Basij chief says Iran never sought talks, US must meet MoU terms

Iran began backing Arab armed groups in the 1980s, when the Revolutionary Guards trained Hezbollah in Lebanon. The strategy was meant to compensate for Iran’s weak conventional military by projecting power abroad and keeping conflict away from Iranian territory.

That model has suffered major setbacks. The wars triggered after the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attack ultimately brought direct attacks on Iran. Hezbollah and Hamas have been badly weakened, Bashar al-Assad’s government in Syria has fallen, and Iraq has ordered militias to disarm by October.

The Economist said the network is more likely to fragment than collapse, with some groups becoming more dependent on Tehran, others more autonomous and some looking toward alternative patrons.

Hezbollah represents the first category. Before 2023 it purportedly had more than 100,000 rockets and missiles and an experienced fighting force. Hassan Nasrallah, killed by Israel in 2024, was ideologically close to Iran but retained considerable autonomy.

His successor Naim Qassem has less authority, while Israeli strikes have killed many senior commanders and Lebanon is demanding Hezbollah surrender its remaining arsenal. The Economist said the IRGC sent personnel to Lebanon to exercise more direct control, leaving Hezbollah little choice but to enter another war with Israel in March. Its domestic popularity has also fallen, leaving Iran with an incentive to preserve the group partly because of what its collapse would symbolize.

The Houthis are at the opposite end. Iran’s support transformed them from a local Yemeni insurgency into a force capable of using anti-ship missiles and downing US Reaper drones, but they increasingly act according to their own interests. They are producing more of their own weapons, have developed ties with al-Shabab in Somalia, and have held contacts with Russia and China. Tehran and the Houthis still share enemies, but that does not mean the group takes orders from Iran.

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  Houthis more effective Iran ally than Hezbollah, Yemen expert says

Iraqi Shiite militias fall somewhere in between. Iran remains an ally, but their main patron is now the Iraqi state, which pays more than 200,000 militiamen. Some attacked US bases earlier this year, but larger groups have been reluctant to risk their domestic position. T

he Economist said the IRGC was reported to have created smaller cells in Iraq to attack Persian Gulf states because bigger militias were unwilling to do so.

Hamas has always been an awkward fit in the largely Shiite network. Its new leader Khalil al-Hayya is considered close to Iran, but other officials favor stronger ties with Turkey and Persian Gulf countries.

In March, Hamas urged Tehran to stop attacking Persian Gulf states. Iran is unlikely to abandon Hamas, but its support may become more rhetorical than material.

Tehran also has fewer resources to rebuild the network. The war has caused hundreds of billions of dollars in damage, the United States is blockading Iranian ports and tightening sanctions, and Assad’s fall has severed Iran’s land route to Lebanon.

The Economist compared the situation, with caveats, to Soviet client states in the 1980s, when Moscow could no longer afford to sustain all its allies. Its conclusion: Iran’s regional network may survive, but increasingly as separate actors rather than a single functioning “axis.”

The argument comes after six months of war, intermittent diplomacy and repeated attempts at mediation have failed to produce a durable settlement.

US strikes and economic pressure have continued, Iran has retaliated across the region, and the latest escalation has again brought attacks to southern Iran while traffic through the Strait of Hormuz has fallen close to a standstill.

At home, the rial has pushed past 2.2 million to the dollar, while gas shortages and mounting economic pressure have sharpened the question of how long Iran can sustain the confrontation.

“Iran is now living through one of the most fateful junctures of its confrontation with known adversaries,” the IRGC-linked Javan newspaper wrote Wednesday.

Coming from a publication close to the security establishment, the unusually stark assessment was notable.

Khorasan, aligned with parliament speaker Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf, sounded a similarly somber note, describing the crisis as “a moment not yet past but already worth calling history.” Iranians, it said, “have lived through two wars in one year.”

Economy or ideology

For those advocating a diplomatic way out, the increasingly urgent argument is that Iran’s economy cannot withstand indefinite confrontation.

