Iran International
The latest US-Iran diplomacy may reflect coordinated pressure rather than compromise, analysts told Iran International’s Eye for Iran podcast, describing Washington and Jerusalem as playing a potential “good cop, bad cop” strategy.
Middle East analyst Dr. Eric Mandel said the contrasting public tones adopted by US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should not necessarily be read as disagreement.
“This could be a giant ruse — Netanyahu and Trump playing bad cop, good cop,” Mandel said, arguing that diplomacy may be designed to demonstrate that all political options were exhausted before stronger measures are considered.
Former US ambassador John Craig echoed that assessment.
“The pressure is deliberate,” Craig said, adding that talks could represent “a prequel… to military action,” as Washington increases its force posture in the region.
Military buildup alongside diplomacy
That military posture has become increasingly visible. President Donald Trump has said he is considering sending a second US aircraft carrier to the Middle East as tensions with Tehran escalate, describing an expanding naval deployment intended to reinforce American leverage.
“We have an armada that is heading there and another one might be going,” Trump said in an interview with Axios, signaling that additional forces could be deployed if diplomacy fails.
The United States has already positioned the USS Abraham Lincoln carrier strike group, accompanied by destroyers armed with long-range Tomahawk missiles, within the US Central Command area covering the Middle East.
The Pentagon has also moved additional fighter jets, air defense systems and other military assets into the region.
Defense planners are weighing further options should Trump authorize a broader buildup, including the possible deployment of additional carrier groups.
The military movements come as Washington pursues indirect talks with Iranian officials over Tehran’s nuclear program — the first such discussions since US strikes targeted three major Iranian nuclear facilities last June was held in Oman last week. A second meeting is set to continue this week in Geneva.
At the same time, the Trump administration has warned US commercial vessels to avoid parts of the Strait of Hormuz and the Gulf of Oman.
Netanyahu struck a notably cautious tone following his meeting with Trump in Washington, the seventh between the two leaders since the US president returned to office.
Speaking before departing the United States, the Israeli prime minister said Trump believes Iran could still be pushed into accepting what he called “a good deal,” but made clear he remains doubtful.
“I do not hide my general skepticism about the possibility of reaching any agreement with Iran,” Netanyahu said, stressing that any deal must address ballistic missiles and Tehran’s regional proxy network in addition to its nuclear program.
Trump, meanwhile, warned that failure to reach an agreement would be “very traumatic for Iran,” while urging Tehran to move quickly toward accepting US conditions.
Pressure grows as unrest inside Iran deepens
The diplomacy is unfolding against the backdrop of one of the deadliest crackdowns in the Islamic Republic’s history. Iranian security forces opened fire on nationwide protests on January 8-9 with at least 36 thousand killed in a matter of days as demonstrations spread across multiple cities.
Voices connected to people inside Iran, shared on Eye for Iran, suggest that the internal crisis is shaping how many Iranians now view international negotiations.
Mina, an Iranian speaking on the program whose friends were killed or imprisoned during the protests, described a level of desperation.
“There are people in Iran who watch the air traffic every night to see if there are fewer airplanes in the sky,” she said. “Maybe tonight intervention will come.”
Her account reflects a growing sentiment among some protesters who, after years of failed reform movements and escalating repression, say they no longer believe internal change alone is possible.
Many, she said, now see outside pressure — including potential military action — as the only remaining path to ending the rule of the Islamic Republic.
Analysts say that reality adds urgency to the current diplomatic moment. Washington emphasizes negotiations, while Israel highlights the risks of delay, creating what Mandel described as a coordinated messaging strategy rather than a clear policy divide.
“The president wants to show he has gone to the nth degree diplomatically,” Mandel said.
“But that doesn’t mean other options disappear.”
Craig argued the visible military buildup is intended to shape Iranian calculations during talks, warning Tehran may attempt to prolong negotiations to buy time — a pattern seen in previous nuclear negotiations.
Netanyahu’s skepticism mirrors longstanding Israeli concerns that agreements focused narrowly on nuclear restrictions fail to address broader threats posed by Iran’s missile program and proxy forces operating across the region.
