Three-minute read
Deepening divisions within Iran’s ruling establishment have erupted into open warfare over negotiations with the United States, the regime’s nuclear strategy, and responsibility for the mounting consequences of Tehran’s regional and international confrontation.
While Masoud Pezeshkian’s government and Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi are trying to buy time for the regime by sending signals of readiness for negotiations, rival factions are accusing them of capitulation, demanding Araqchi’s dismissal, and openly calling for withdrawal from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and acquisition of nuclear weapons.
The escalating attacks reveal a regime trapped between two dangerous choices: retreat under international pressure or continue a confrontation that has already imposed enormous military, political, and economic costs.
Hardliners Accuse Araqchi of Helping Washington
The immediate dispute intensified after reports suggested Tehran signaled readiness for negotiations through intermediaries.
Reuters reported on November 1 that oil prices fell more than seven percent after Pezeshkian said the regime’s Supreme Leader had granted the government certain authority to pursue talks. Brent crude fell by $8.66 to $104.77 a barrel as markets interpreted Tehran’s statements as reducing the possibility of further escalation.
Pezeshkian is warning that economic hardship could trigger #IranProtests even as regime factions turn on one another over war and negotiations. In Rasht, a state-staged “unity” rally ended in a fight, while the #IRGC handed out 400,000 relief packages amid deepening food…
— NCRI-FAC (@iran_policy) October 16, 2026
The reaction inside the regime was furious.
Hardline outlet Nobonyad accused Araqchi of effectively assisting Washington by sending negotiation signals that lowered oil prices and provided U.S. President Donald Trump with an economic and political advantage shortly before the American midterm elections.
The outlet derisively described Araqchi as the regime’s “minister of foreign losses” and demanded that he be removed and held accountable. It also attacked Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf for blocking efforts to impeach him.
Two impeachment motions against Araqchi have already been registered in parliament. Among the accusations are his public statements, their alleged impact on global oil prices, and his continued advocacy of negotiations with Washington as a way out of the regime’s crises.
The language increasingly resembles accusations of betrayal rather than an ordinary policy dispute.
"Seven years after a sudden gasoline-price increase helped ignite the November 2019 #IranProtests, the fear of another uncontrolled eruption is again visible inside Iran’s own political and media establishment," Dr. @MasumehBolurchi writes. https://t.co/FdKN6aAy9Y
— NCRI-FAC (@iran_policy) October 27, 2026
Calls for a Nuclear Bomb Grow Louder
While one faction searches for an exit through negotiations, another is demanding escalation.
Vahid Ahmadi, a member of parliament’s Security Commission, called for withdrawal from the NPT and said that if the regime’s survival were threatened, acquiring a nuclear bomb could become a “public demand.”
Reza Nouri, Khamenei’s representative in North Khorasan, went further by calling for reconsideration of the regime’s nuclear doctrine, arguing that previous religious prohibitions could be revised under current circumstances if authorized by the Supreme Leader.
Other parliamentarians have made similar statements, openly arguing that Tehran should abandon the NPT and develop a nuclear deterrent.
The significance is difficult to miss. While regime diplomats continue to insist abroad that Tehran is not pursuing nuclear weapons, officials inside the system are increasingly discussing precisely that option.
Iran’s retirees protest #poverty, corruption and war as wheat prices jump 151% and hospitals report medicine shortages. Meanwhile, state-TV experts expose intelligence failures and regime newspapers warn that factional divisions are eroding public confidence. #Economic grievances…
— NCRI-FAC (@iran_policy) November 1, 2026
The Fight Is Over Who Will Pay for the Crisis
Behind the rhetoric lies a deeper struggle.
Negotiations may provide the regime with temporary economic or military relief, but any retreat carries enormous political risks for a system that has spent decades telling its supporters that compromise with the United States amounts to surrender.
But beneath this blame game lies a more fundamental fear. The regime’s social base has narrowed, making the morale and cohesion of its remaining loyalists increasingly critical to survival. Any visible retreat after years of confrontation, sacrifice and propaganda risks demoralizing the very constituency the state relies on as its first line of defense against a society that has repeatedly returned to protest despite repression. For Tehran, the danger of concession is therefore not only diplomatic. It is domestic: a weakened loyalist base confronting an increasingly defiant population could leave the regime politically and coercively exposed.
No Way Out of the Regime’s Strategic Deadlock
The contradictions are becoming increasingly difficult to conceal.
One faction argues that negotiations are necessary to reduce pressure and prevent another destructive confrontation.
Another insists that negotiations themselves invite further pressure and that only nuclear escalation can restore deterrence.
Iran’s regime is struggling with factional infighting, student and worker #protests, medicine shortages and mounting economic hardship. Yet it continues trying to project military strength against regional and international adversaries. Its inability to manage these simultaneous…
— NCRI-FAC (@iran_policy) November 3, 2026
Yet both operate within the same system and defend the same ruling structure.
That is why the current infighting is particularly revealing. The factions are not debating competing visions for Iran. They are fighting over how to preserve a regime facing accumulated military setbacks, economic pressure, international isolation, and mounting domestic discontent.
The harder the circumstances become, the louder the accusations of surrender grow. The regime is increasingly trapped between retreat, which threatens its authority, and escalation, which threatens to deepen the crisis that produced the retreat in the first place.
The growing factional warfare is the political expression of that deadlock.