Pro-reform Shargh defended President Masoud Pezeshkian’s call at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit in Bishkek for a return to reciprocal diplomacy under the June MoU.

Columnist Ahmad Zeidabadi argued that with the rial above 2 million to the dollar and the country facing severe gas shortages, Iran could no longer afford endless confrontation.

“Pezeshkian’s message in Bishkek reflects the urgent needs of our society: our real economy cannot survive endless isolation,” Zeidabadi wrote. “True national strength lies in protecting citizens’ livelihoods through practical diplomacy, not in clinging to dogmatic slogans.”

The argument echoes concerns raised by Pezeshkian himself, who has identified sanctions, political infighting and the role of quasi-governmental companies among the pressures weighing on Iran’s economy.

But for hardliners, the lesson of the past six months is almost precisely the opposite.

‘Capitulationist current’

Kayhan’s ultraconservative editor Hossein Shariatmadari demanded the “purging of the capitulationist current,” attacking Executive Deputy Jafar Ghaempanah and Yousef Pezeshkian, the president’s son, for questioning whether uranium enrichment was essential to Iran’s survival.

“Questioning enrichment under enemy fire is not pragmatism—it is ideological surrender,” Shariatmadari wrote.

He argued that abandoning enrichment would merely encourage Washington to demand further concessions over Iran’s missiles and coastal defense systems, echoing a longstanding argument made by former Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.

Shariatmadari portrayed the advisers’ comments as an attempt to prepare public opinion for capitulation to Washington’s D-Day campaign, arguing that pressure over enrichment, missiles and regional support formed part of a single Western effort to strip Iran of its defensive capabilities.

He pointed to the latest US strikes on Larak Island as proof that Washington responds only to uncompromising force.

Those strikes, however, came amid another escalation that brought the human costs of the confrontation back to southern Iran. Attacks were reported on Larak and in several southern cities, including Ahvaz, Bandar Abbas, Qeshm and Chabahar.

Six months of war have therefore produced an unusual point of agreement across Iran’s bitter political divides: the country has reached an extraordinarily dangerous moment.

For advocates of diplomacy, economic exhaustion makes compromise increasingly necessary. For hardliners, the same six months have demonstrated that compromise under pressure would only invite more pressure.

The two presidents exchanged only briefly on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit on Tuesday, with no dedicated bilateral meeting—an absence seized on by Iranian critics as evidence of Beijing’s reluctance to embrace Tehran more closely.

The optics were particularly sensitive in Tehran, where closer ties with China and Russia have for years been promoted as the cornerstone of a “Look East” strategy intended to reduce Iran’s dependence on the West.

Heshmatollah Falahatpisheh, a former member of parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Committee, said Xi’s treatment of Pezeshkian sent a message from China to the United States amid the war.

“Xi's cold reception of Pezeshkian was this Eastern vendor's message to America amid the war,” he wrote on X. “What some in Iran called a strategic partnership was, for China, nothing more than a superficial relationship.”

Prominent moderate politician Davoud Heshmati also pointed to the absence of a bilateral meeting, arguing that it was “rejected by the Chinese side.”

A serious warning

Conservative commentator Mostafa Najafi described the encounter as “a serious warning and negative signal in Iran-China relations,” particularly if Tehran had requested a meeting and Beijing had declined.

He warned that continued ambiguity in the relationship could have significant consequences for Iranian foreign policy at a time when Tehran’s international options are already limited.

The unease over Pezeshkian’s encounter has been amplified by a separate, disputed claim that Beijing has attached conditions to deeper cooperation with Tehran.

Hossein Marashi, secretary-general of the centrist Executives of Construction Party, said in an interview with EcoIran that China had set specific conditions for implementing parts of a 25-year cooperation agreement and for a planned visit to Beijing by parliament speaker Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf.

Ghalibaf was appointed Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei’s special envoy for China affairs in May but has yet to travel to China or meet Chinese officials in that capacity.

“The Chinese have told us very clearly: You open the Strait of Hormuz, you do not charge [transit] fees, you resolve your issues with Saudi Arabia and the United States, before Ghalibaf comes to China,” Marashi claimed.