The Israeli leader also announced he would not return to Washington next week for a planned Board of Peace gathering and will instead address the AIPAC conference virtually, a move that has fueled speculation about the urgency surrounding current Iran discussions.
“If you told me tonight something dramatic happened,” Mandel said, “I wouldn’t be surprised.”
Addressing journalists on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference on Saturday, Pahlavi argued that failure to confront the authorities decisively would embolden authoritarian actors beyond Iran.
Diplomatic pressure alone, he added, was insufficient. “It is time to end the Islamic Republic,” he said.
His remarks came at a time when Iran, nuclear negotiations, regional tensions and domestic crackdowns have been among the key issues discussed at the Munich Security Conference.
Protests persist despite crackdown
Resistance inside Iran, Pahlavi said, continues despite arrests and executions of the people.
“When they came to the streets, they were only met with this brutal genocidal level, industrial level massacre,” he said, adding that many were forced to retreat but “people are still out there chanting.”
He warned that delay could cost lives. “Every day that goes by, more people could die,” he said, arguing that negotiations would not yield meaningful results.
The 2026 Munich Security Conference has become one of the most outspoken platforms for presenting international perspectives on the future of the Islamic Republic, with Prince Reza Pahlavi, US Senator Lindsey Graham, European Parliament President Roberta Metsola, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky each addressing the issue from different angles – including Iran’s protests, the role of the Revolutionary Guards, international pressure and possible future scenarios.
Sanctions and revenue pressure
Pahlavi urged stronger enforcement of sanctions to weaken the government’s ability to sustain its security forces.
“One way to weaken the regime even further is to impose more restrictions so that their source of revenue is cut off so they can no longer sustain their own elements,” he said.
“Any source of revenue to the regime will contribute to its ability to sustain itself a little bit longer, but at the end it will fall,” he added, describing financial pressure as a way to accelerate collapse.
Earlier, Pahlavi designated February 14 as a global day of action and called on Iranians abroad to rally in Munich, Los Angeles and Toronto, as well as in other cities worldwide, to demonstrate their support for the “Lion and Sun Revolution” and their compatriots inside the country.
Regional instability and Europe’s stakes
Instability across the Middle East is rooted in radical Islamist movements, including forces linked to Tehran, Pahlavi noted.
“This regime has only one purpose which is to export this ideology. It is a threat to its own people.”
He said political change would benefit neighboring countries and Europe alike.
“We have now a possibility of even more migration to Europe as a result of any continuation of the status quo.”
“A free Iran that would be able to supply Europe with its energy needs would certainly be an alternative to the only source that you have right now,” he added, referring to Europe’s reliance on Russia.
He described a post-Islamic Republic transition as a “win-win” outcome that would open trade and investment while strengthening stability.
Ready to lead transition
The exiled prince said calls for his leadership inside Iran carry both weight and responsibility.
“Millions of Iranians chanted my name and called for my return. That humbles me and gives me a lot of responsibility at the same time to answer their call and to be the leader of this transition as they have asked for,” he said.
He emphasized that participation in the movement is broad-based.
“Anybody who agrees with those four core principles, irrespective of their political affiliation or viewpoints, can be part of this national struggle for freedom,” he said.
First 100 days and institutional continuity
Stabilizing the country would be the priority immediately after a collapse, Pahlavi added.
The first phase would be to “stabilize the country, stabilize the economy” and ensure security, he said, arguing that encouraging “maximum defections” would prevent chaos similar to Iraq after Saddam Hussein.
Those “criminally responsible” with “the blood of people on their hands” would face courts, he added.
He also outlined a phased constitutional process culminating in elections.
“At the end of this process, once the constitution is approved and the nation votes in a referendum to adopt it, we will have the election of the first new parliament and the first new government of that future democracy.”
Monarchy, republic and inclusion
Asked about the future political system, Pahlavi said voters – not factions – should decide.
“Democracy is not about exclusion, it’s about inclusion, unless you are not in conformity with democratic principles,” he noted.
“My position is neutral towards the outcome,” he said, arguing that Iranians should decide “by the ballot box.”
He rejected criticism that he seeks power for himself.
