Weakened by war, Iran's Revolutionary Guards grow more central – Bloomberg
Senior commanders of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards during a meeting with Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei at the Imam Khomeini Hussainiya in Tehran, August 2023
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) emerged from its 12-day confrontation with Israel in June bruised but more entrenched in the country’s power structure, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday.
Bloomberg said the Israeli strikes killed many senior commanders in what was described as the most damaging conflict in the Guard’s history, forcing a restructuring of Iran’s security decision-making. Yet the confrontation has also reinforced the IRGC’s role at the heart of the Islamic Republic.
The Guard, founded after the 1979 revolution, has grown into a sprawling organization with land, naval, aerospace and intelligence arms, as well as the Quds Force for operations abroad and the Basij volunteer paramilitary.
Its influence extends into universities, hospitals, media outlets and large business conglomerates such as Khatam al-Anbiya, which is involved in oil pipelines, infrastructure, and housing projects. Estimates of its direct personnel run as high as 200,000, Bloomberg said.
“The war affirmed just how important the IRGC is,” Abdolrasool Divsallar, an Iran military analyst at Universita Cattolica in Milan, was quoted as saying.
A newly announced National Defense Council, headed by President Masoud Pezeshkian and dominated by IRGC veterans, underscores that expanded role, according to state media cited by Bloomberg.
The Guard is criticized at home and abroad. Rights groups and Western governments have accused its security branches of human rights abuses and crackdowns on dissent, while critics inside Iran link it to corruption and political repression. Supporters see it as a bulwark against Israel and the United States and as central to defending Iran’s sovereignty.
Narges Bajoghli, a professor at Johns Hopkins University, told Bloomberg: “People are angry at them, but they also realize that there is no other force in the country. What they’re committed to today is about sovereign independence and the idea of resistance.”
The IRGC’s overseas networks — Hezbollah in Lebanon, militias in Syria, and Hamas in Gaza — have been badly weakened by Israeli action, Bloomberg said. That may push the organization to focus more on nuclear deterrence, analysts said.
Ali Alfoneh, a senior fellow at the Arab Gulf States Institute, told Bloomberg: “The 12-day war exposed the IRGC’s counterintelligence failures. However, the IRGC’s loss of prestige is unlikely to lead to its capitulation.”
The report said the IRGC’s future remains closely tied to that of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, now 86, around whom the organization’s management is centralized.
It would take a US ground invasion or a sustained bombardment by both the US and Israel to change the metrics for the IRGC, Alfoneh said.
Iran plans to launch the first satellites in its new Soleimani constellation of narrowband satellites by the end of the Iranian year in March 2026, the head of the country’s space agency said.
Hassan Salarieh, head of the Iranian Space Agency, told the Tasnim news agency that the Soleimani constellation will be Iran’s first narrowband satellite network.
“In the initial phase, nearly 20 satellites will be built and placed in orbits with different inclinations to provide narrowband communications aimed at developing Internet of Things services,” he said.
The constellation is named after Qassem Soleimani, the commander of Iran’s Quds Force - the foreign arm of the Revolutionary Guards -- who was killed in a US drone strike in Baghdad in 2020.
According to Salarieh, test launches of prototype satellites will begin this year, with some placed in orbit to carry out preliminary checks.
The main production phase of the satellites will begin in 2025, with operational launches of the constellation expected to start in early 2026 and continue into 2027. “Technical challenges and delays are natural in the space industry,” he said, but added that progress so far was “satisfactory.”
The constellation is being developed by a consortium of government and private entities. Salarieh said design work began in late 2023, and that many subsystems and components are now under construction.
Salarieh has since said a second version of Nahid-2 will be launched aboard Iran’s domestically developed Simorgh rocket, underlining Tehran’s efforts to expand its independent launch capacity.
Iran is also developing heavier launchers, including the Sarir and Soroush classes, and is expanding its Chabahar spaceport to reduce reliance on foreign facilities.
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has separately conducted suborbital tests of its Qased satellite carrier, most recently in July, weeks after the 12-day war with Israel.
Western governments have repeatedly voiced concern over Iran’s satellite launches, warning that the same rocket technology can be used for ballistic missiles. Tehran says its space program is peaceful.
Yemen’s foreign minister accused Iran on Sunday of driving the Houthi movement to reject peace initiatives and prolong the country’s decade-long conflict, Asharq al-Awsat reported.
Shaye al-Zandani said the peace process was “almost frozen” because Tehran encouraged the Houthis to resist compromise.
“The Houthis do not show a desire for peace because they live on war,” he told the Saudi-owned newspaper, adding that “Iran’s role is very large in keeping them entrenched in these positions.”
The minister also said the United Nations Security Council was discussing new measures on Yemen, adding that some states believe Resolution 2216 – the main international framework for the conflict – is no longer workable.
In 2015, the UN Security Council adopted the resolution, imposing sanctions on people undermining Yemen’s stability and calling on all parties, especially the Houthis, to end violence.
Any new resolutions would likely complement it with steps “focused on unified measures against the Houthis,” he said.
Al-Zandani added that the international community had not dealt “seriously enough” with Iranian arms transfers, which he said had enabled the Houthis to acquire drones, ballistic missiles and even hypersonic weapons.
“Unless Iran changes its policies and accepts good neighborly relations, its continued interference in Yemen is not in its interest or the region’s,” he said.
Last week, US ambassador to the United Nations, Dorothy Shea, condemned Iran for the Houthi rebels’ continued attacks on civilian cargo vessels in the Red Sea during the UN Security Council briefing on Yemen.
“Iran’s defiance of this Council’s resolutions enables the Houthis to escalate regional tensions. Iran’s continued support for the Houthis also poses a threat to the people of Yemen and to freedom of navigation in the Red Sea,” she told the council.
