Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei on Wednesday suggested a US pressure campaign on Venezuela aimed to seize its territory and oil wealth in lengthy diatribe against hegemony of Western countries.
The 86-year-old theocrat styles himself a divinely-appointed protector of the oppressed worldwide and his remarks were couched as a general description of how weaker nations are usurped by more powerful ones led by the United States.
Speaking at a ceremony marking the birth anniversary of Fatemeh Zahra — the daughter of the Prophet Mohammad and a revered figure in Shia Islam — Khamenei said the motives behind what he called hegemonic pressure differ across regions.
“Sometimes it is about expanding territory,” he said, pointing to “what the Americans are doing with some Latin American countries.”
Western designs can also aim at extracting commodities," he said. “They apply pressure so they can take a country’s underground resources — its oil, for example."
Iran's relationship with Washington and Western Europe is at a low ebb since the United States joined a surprise Israeli military offensive against the country in June.
Britain, France and Germany then triggered the reimposition of international sanctions which have throttled Iran's already ailing economy.
Khamenei’s remarks came a day after the United States seized a Venezuela-linked tanker accused of transporting sanctioned Iranian and Venezuelan oil.
Washington says the tanker was part of a network tied to Hezbollah and Iran’s Revolutionary Guards.
Iran’s embassy in Caracas condemned the operation as an illegal act, calling it “robbery in the Caribbean Sea” and a violation of international maritime law.
US forces have mounted the largest buildup of forces in the Caribbean since the 1962 Cuban missile crisis and President Donald Trump has suggested the policy aims at the removal of leftist populist President Nicolas Maduro and has vowed attacks on land.
US air strikes on alleged drug boats in the region have killed at least 87 people.
'Hearts and minds'
Khamenei added that Western states also push to “reshape cultural and religious life,” often by influencing lifestyles and social norms through media. “They try to change how people live, think and believe,” he said.
But he said the most consequential objective is what he described as an engineered identity transformation. “More fundamental than all of these is the effort to change a nation’s identity,” he said.
Iranian officials accuse the West of seeking to foment sedition and rebellion in the country including by fomenting opposition to mandatory veiling laws for women.
The death of a young woman, Mahsa Amini, in morality police custody in 2022 led to nationwide protests dubbed the Woman, Life, Freedom movement which were quashed with deadly force.
Khamenei added that attempts to alter Iran’s cultural and religious foundations stretch back a century. “For a hundred years they have tried to rewrite who we are — our religion, our history, our culture,” he said. “The Islamic Revolution cleared that away, but the pressure continues. And resisting this pressure is essential.”
Khamenei said Iran is progressing despite economic and political pressures. “By God’s grace, the Islamic Republic is moving forward,” he told the audience of religious reciters. He said Iranians continue to show the world that Islam stands for “steadfastness, strength, honesty and justice.”
He also said the country faces a sustained “media and propaganda war” aimed at undermining public morale. “The enemy learned it cannot gain this land through military pressure,” he said. “So it turned to changing hearts and minds. We are standing firm, but the threat is real.”
Tehran’s unveiling of a towering statue depicting the Roman Emperor Valerian kneeling before pre-Islamic Persian King Shapur I has renewed criticism of the Islamic Republic’s appeal to nationalist sentiment following the June war with Israel.
For over forty years, the theocracy purged ancient Persian history from schoolbooks, replacing it with post-Islamic narratives. But after the 12-day conflict with Israel, officials have turned to the distant pre-Islamic past to rally a divided society.
From murals of ancient kings and soldiers to patriotic songs added to Shi’ite mourning ceremonies performed before Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, Tehran now embraces imagery once deemed heretical by its own revolutionary ethos.
'Kneel before Iran' campaign
Tehran’s Revolution (Enghelab) Square was the scene of an unusual spectacle on Friday as officials unveiled a massive bronze statue depicting Roman Emperor Valerian kneeling in submission before Sassanid King Shapur I, commemorating Iran’s victory at the Battle of Edessa (260 AD).
The event was held under the slogan “Kneel before Iran,” part of what authorities describe as a campaign to project “national unity and historical pride” following the June war with Israel.
Tehran Mayor Alireza Zakani, a staunch ultraconservative, said on X: “Enmity with Great Iran can only end in kneeling before this historic nation.”
Municipal official Davood Goodarzi said the installation would be accompanied by visual displays depicting “other victories of Iranians over foreign aggressors,” including the defeat of British forces by local commander Rais-Ali Delvari, Mirza Kuchak Khan’s resistance against Russian troops, and Surena’s triumph over Rome at the Battle of Carrhae in 53 BCE.
The goal, Goodarzi said, is “strengthening concepts such as national dignity, social unity, and Iranian identity.”
The statue, he said, would remain temporarily at Revolution Square before being moved to a city gateway “where it will stand as the first emblem of Iran before diplomats and foreign visitors.”
Unveiled women were allowed to attend the unveiling ceremony—an uncommon scene at events organized by Tehran’s ultra-hardline municipality.
The turn to the pre-Islamic past
The sharp reversal also recalls remarks once made by Khamenei. In a 2011 speech, he asserted that “all the great military victories of this nation came after Islam,” dismissing pre-Islamic accounts as “things that are not documented.”
In 1987, he had said that prophets triumphed over kings such as Cyrus and that “nothing remains of these monarchs in history but names remembered with derision.”
Nevertheless, pro-government social media accounts have now gone so far as to circulate posters equating Khamenei himself with Shapur, showing him standing with a staff as Benjamin Netanyahu and Donald Trump kneel before him. The caption reads: “You will kneel before Iran.”
'Hypocrisy'
Pro-government figures have hailed the move as a patriotic success. Conservative political reporter Hossein Saremi posted: “Today’s grand Iranian gathering showed that people and the state share one essence: Iran itself. Nothing can take our homeland away.”
Others, however, called the spectacle “hypocrisy.” Journalist Gholamhossein Pashaei wrote on X: “Every year you close Pasargadae to stop people from celebrating Cyrus Day, yet you unveil Shapur’s statue in Enghelab Square with drums and fireworks during Fatimiyya (mourning period)!”
Dissident commentator Hamid Asafi called the ceremony “a perfect snapshot of the Islamic Republic’s contradictions.”
On Telegram he wrote: “A week ago they closed Cyrus’s tomb out of fear of the crowds, and now they glorify Shapur in the same breath. The Islamic Republic fears living history but poses for selfies with its corpse.”
He added: “They know people no longer respond to rosaries and sermons. That’s why they’ve brought history back to the stage—in a controlled costume. If they can’t erase the past, they’ll try to own it.”
The irony deepened as UNESCO formally recognized Cyrus’s Charter as one of the earliest human-rights documents.
President Masoud Pezeshkian wrote on X: “Iran, the cradle of dialogue, justice, and coexistence, can still inspire peace today.”
Users swiftly replied, questioning how such pride could coexist with a government that blocks access to Cyrus’s tomb each year to those wishing to visit it on his birthday.