Iran’s exiled prince says to counter Islamist extremist threats such as Iran's proxy Hamas in Gaza, the world must cut their source of support from Tehran.
Appearing in Piers Morgan Uncensored on Sky News Australia Tuesday, Reza Pahlavi reiterated the call on the global community to differentiate between Iranian people and the Islamic Republic's regime, saying that what the people of Iran want is “totally different” from the “radical” regime in their country.
He said the world cannot ignore the elephant in the room, referring to how the Islamic Republic is the main engine behind a wide range of conflicts, elaborating that since its establishment in 1979, the Islamic Republic has fomented “antagonism, regional instability, warmongering” through supporting terrorist groups.
Stating that the cure for the extremism fueling terrorist groups was to end it at the source, which is the Islamic Republic. “I’ve always asked the world community, including the media when they talk about Iran, to specify they are talking about the regime in Iran, not the people," he explained.
“The principal support and the principal funding that comes to these (terrorist) groups must have a money trail … it is not a secret that the regime in Tehran has been behind most of these groups, has financed them, has armed them, has used them as proxies,” he said.
Stressing the threat this poses to the West, including the recent revelation in The Times in London that Tehran was backing mass pro-Palestine protests in London, and stoking unrest in Europe, he added: “Today we hear this ominous sound of radical Islamists who are trying to shape a different future for countries even in Europe.The cure is to put an end to the source behind this extremism.”
In addition to its web of proxies across the Middle East, Iran has also been found to be supplying arms to Russia in its invasion of Ukraine, showing the breadth of the threat posed by the regime's war-mongering elite. Since mid-2022, Iran has reportedly supplied a substantial number of kamikaze Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) to Russia, which have been extensively deployed to target civilian infrastructure and cities.
The former crown prince, who has long campaigned for a secular and democratic Iran rather than a restoration of the monarchy, has time and again talked about how the collapse of the Islamic Republic and the establishment of a new government in Iran that is at peace with the world can resolve a plethora of international conflicts. He enjoys a large supporter base in Iran and abroad with no gathering held without people chanting slogans in admiration of the Pahlavi monarchs, who were pioneers of leading Iran to its modernization. A Revolutionary Guard official revealed this week that imprisoned protesters expressed a desire for the return of the exiled prince to Iran.
Pahlavi made the remarks amid an escalating conflict in the Middle East, ignited on October 7, when Tehran-backed Hamas Islamist militants launched a multi-thronged attack into Israel, killing over 1,400 mostly civilians and taking more than 240 hostages. Thousands of Palestinians have been killed in Israel's retaliatory bombardment in the most serious conflict since Hamas took control of the Strip in 2007.
The Islamic Republic has been trying to indoctrinate the Iranian people with anti-Israel notions and its attempts start since the early years at elementary schools where students must shout “death to Israel and the US” before going to the class every morning. Since war broke out, around 40 attacks have also been made on US bases in Iraq and Syria as the regime capitalizes on the opportunity to expand the conflict beyond Gaza.
However, amid the wave of pro-Palestinian rallies across the world, hardliners in Iran are admitting that the general public in Iran have little appetite for the Palestinian cause. Iran has seen no grassroot, popular expression of solidarity with Palestinians, except by groups loyal to the regime despite the fact that the Islamic Republic of Iran is the main supporter of Hamas – or perhaps because of it.
Even on the streets of London where some 100,000 people at a time have come out in pro-Palestine marches, Iranians have made their voice heard.
Since the Hamas terror operation it codenamed al-Aqsa Flood (Storm in Persian), Iranians have become even more vocal about their distance from the Islamic Republic’s narrative of the conflict, making trendy hashtags like #IranStandsWithIsrael or chanting creative slogans about where the regime should put the Palestinian flag. Public events such as football matches, are a good touchstone to see the real public mood of Iranians, who use such events to chant slogans against the regime’s pro-Hamas propaganda.
Earlier this week, people set fire to a pro-Hamas billboard in the religious city of Mashhad, where the Supreme Leader and President Ebrahim Raisi hail from. Setting fire to billboards and monuments promoting the Islamic Republic’s lines of propaganda has become another way Iranians express their desire to break free from the rule of the Islamic theocracy. A large number of Iranians also stand with the people of Israel but do not dare to express their opinions openly in fear of reprisal by the regime.
It is time for many under the regime to break free of not only its control of how to dress, but also from the confines of how they must think. According to an Iranian anti-regime activist, “Iranians risk their life to stand by the people of Israel” because they have been “prisoners of these terrorists and their propaganda for 45 years!”