“In that regard, the United States commends Yemeni government-aligned forces for their July seizure of at least 750 tons of Iranian weapons bound for the Houthis. We urge the UN Secretariat to facilitate an inspection of that seizure by the Yemen Panel of Experts as soon as possible.”
The Iran-backed group, which controls around two thirds of Yemen's population in one third of the country, began a maritime blockade in the Red Sea in November 2023, following a call by Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei in a show of allegiance to Iran-backed Hamas in Gaza.
A 24-year-old Palestinian woman from Beit Ummar in the occupied West Bank has been arrested on suspicion of espionage for Iran, according to Israeli media on Monday.
Arrested early in August, she has admitted to some of the allegations against her, according to a report by Channel 12, including having had lengthy contact with an Iranian agent and having carried our several missions on behalf of Iran.
Police and the Israeli military must now provide additional material to a military court in a case described as “highly security-sensitive,” Ynet reported, with judges demanding evidence such as technological tests and further intelligence operations to substantiate the charges against the suspect.
A gag order has been imposed on the case.
The suspect, whose investigation is being conducted jointly by the military and the Shin Bet intelligence service, will remain in custody for another eight days as of Monday.
It is the latest in a string of cases involving Israeli citizens accused of working for Iran since the October 7, 2023, attacks by Iran-backed Hamas. However, it is the first such case known to emerge from the occupied West Bank, although seven men from East Jerusalem were arrested last year.
Recent incidents include an Israeli soldier charged with passing information to Iran in exchange for money — including interception videos and photographs of missile landings — and a Bedouin teacher in the Negev accused of filming fighter jet takeoffs.
Last Thursday, officials also revealed that Iranian operatives hacked the Telegram account of former Interior and Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked during the 12-day war. Shaked, who has not held office for more than two years, had previously been warned of Iranian attempts to eavesdrop on her communications.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guard got a leaked British Ministry of Defense database from the Taliban, hoping to use it to detain suspects as bargaining chips in nuclear talks while the Taliban seeks recognition as Afghanistan’s rulers, the Telegraph reported.
A group of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard officials travelled to Kabul last week, where the Taliban handed them a leaked list containing personal details of Afghans who had applied for asylum in Britain — including soldiers, intelligence assets and special forces members — in exchange for Iran’s potential recognition of their rule, senior Iranian and Afghan officials told the paper.
The Telegraph said the officials travelled without the knowledge of Iran’s civilian government.
A senior Iranian official told the paper that four Guards members promised the Taliban they would push Tehran to speed up recognition of the Islamist group.
“The Taliban gave them the list. They want to find British spies before the ‘snapback’ to have something to pressure London behind closed doors,” the official was quoted as saying.
Iranian border forces have already detained several people whose names appeared on the leaked list, the report said.
“Many were released because they were only former Afghan soldiers, while others are being held for further checks. The focus is just on British spies,” the source added.
The database, dubbed a “kill list” by British media, was accidentally leaked in 2022 when a Royal Marine emailed the full file to Afghan contacts. It included names, phone numbers and email addresses of around 25,000 Afghans and more than 100 British special forces personnel and MI6 operatives who endorsed Afghan relocation applications.
The Taliban’s decision to share the file followed internal debate, the paper said, with some officials objecting due to Iran’s treatment of Afghan refugees.
“Some argued that we should not do any favors for the Iranians … but if they were willing to recognize the Islamic Emirate in return, that would not be a bad deal,” a Taliban official was quoted as saying.
Earlier on Monday, Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei said that recognizing the Taliban was a “sovereign decision,” adding that Tehran maintains extensive interactions with Afghanistan due to shared ties, a long border and common challenges, and would make a decision on recognition “whenever its national interests require.”
The reported development comes as Britain, France and Germany warned they would trigger the 'snapback' mechanism to restore UN sanctions unless Iran resumes nuclear talks before the end of August.
A top military adviser to Iran’s supreme leader warned on Sunday that another war with Israel or the United States was likely, dismissing the current ceasefire as just another phase in the conflict.
“We are not in a ceasefire, we are in a stage of war. No protocol, regulation, or agreement has been written between us and the US or Israel,” said senior Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) general Yahya Rahim Safavi.
“I think another war may happen, and after that, there may be no more wars.”
Safavi’s comments is the latest in a series of combative remarks from military leaders on both sides, with Israel’s army chief vowing readiness for further strikes and Iran’s General Staff warning of “a far stronger response” to any future attacks by US or Israel.
Safavi argued that Iran must build power at both the regional and global levels.
“The Americans and the Zionists say they create peace through power; therefore Iran must also become strong, because in the system of nature the weak are trampled,” he said.
Tehran’s leadership continues to project defiance despite the threat of renewed UN sanctions and worsening shortages of power and water at home—that has led Iran’s moderates to call for a change of course in foreign policy.
Safavi outlined what he called Iran’s strategy for deterrence.
“We must strengthen our diplomatic, media, missile, drone and cyber offensive strategy,” he said, “we, the military, do scenario-planning, we see the worst case, and we prepare a plan for it.”
Iran-Israel war
Safavi’s comments come two months after Israel launched a surprise military campaign on June 13 targeting military and nuclear sites, killing hundreds of military personnel, nuclear scientists and civilians.
Iran responded with missile strikes that killed 31 civilians and one off-duty soldier, according to official figures published by the Israeli government.
The Islamic Republic says 1,062 people were also killed by Israel during the 12-day conflict, including 786 military personnel and 276 civilians.
On June 22, the US carried out airstrikes on Iran’s key nuclear sites at Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan.
A US brokered ceasefire came into effect on June 24, which ended the 12 day air war.