The Trump administration’s decision to eliminate funding for Voice of America (VOA) represents a missed opportunity to reform and enhance the outlet’s capacity to counter adversarial propaganda.
A review of Yonah Jeremy Bob and Ilan Evyatar, “Target Tehran: How Israel Is Using Sabotage, Cyberwarfare, Assassination—and Secret Diplomacy—to Stop a Nuclear Iran and Create a New Middle East” (Simon & Schuster, 2023).
On October 1, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) announced the killing of Mohammad Jaafar Qasir, a high-value Hezbollah operative who commanded the group’s Unit 4400—the body responsible for transporting...
The Islamic Republic’s succession games are just getting started.
The Islamic Republic is developing a comprehensive strategy to bring about Israel’s elimination as a sovereign state.
Despite predictions in several Western news outlets that Iran’s new president, Masoud Pezeshkian, will “soften” the Islamic Republic’s “absolutist foreign policy,” among...
At least 50 percent of Iranian voters boycotted the second round of the Islamic Republic’s presidential election on July 5, which resulted in a victory for Masoud Pezeshkian, touted...
Constant—and highly stage-managed—elections are a useful tool for Iran's theocratic leadership to remain in power.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has not always seen eye to eye with his country’s presidents. Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani nudged the Islamic Republic too close to the West for the supreme leader’s...
The Islamic Republic also has a history of diverting resources intended for humanitarian purposes.
The Biden administration must begin taking the Islamic Republic’s threat to world peace seriously
The newly “re-elected” Assembly of Experts will play a large part in determining Iran’s post-Khamenei leadership.
In sum, while the ODNI’s report paints a picture of a more capable Islamic Republic with an expanding nuclear program, policymakers’ motivation and ability to check this challenge will stem first and foremost from accurately understanding it.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on February 28 called for mass turnout in Iran’s elections on March 1. Yet even government polling indicates that the majority of...
Iran hopes to ally with Eastern powers to gain economic and political power in the Middle East.
While a few statements and photo ops here and there might suggest that Saudi Crown Prince and de facto ruler Muhammad Bin Salman (MBS) is in the process of replacing Saudi Arabia’s traditional partner,...
The clerical regime in Tehran has held the streets. It remains to be seen, however, if the strategies employed to keep the ayatollahs afloat will prevail. When Mahsa Amini, a young Sunni Kurdish-Iranian girl, died on September 16 in the custody of the morality police, nationwide demonstrations erupted, often with young women and girls on the frontlines.
Assessing the Islamic Republic of Iran’s Ballistic Missile Program