“I’m not running for office. I’m not running for a job. I’m not seeking a power or a title,” he said.
“The day that happens, I consider that the end of my political mission in life.”
Iran’s internet, throttled for 20 days during January’s mass killing of protesters, has been restored since earlier this month, but remains unstable, with VPNs and other censorship-bypassing tools now far harder to access than before the shutdown.
“The internet is not stable enough for me to confidently take on projects, and transferring money has become so complicated that the losses outweigh the income,” one electrical engineer working as a freelancer told Iran International, speaking on condition of anonymity for security reasons.
Iranian entrepreneurs and freelancers are mostly shut out of global platforms and payment systems due to US sanctions, forcing them to depend on expensive workarounds that put their businesses at risk.
The engineer said that before the shutdown, earnings depended on the size and complexity of each contract.
“If the project was small or academic, the hourly rate was around $50. Larger and more complex projects would pay between $1,000 and $1,500 in total,” he said. “The number of projects per month varied, but overall I had a good level of income.”
That stability has eroded amid repeated disruptions and mounting financial barriers, he said.
“Inside Iran there is no industry where I can find work in my field. It’s complete confusion.”
An online translator who works with overseas agencies described similar disruption.
“When the connection cuts out, I cannot join interpretation sessions or upload translated files on time,” she told Iran International. “Clients do not want explanations. They just move to someone in another country.”
She said several long-term contracts were suspended after repeated outages, adding that rebuilding trust with foreign employers may take months.
Network shock ripples through digital labor
Freelancers described what they called a “freeze” in project flow, particularly from overseas clients who rely on constant connectivity and predictable delivery timelines.
The business daily Donya-e-Eqtesad, citing one of the country’s largest freelancing platforms, reported that project volume on a major platform dropped by up to 96 percent in the first days of the shutdown. The newspaper said activity has yet to fully recover.
Official data on the overall size and income of Iran’s freelance sector is not publicly available, making independent estimates difficult to verify.
“The recent internet shutdown is not just an effort to silence the people; it has also devastated over one million online businesses, with their sales dropping by up to 80 percent and small businesses suffering the most damage," the US State Department's Persian account on X posted in late January.
"As a result of the Islamic Republic regime’s reckless policies, nearly half of all jobs are now at risk."
Economic uncertainty compounds losses
The internet disruption coincided with wider infrastructure strain and economic volatility, intensifying pressure on digital workers.
“The most important factor here is the internet shutdown, which can broadly be categorized as an infrastructure disruption,” economic journalist Mahtab Gholizadeh told Iran International from Berlin.
“Alongside that, we have seen electricity and gas outages and other infrastructure shocks that limit access to the basic conditions industries and businesses need to grow,” she added.
Political uncertainty and foreign policy pressures are further weighing on the economy, Gholizadeh said.
“With this level of uncertainty in Iran’s diplomatic environment, conditions become unstable and high volatility prevents making decisions about future,” she said.
Foreign contracts unravel
Freelancers working with overseas employers were particularly exposed during the shutdown.
“In a country where the rial continuously loses value, many of these individuals could secure dollar income through freelancing that stabilizes their livelihoods and even acts as an economic buffer,” Canada-based science and technology journalist Mehdi Saremifar told Iran International.
“However, internet shutdowns and structural restrictions remove even this limited opportunity and effectively block access to the global market,” he added.
Saremifar cautioned that headline income figures often reflect exceptional cases rather than sustained averages.
“The main issue in Iran’s freelance market is not the income ceiling but severe instability and total dependence on internet access,” he said. “With every shutdown or disruption, the entire income stream stops.”
Even after partial reconnection, several freelancers said employers remain hesitant to assign projects inside Iran, citing concerns over delivery delays and payment obstacles.
Digital workers who spoke to Iran International expressed deep concern over losing their jobs and professional reputations, with many increasingly considering emigration. Beyond financial losses, they also described psychological strain caused by repeated uncertainty.
The shutdown appears to have seriously undermined one of the few lifelines available to young Iranians amid deepening isolation and the rial’s unprecedented collapse, compounding economic and psychological strain.