Hardliners hit back

Ghalibaf’s office rejected the attribution of such conditions to China and urged media outlets to refrain from publishing claims that could “affect Iran’s national interests and its foreign relations.”

There is no independent evidence that Beijing imposed the conditions described by Marashi.

Marashi’s comments prompted a fierce response from conservative and hardline media, where questioning the relationship with Beijing was portrayed by some as serving Washington’s interests.

The hardline Kayhan newspaper called Marashi “a facilitator of White House policies” and accused him of seeking to “poison Iran’s strategic relations with its Eastern partners from within.”

A commentary published by the Fars news agency went further, accusing reformists of trying to portray relations with China as unstable and dependent on Washington and calling for Marashi’s prosecution.

The dispute also spilled onto Persian-language social media, where hardline users accused Pezeshkian of placing greater importance on reaching an agreement with the United States than on relations with China.

Others argued that the absence of a bilateral meeting reflected Beijing’s choices rather than the Iranian president’s diplomacy.

The argument exposes a deeper uncertainty over Iran’s “Look East” strategy. Its advocates have presented China as a strategic partner capable of helping Tehran withstand Western pressure, while critics increasingly question whether Beijing sees the relationship in comparable terms.

The brief encounter in Bishkek cannot by itself answer that question. At a moment when Iran’s options are narrowing, it remains unclear how far its most important partner is actually prepared to go.

“We’re investigating it because obviously we care. We want to know,” Vance told reporters in Washington.

“If we do make mistakes, again, this is a big difference between us and Iran, when our military makes mistakes, they learn from them to try to get better from them,” he added.

The explosion ripped through a residential building hosting a wedding in the small town of Kuhestak in Sirik County on Tuesday, during a new wave of US strikes along Iran’s Strait of Hormuz coast.

Iranian authorities said at least 68 people were wounded. A four-year-old child was among those reported dead. Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei described the wedding strike as a “war crime.”

CENTCOM said Wednesday it was already looking into reports of the incident but rejected allegations that American forces deliberately target civilians.

“We’re aware of the reports, which originated from Iranian state media, and we are looking into them,” US Navy Captain Tim Hawkins, a CENTCOM spokesperson, told Iran International. “The U.S. military never targets civilians, unlike the IRGC.”

CENTCOM said its forces carried out multiple strikes across southern Iran on Sept. 1, targeting Revolutionary Guard air-defense sites, radar systems, maritime assets and facilities, mine-laying capabilities and communications sites.

On Thursday, Reuters published an analysis by four weapons experts who said the damage was more consistent with a direct hit than a ricochet from another target.

Three assessed that the munition was likely American rather than an errant Iranian air-defense missile. One said a US weapon may simply have missed its intended target.

Those assessments are not definitive, and the US investigation remains ongoing.

Shahin Milani, executive director of the Iran Human Rights Documentation Center, told Iran International that any strike on civilians required proper investigation, while cautioning that restrictions on independent access inside Iran made the full civilian toll difficult to verify.

“Striking civilian targets contravenes international law, and all such incidents must be properly investigated,” Milani told Iran International. “The Iranian government, however, has consistently denied UN mechanisms access to the country. Moreover, given the Iranian government’s long history of disseminating falsehoods, it is very difficult to ascertain the real extent of harms to civilians based on the reports produced by state-run media in Iran.”

Reuters cited a US official, speaking on condition of anonymity, as saying investigators were considering several possible causes, including a US strike, a US munition ricocheting from another target, or an Iranian air-defense missile or interceptor going astray.

The incident has renewed scrutiny of the civilian toll of the US-Iran war, six months after a missile struck a primary school in Minab, killing scores of children and teachers, according to Iranian authorities.

Washington did not publicly accept responsibility for the Minab strike.

Reuters reported in March, however, that an initial internal US military investigation found American forces were likely responsible.

The Pentagon has not publicly released the findings of that investigation.

