Three-minute read
In recent days, the regime’s own media and judiciary have provided a revealing window into what Tehran fears most: an organized resistance that can endure repression, maintain continuity, and demonstrate its capability as an alternative center of political gravity.
A telling catalyst was a December 19 opinion column by former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who argued that Iranians reject both clerical rule and a return to monarchy, and that the claim “there is no alternative” ignores an organized opposition. Pompeo wrote, “They do not want a theocracy or a monarchy,” framing the regime as “on the ropes” and pushing the idea that change is feasible.
The regime’s sensitivity did not show up only in predictable denunciations. It showed up in a rare act of clarity from a state-linked Iranian outlet: Asr-e Iran openly argued that Pompeo’s reference to an “organized and democratic opposition” points specifically to the PMOI—not to other opposition currents that might want to claim the label. In other words, a regime-adjacent platform effectively confirmed that Tehran understands the strategic implication of the phrase “organized opposition”: this is not about sporadic protests; it is about structure.
That distinction matters because the clerical dictatorship has repeatedly demonstrated it can absorb anger when it is dispersed. Its vulnerability grows when anger becomes coordinated—when networks, discipline, and messaging convert public grievance into sustained political pressure.
The Iranian dictatorship is in dire straits.
The Iranian people deserve our support to build a better future. https://t.co/aodxrbZ6qk
— Mike Pompeo (@mikepompeo) December 19, 2025
The judiciary’s playbook: criminalize visibility, export intimidation
Meanwhile, in coverage of the 49th session of a sham court case involving allegations against 104 individuals linked to the PMOI, Iranian state media emphasized the proceeding’s “public” nature and its media coverage—an approach that functions as a broadcast channel for delegitimization rather than a transparent search for truth.
What stands out is the effort to push this campaign beyond Iran’s borders. The judiciary’s own news outlet, Mizan, framed European parliamentary hosting of Mrs. Maryam Rajavi as evidence of “double standards” and highlighted the timing—occurring while the Tehran court sessions are underway—suggesting that international platforms should be treated as a legal and political provocation. State broadcaster reporting from the court similarly stressed claims about “double standards” and the notion that invitations contradict European commitments—language clearly intended to intimidate institutions abroad into self-censorship.
#Iran’s Top Officials Warn of @Mojahedineng Influence and Looming Revolthttps://t.co/uJxSXN18t9
— NCRI-FAC (@iran_policy) April 18, 2025
The security propagandist’s slip: 1981 still haunts them
Alongside judicial spectacle, regime-aligned security messaging is reviving a foundational trauma narrative to justify permanent repression: the early 1980s. In an interview on state TV, documentary-maker Javad Moghouyi described the summer of 1981 as one of the most frightening periods for the system, claiming that around 100,000 armed people poured into Tehran and other cities—urging the audience to imagine Azadi Stadium packed and spilling into the streets.
The regime’s security storytellers are not revisiting history for accuracy; they are weaponizing memory to reassure a demoralized base. The intended message is that the system has already survived what it portrays as its most existential threats—and therefore should survive again, as an imminent uprising looms.
Former Interrogator at the regime's Ministry of Intelligence acknowledges the involvement of the democratic opposition PMOI/MEK in the uprisings that have occurred in #Iran in recent years.#FreeIran2024 https://t.co/CZOWnThv3w
— Dowlat Nowrouzi (@DowlatNowrouzi) January 11, 2024
Why this obsession intensifies in moments of crisis
The timing of this narrative offensive is not incidental. The clerical regime is navigating multiple pressure points—economic stress, public health alarms, social fatigue, and the credibility erosion that comes when institutions admit systemic corruption while daily life becomes unaffordable. In such conditions, the regime’s priority is not to solve grievances; it is to prevent grievances from gaining organizational form.
UN human-rights experts said the regime in Iran had executed more than 1,000 people in 2025 by late September, calling it an “unprecedented execution spree” and reiterating that international law restricts the death penalty to the “most serious crimes.”
According to the NCRI, the execution wave is accelerating because the leadership fears another nationwide uprising: in a December 3 statement it described November 2025 as the “bloodiest month in 37 years” with 335 executions, adding that Khamenei is “attempting to prevent an uprising through mass killings.”
#Iran News: Former Intelligence Interrogator Warns of Nationwide #Protests Amid Crisishttps://t.co/BwiYtEOgUe
— NCRI-FAC (@iran_policy) March 30, 2025
What Tehran is admitting through its behavior
The regime’s defenders will insist that naming opposition groups and staging trials is “national security.” But the pattern points to something more political: an attempt to criminalize not just alleged acts, but networks, platforms, and legitimacy.
When a state-linked outlet spells out whom foreign policymakers mean by “organized opposition,” when the judiciary treats foreign parliamentary hosting as a legal grievance, and when security media invokes the regime’s survival in the 1980s to rally a demoralized base, Tehran is acknowledging its central vulnerability: it can often contain spontaneous anger, but it struggles to contain coordination.
That is why Tehran’s fixation is so persistent. The clerical system fears an opposition it cannot decapitate—because it is not a single protest, a single leader, or a single moment. It is the prospect of structure.