Iran’s rial, trading at nearly 1.6 million to the US dollar on Friday, has lost half its value in just six months and risks losing its role as both a store of value and a functioning currency.
Heydari was injured by live ammunition in his leg during protests on January 8 and taken away alive by security forces. After 33 days of complete silence about his whereabouts, his body was handed to his family on February 9.
Authorities told his father by phone that his son had “died during the protests” and that his body had been kept in morgue for over a month.
Family members who saw the body dispute that account.
They told Iran International that signs of severe beating, a broken nose and, most critically, a bullet wound to the left side of his forehead indicate he was tortured during detention and later killed with a close-range shot to the head.
Two additional visible signs, they said, strongly suggested that only days – not weeks – had passed since his death.
Live fire and arrest
Heydari was born on March 27, 2005, in the village of Virani in Shandiz and lived in Mashhad. He worked in a woodworking shop. Had he not been killed in mid-February, he would have turned 21 within weeks.
On the evening of January 8, he joined thousands of others protesting on Haft-e Tir Boulevard in Mashhad. Witnesses said security forces began firing at crowds gathered near the local police station around 9 p.m.
A protester who survived the crackdown told Iran International that a live round struck Heydari in the leg early in the shooting.
“He lost balance and fell. There was heavy bleeding. We couldn’t pull him back,” the witness said. “Security forces reached him, lifted him and dragged him away.”
Heydari’s mobile phone fell from his pocket as he collapsed. The witness retrieved it before fleeing.
33 days of enforced disappearance
From the moment of his arrest until the early hours of February 9, his family received no official information about his location, medical condition or legal status.
After learning from the witness that Heydari had been wounded and detained, the family searched for him across hospitals, detention centers, courts and morgues. Authorities – including the Intelligence Ministry, the Revolutionary Guards’ intelligence unit and local police – denied knowledge of his case.
The systematic denial of information about a detainee seized in plain sight amounts to enforced disappearance under international law. In practice, it left the family in prolonged uncertainty, cut off from any legal recourse and unaware of whether he was alive or dead.
Such denial also removes scrutiny – a condition that rights groups say can facilitate torture and extrajudicial killing.
The call from the morgue
In the early hours of February 9, officers from the investigative unit in the Shandiz area phoned Heydari’s father and instructed him to go to the Behesht-e Reza cemetery in Mashhad to identify and collect his son’s body.
When the father asked what had happened, he was told his son had “died during the protests” and that his body had been in morgue for more than a month.
Family members who viewed the body said there were visible bruises and a fractured nose, consistent with severe beating. The gunshot wound to the forehead, they said, appeared to have been fired from close range, likely with a handgun.
They also pointed to physical details suggesting that Heydari had been alive long after his January 8 arrest. He had visited a barber that Thursday and had only faint stubble at the time of his detention, they said, but facial hair had grown noticeably by the time his body was returned. They added that the body’s condition did not align with a death that had occurred a month earlier.
Together, they say, these signs contradict the official explanation and indicate he was killed days before his body was released.
Burial under watch
Heydari was buried in his hometown of Virani. The funeral drew large numbers of residents, alongside a significant presence of plainclothes security agents.
Agents attempted to detain several participants during the burial but were prevented by resistance from mourners, according to attendees. The following day, security forces warned the family against holding a memorial ceremony. The gathering ultimately proceeded after mediation by relatives.
Silence and risk
Shahram Sadidi, a Mashhad-born political activist based in the UK who first publicized Heydari’s disappearance, told Iran International that public unawareness may have made it easier for authorities to act without scrutiny.
“If news of his detention had spread earlier, public pressure might have prevented this outcome,” he said.
Field reports, Sadidi said, indicate that more than a thousand people – possibly several thousand – were detained in Mashhad during and after the January 8 protests, with little information released about most of them.
“Families are often threatened that speaking out will harm their loved ones,” he said. “Fear keeps many silent, and that silence creates space for abuse.”
Heydari’s case, marked by live-fire injury, disappearance and a fatal gunshot in custody, underscores the risks facing detainees held beyond public view – and the consequences of 33 days in which no authority acknowledged where he was.
