By: Prof. Kazem Kazerounian
A version of this article is published in Washington Examiner August 13, 2026
Since the United States and Israel launched their February 28 attacks, thousands have reportedly been killed, shipping routes have come under assault, and the Strait of Hormuz has become an instrument of coercion. Yet missiles, blockades, and negotiations cannot answer the central political question: Who can lead Iran beyond the Islamic Republic? That answer will determine whether the country moves toward popular sovereignty or is trapped between competing forms of authoritarian rule.
For the Iranian regime, that question is more dangerous than any military strike. The regime can absorb physical losses, rebuild command structures, and tighten repression. What it cannot easily survive is international recognition that an organized democratic alternative exists. Its next offensive will therefore be fought through television studios, think tanks, diplomatic circles, social media, and the ecosystem of influence it has cultivated abroad.
This playbook is already visible. In January, the European Union sanctioned Iranian regime entities for censorship, online trolling, surveillance, and disinformation. Hamburg’s 2025 intelligence report is even more direct: it identifies the MEK and its political coalition, the National Council of Resistance of Iran, as the primary focus of the regime’s Ministry of Intelligence in Western countries. The regime does not spend such resources randomly. It targets organizations it considers capable of threatening its survival.
The danger is compounded by the Pahlavi camp’s own channels into the regime. For more than two decades, Reza Pahlavi has publicly claimed contact by telephone, fax, email, and social media with clerics, bureaucrats, military officers, IRGC personnel, and Basij members. He has claimed daily communication with military “representatives,” while his senior circle promoted a defection platform reporting 160,000 applicants from state and security bodies. These are claims advanced by Pahlavi himself. If genuine, extensive channels exist. If exaggerated, they expose a credibility crisis. Either way, the relationship demands scrutiny and creates opportunities for manipulation by regime intelligence.
The Iranian regime’s next move will be a narrative assault. Regime operatives, lobbyists, friendly commentators, former officials, and anonymous accounts will revive accusations designed to make the MEK and NCRI politically untouchable. Pahlavi’s network can then amplify those charges before Western audiences.
The language differs, but the existential fear is shared. The Iranian regime knows that a democratic republic would abolish clerical sovereignty. The Pahlavi project knows that the same republic would close the door on dynastic restoration. Both depend on convincing the world that only their model can govern Iran. A credible, organized democratic alternative destroys that claim for both.
This common threat forges their strategic partnership. No signed pact is required. The regime’s network produces allegations. The Pahlavi network repackages them in language acceptable to Western audiences. Media repetition and algorithms do the rest. The regime gains a divided opposition. The Pahlavi project sees its strongest republican rival pushed aside. Survival draws both toward the same target.
Not every Pahlavi supporter is an agent of the Iranian regime. But influential elements within his network increasingly employ the same methods: systematic demonization, harassment, fabrication, and exclusion. Reporting on authoritarian currents among Pahlavi supporters, including the harassment of journalists and glorification of SAVAK, should serve as a serious warning to democratic governments.
War creates ideal conditions for manipulation. Rumors, fabricated stories, and coordinated disinformation spread rapidly, while independent access to Iran remains severely restricted. Governments searching for convenient interlocutors may mistake media visibility for political legitimacy. A dynastic name is then marketed as leadership, while the Iranian regime’s influence machinery works relentlessly to make the organized democratic resistance appear politically radioactive.
Western governments and journalists must resist this trap. They should demand transparency about funding, lobbying relationships, contacts with regime institutions, and coordinated online campaigns. Every opposition movement should be judged by the same standards: its program, internal conduct, commitment to pluralism, and measurable presence among Iranians.
Iran’s future must not be reduced to a choice between two dictatorships, one invoking religion and the other a crown. Iranians deserve a secular democratic republic based on free elections, gender equality, minority rights, an independent judiciary, and separation of religion and state. These principles stand at the heart of the NCRI’s Ten-Point Plan.
The Iranian regime understands that military pressure can damage its apparatus, but only an organized democratic movement can replace its rule. That is why the coming propaganda offensive will focus on the MEK and NCRI. When the turban and the crown direct their fire at the same democratic resistance, the world should ask the question both fear most: Why are they so determined to destroy it?