political agendas.
The objective of attaining complete state control over mosques in matters of religion and religiosity entails direct intervention by governmental institutions in the organization and execution of religious ceremonies. This is achieved through: the appropriation of public spaces by advocating Sharia as a way of life, and by substituting religious teachings with governmental directives.
Prior to the establishment of the Islamist regime in 1979, Iranian mosques served as civil institutions for worship and congregation, with ownership being shared. The Imam of the congregation was selected by the local community, and management was overseen by a board of trustees elected by the locals, with minimal political involvement. Every class and group of Muslims could claim the local mosque as their own.
However, the Islamist regime usurped the mosques by establishing Basij bases, appointing Imams, and constructing new and additional mosques. Following the usurpation, it treated the public domain as its conquered property.
Over the past 45 years, any Imam who has made a critical statement against the government has been dismissed from their position. Sunnis are unable to have even a single mosque in major cities like Tehran, Mashhad, Kerman, and Shiraz.
The country's mosques underwent governmentalization through three specific processes.
The first involved the formation of the Headquarters of Imams and Congregations to appoint and control mosque imams. This institution was established in every province and operates under the supervision of the Leader’s office.
The second process entailed the establishment of Basij bases in mosques as the initial government institution installed there.
The third process involved setting up "cultural centers" within mosques, managed by the Supreme Headquarters of the Cultural and Artistic Centers of the country's mosques, aimed at countering the "cultural invasion of the enemy" as mandated by the Supreme Council of the Cultural Revolution in 1992.
This way, the Islamist regime turned mosques that the Iranian people voluntarily built with their own hands and funds, into government institutions.
The regime transferred religious institutions such as seminaries, mosques, endowments, and mausoleums from civil institutions into completely state-owned entities.
In Ali Khamenei's myopic worldview, this future likely entails today's young Iranians carrying on the torch of the 1979 Islamic Revolution, along with its tenets of political Islam.
But, the ruler's decades-long endeavor to indoctrinate and shape post-revolution generations of Iranians through the education system and dozens of state and religious propaganda outfits has failed, tarnishing the legacy of the Islamic Republic.
From widespread secularization to the populace's resolute anti-regime stance and protests, Iran has witnessed profound transitions over the past decade. In the process, it's evident that the people have turned their backs to the aspirations of both Supreme Leaders.
Today's youth, thoroughly detached from the state, often lead dual lives: experiencing pervasive oppression at schools and universities while encountering contrasting narratives of pre-revolutionary life at home. Despite crackdowns on internet access amid protests, Generation Z has found a window into life in the West, solidifying their rejection of their daily reality.
But, Khamenei can’t take all the credit for this rejection – after all, he is only the second Supreme Leader. His predecessor, Ruhollah Khomeini, did his share to try and forcibly imprint his worldview onto Iranian youth through school curriculums.
Khamenei, though, is unlikely to cease his efforts. Recently, the regime's education officials have hinted at several overhauls, indicating a further tightening of control over what is taught to children and students.
Here is a brief overview of what you need to know about the Islamic Republic’s quest to mold the future Iranian generations through schools and universities – and how they failed in their goal to establish Iran as a successful example of political Islam.
Islamic ‘Revolutionary’ Overhaul of Iran's Education System
Let’s take a step back.
For a period after the revolution in 1979, after the ouster of Iran’s monarch Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, Iranian universities were shut down to completely alter the country’s education system according to the new government's ideological framework.
“Iran's new revolutionary authorities are engaged in a massive upheaval of the country's educational system from the primary grades through the universities,” reads a Washington Post article from 1980.
Literature textbooks would start with songs and slogans of the Islamic revolution – and instead of reading the great Persian poets, young children would learn chants like “Khomeini, Khomeini, you are light from God” and "This American shah should be executed."
In directives that could be called revisionism, history textbooks were rewritten to promote Islamic principles and so-called revolutionary values, with hardly any mention of the ancient kings of Persia.
The Islamic Republic’s first Supreme Leader Rouhollah Khomeini early on saw the potential in using the education system to pass on the ideals articulated with the birth of Islam 14 centuries ago.
Conversely, Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi’s “White Revolution” in the 60s and 70s had aimed to modernize Iran through means that included educational advances – including the deployment of teachers to villages that had no schools. The educational system was secular and mostly based on the European models, although students had a weekly hour about the White Revolution and modernization.
Schools Under Siege by Radical Indoctrination and Political Islam
Several studies show that over the last decades, the Iranian school curriculum for Grades 1 - 12, has promoted radical ideological indoctrination.
“Gender discrimination permeates Iran's textbooks. Women are accorded little importance as individuals, and their contributions to society outside the home are largely ignored. This attitude toward women is justified in the textbooks through numerous references to the Koran and the lives of prophets and Imams,” an extensive Freedom House study by Saeed Paivandi reads.
Textbooks advocate for the destruction of Israel, glorify child martyrdom and jihad, while fostering animosity toward the US. School materials also venerate past Iranian empires and promote false narratives in history textbooks.