The question came as the United States renewed strikes on Iranian military targets and Trump rejected Tehran’s call for a return to the Islamabad Memorandum, saying an agreement with the Islamic Republic was not “worth the paper it’s written on.”

But responses sent by a number of Iran International viewers raised a different question: if Iranians return to the streets, can they be certain that Washington will continue supporting them?

Some pointed to the experience of the past eight months, during which Trump has moved between encouraging Iranians to challenge the Islamic Republic, launching a war against it, reaching an agreement with Tehran and again escalating military pressure.

That history began with the nationwide anti-government protests in December and January.

Trump repeatedly encouraged Iranians to stay in the streets. On January 13, as the crackdown intensified, he told protesters to “take over your institutions” and declared that “help is on its way.”

The repression that followed was on an extraordinary scale. More than 36,500 people were killed by security forces during the January 8-9 crackdown, according to classified government documents and other evidence, including field reports and accounts from medical staff, witnesses and victims’ families, reviewed by Iran International.

Trump also warned Tehran against executing detained protesters, saying the United States would take “very strong action” if executions went ahead.

Days later, he said he had been informed that more than 800 planned executions had been canceled and suggested that his intervention had helped stop them. Iran’s prosecutor general later denied that such a mass execution plan existed.

Then, on February 28, the United States and Israel launched their war against the Islamic Republic.

Trump again addressed the Iranian public directly. He urged people to stay sheltered while the bombing continued but said that once military operations were over, Iranians should “take over your government.”

For opponents of the Islamic Republic who interpreted his remarks as a commitment to support political change, the months that followed produced a more complicated picture.

The war eventually gave way to negotiations and the Islamabad Memorandum. The agreement dealt primarily with security and geopolitical issues, including the Strait of Hormuz, Iran’s nuclear activities and sanctions. The political rights of Iranians and the government’s repression of protesters were not central elements of the framework.

That did not make Washington an ally of Tehran. The United States has continued imposing severe economic and military pressure on the Islamic Republic, and the agreement itself later unraveled.

But it demonstrated an important limitation to Trump’s earlier rhetoric: Washington’s immediate priorities could shift from political change inside Iran to reaching an arrangement with the government Iranians had been encouraged to confront.

Executions also continued.

Trump has not been completely silent about them. In July, he reacted to the execution of one protester by writing “Savages!!!” and shared material about another case. But those interventions were far more limited than his earlier warnings that executions could trigger strong US action.

This is the context in which Trump is now once again asking Iranians to rise up.

He himself acknowledged on Wednesday why doing so is difficult. Asked about the absence of another uprising, Trump said protesters “get shot,” while arguing that the Islamic Republic was growing weaker and would eventually become less capable of suppressing them.

The scale of the January crackdown makes that explanation difficult to dispute. Taking to the streets against the Islamic Republic can carry an immediate risk of imprisonment, execution or death at the hands of security forces.

But the responses received by Iran International suggest another calculation is also at work for at least some Iranians: what happens if they act on Trump's encouragement and US priorities subsequently change?

There is precedent for Washington placing limits on how far it is prepared to go. During the 12-day Israel-Iran war in June 2025, Trump prevented Ali Khamenei from being assassinated, he later confirmed in a post on Truth Social.

"I SAVED HIM FROM A VERY UGLY AND IGNOMINIOUS DEATH," Trump posted on June 27, 2025.

That episode does not establish that Trump prevented the overthrow of the Islamic Republic, as some of his critics have argued. But it reinforces the distinction between Trump's rhetoric about regime change and the limits Washington may impose when making military and diplomatic decisions.

Trump’s messages to Iranians over the past eight months have therefore contained two different signals.

He has repeatedly encouraged them to challenge the Islamic Republic and, at moments, suggested that American power would help create an opportunity for them to change their government. At other moments, Washington has prioritized a ceasefire, negotiations and specific US security interests.

For people being asked to risk their lives in another confrontation with the Islamic Republic, that distinction is not theoretical.

Trump is asking when Iranians will rise up and fight. The experience of the past several months helps explain why some of them are responding with a question of their own: if they do, how long can they count on his support?