Why has Khamenei’s strategy failed in Iran?

 

54 executions in just 30 days including 11 executions on July 23 alone. On this same day, authorities hanged political prisoner Iman Sabzikar in public in Shiraz, south-central Iran. This is the first public hanging in two years and part of the Iranian regime’s latest report card of executions, and a chapter of the mullahs’ horrific human rights violations record. The rate of executions in Iran is escalating in horrific fashion.

• 255 were executed in 2020
• 366 were executed in 2021
• And 266 prisoners (more than the entire year 2020) have been executed in the first half of 2022 until the end of June, according to Iran Human Rights Monitor.

Iranian regime Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, when appointing Ebrahim Raisi as his regime’s president back in August of last year, described the measure as “full of meaning” due to the fact that “new individuals have new initiatives.”  And in his Nowruz (Iranian calendar New Year) message on March 21 he described Raisi as a figure who has “revived hopes.”

In June of 2016, years before appointing Raisi, Khamenei had issued specific warnings about the country “having certain tectonic plates” and “if these plates become activated, there will be earthquake(s).” These plates have been activated since December 2017 in the form of escalating rallies and uprisings that evolved into a massive earthquake in the nationwide protest of November 2019 that the regime responded to by killing over 1,500 protesters.

These words by Khamenei in describing Raisi—best known for his direct role in the summer 1988 massacre of over 30,000 political prisoners—is tantamount to the ongoing surge in executions by the mullahs’ regime that has taken Iran by a storm.

Khamenei believes the solution to containing Iran’s tumultuous atmosphere was in appointing a “young, Hezbollahi government” and appointing Raisi as its president. This is the last arrow in Khamenei’s quiver to install fear throughout Iran’s society and quiet the society’s tectonic plates. The regime’s dictator has also used the Guardian Council to disqualify all his rivals in the sham Majlis (parliamentary) elections of February 2020, and eliminating influential figures of his own inner circle, including Hassan Khomeini, the grandson of Ruhollah Khomeini, the regime’s first supreme leader, and former Majlis speaker Ali Larijani from the regime’s sham presidential election in June of last year.

Raisi has been ramping up the number of executions in Iran from the very first weeks of his tenure. The number of executions in eight months, from August 2021 to March 2021, was more than those registered in 12 months, from March 2020 to March 2021. And now, Raisi’s report card shows at least 266 executions in the past four months alone.

In May, Amnesty International warned that Iran has seen the highest number of executions in 2021, since Ebrahim Raisi became the regime’s president.

“Iran accounted for the biggest portion of this rise, executing at least 314 people (up from at least 246 in 2020), its highest execution total since 2017. This was due in part to a marked increase in drug-related executions—a flagrant violation of international law which prohibits the use of the death penalty for crimes other than those involving intentional killing,” according to the Amnesty International report. The actual number of executions are most likely higher.

However, the Iranian society has remained anything but silent. In fact, public protests, rallies, and uprisings have been escalating yet again. High prices led to major protests in the cities of Tehran, Izeh, Masjid Soleiman, Shahrekord, Ardabil, Quchan, Iranshahar and others. Teachers have taken to the streets in numerous rounds of nationwide rallies and gatherings checkered across the country protesting the mullahs’ plundering policies. Time and again authorities have seen Iranians holding their ground and resisting the regime’s oppressive forces dispatched to quell peaceful protests.

As we speak people are continuously seen chanting “Death to Raisi” and describing the regime president as the enemy. This signals a major strategic failure for Khamenei’s strategy of raising Raisi in the regime’s ranks and, according to many analysts, grooming him as the mullahs’ next supreme leader.

The enemy is attempting to “persuade the public that the country’s officials and administrators don’t know how to run the country” and seek to portray an image of the mullahs regime “facing a dead-end,” Khamenei said on June 21.

This result of Khamenei’s strategic defeat can be vividly seen from inside the regime and among members of the cherrypicked Majlis. Despite Khamenei warning of “anyone who makes the people mistrust the actions of the country’s officials is working in favor of the enemy,” each Majlis session we are hearing strong criticism targeting Raisi and describing him as incompetent.

Two elements can be cited as reasons behind Khamenei’s strategic failure:

Unprecedented hatred among Iran’s society and how the public utterly loath the regime. Many are describing Iran as a powder keg.

An ongoing anti-crackdown campaign by the Resistance Units, a network of brave activists associated to the Iranian opposition People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK) inside Iran. These measures are encouraging the public and bringing new hope for the Iranian people in general.

Iran is faced with an economic crisis, caused by the regime’s corruption, mismanagement, and refusal to back down from its destructive policies, including nuclear bombs, ballistic missiles, and terrorism.

While economic woes are the reason behind many protests in Iran, these movements quickly evolve into full anti-regime demonstrations calling for regime change.

Under such circumstances, instead of responding to the people’s just demands, the regime has doubled down on crackdown and repression. The new wave of executions comes at the same time as it is taking other repressive measures in schools, universities, and public offices. The regime aims to establish a climate of fear and intimidation throughout the Iranian society.

The history of dictatorial regimes, however, has shown that heavy crackdowns and executions will prove counterproductive. There comes a time that such measures will not only fail to lessen the dictator’s concerns but in fact further fuel the fire of social outcries. This is the dangerous phase that the mullahs’ regime currently faces.

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