“Iran largely continues to educate students for the prospect of a global war, and the spreading of the Islamist-Khomeinist revolution. There is a greater focus on Iran’s desire to export its global Islamic Revolution to the Arab Middle East compared to past curricula, with students encouraged to engage in militant activity to achieve Iranian hegemony,” a study by IMPACT-se read, which evaluated Iranian school materials for UNESCO peace and tolerance criteria.
Today, the regime continues its agenda to forcibly imprint political Islam on Iran’s youth, as evident by the growing influence of clerics and mosques in Iran's educational system – particularly with the recruitment of clerics as teachers, the establishment of mosque-centered and seminary-affiliated schools.
In line with Khamenei's anti-Western stance, measures have included prohibiting primary students from studying English and removing the requirement for older students to learn English. Arabic, however, remains compulsory "as the language of the Qur'an" for first and second-year secondary students, as per education officials.
In a nod to the government’s close economic dependance and ties to Beijing, Iranian authorities are reportedly seriously discussing the possibility of adding Chinese to the foreign languages taught in the nation's schools.
In some universities, the flags of Israel and the US are painted at entrances, a regime tactic to force students to walk over them as a sign of disrespect. Yet, social media videos often show Iranian students carefully avoiding to walk on the flags – highlighting their resistance and the failure of Khamenei's policies.
Schools, Universities as Battlegrounds Against Regime
Since 1979, schools and universities have emerged as focal points of unrest and opposition to the regime.
From prominent activist Majid Tavakoli’s historic speech in 2009 on the steps of Amir-Kabir University on the Day of students, bravely and directly attacking Supreme Leader Khamenei, to Iranian schoolgirls in 2022 ripping out images of Khomeini and Khamenei from their textbooks, while chanting “Death to the dictator” – the youth has shown their opposition to the regime’s doctrine.
Following the most recent round of nationwide anti-regime protests in 2022 and 2023, security forces unleashed a fresh wave of crackdowns at universities – using both verbal and physical assault to suppress the student opposition movements.
Amid protests, tens of thousands were arrested – including at least hundreds of students, teachers and professors.
The state has kept up its pressure and tactics to target teachers who joined demonstrations, including arrests, threats, expulsions, and forced retirements.
Regime's Repression Targets Iranian Schoolgirls
Girls’ school particularly became a focal point for unrest after the killing of Mahsa Jina Amini in September 2022, while she was in the custody of the so-called morality police for a hijab violation.
Amid and following those protests, thousands of schoolgirls were reportedly poisoned – with human rights activists and Iranian journalists blaming the regime in Tehran for another “form of gender-based attacks in the country.” Activists also suggest that the wave of attacks were a reprisal for the students’ participation in nationwide protests.
Strengthening those arguments, are the fact that it took Khamenei three months to comment on the attacks and that no arrests have been made in connection with the reported poisonings.
Last year, IranWire exclusively reported that Iranian schoolgirls have been forced to watch pornographic videos at school, aimed at deterring them from joining anti-government protests.
These sessions, conducted by the regime’s security forces, used the explicit content to argue that the protesters' demands would lead to moral decay.
“A cleric accompanied by a woman wearing a hijab and men in uniforms and civilian clothes visited the school and gathered students in 10th, 11th and 12th grades in a classroom. The visitors forced them to watch videos with porn scenes, including rapes and sexual intercourses between humans and animals, in a bid to convince the children that the protesters’ demands would lead to sexual decadence in Iran,” the report read.
The incident caused significant distress among the students, with one student suffering a nervous breakdown and needing to be hospitalized for two days.
Universities at the Heart of Regime’s Foreign Policy Strategy
Universities in Iran have also played an integral role in the Islamic Republic’s foreign policy strategy – which includes recruiting foreign students as ideological ambassadors. These students, often from influential families, are trained to promote Iran’s agenda globally under the guise of "cultural secretaries."
Iran’s Al-Mustafa International University plays a key role in this strategy, receiving substantial funding to educate foreign students and spread the regime’s Shiism worldwide. The institution has students from China, African countries and Latin America. The university has faced international sanctions for allegedly recruiting combatants for conflicts like the war in Syria.
Tehran’s Sharif University for instance, is also under international financial sanctions and known for its close ties to the military and being engaged in military and ballistic missile-related projects for the Iranian government.
Iran's Teachers Confront Hostility and a Failing Educational System
While the Supreme Leader has verbally revered the role of teacher’s in the country, teachers themselves have been met with hostility by the regime.
Their jobs have been hampered by severely low salaries, poor working and living conditions – and in return, placated with unfulfilled promises.
Recently, teacher’s have warned that the regime’s brand of ideological curriculum means a “dead end” for children – and that the authorities have failed in the education sector.
Teachers report that students are rejecting the mandated school curriculum, which is heavily dominated by ideological and religious content, even within science subjects. They say this has led to a significant loss of interest among students.
The regime's security forces have also often attacked gatherings of parents voicing their concerns about the significant qualitative shortcomings of the country's educational system, including a shortage of staff.
Among its shortcoming, an expert report published last year by the ‘reformist’ news outlet Etemaad, showed several significant qualitative deficiencies in Iran's education system – including a lack of justice in providing educational opportunities and a legitimacy gap, stemming from disparities between students' expectations and authorities' ideological perspectives.
