Tehran’s posture increasingly resembles that of an embattled state that sees greater odds of survival in confrontation than in compromise—one that views a decisive clash not as catastrophe, but as a potential turning point.
Forty days after Iran’s deadly January crackdown, senior officials repeated claims of foreign influence while some insiders—even from the hardline camp—offered sharply different explanations.
Rising bread prices have become a growing source of concern within Iran’s political establishment, with warnings that further increases could trigger unrest as inflation erodes living standards.
President Massoud Pezeshkian’s increasingly public confrontations with Iran’s state broadcaster have exposed the limits of his authority, underscoring how one of the country’s most powerful institutions operates beyond the reach of its elected government.
Iranians took to social media on the anniversary of the 1979 Revolution to challenge the Islamic Republic’s claims of overwhelming public support, sharing videos of anti-government chants and questioning the authenticity of state broadcasts.
During state-organized rallies marking Iran’s 1979 revolution anniversary, demonstrators in several cities burned large statues of a horned, bull-headed figure identified by organizers as “Baal,” an ancient deity referenced in biblical and Islamic tradition.
One month after a sweeping and deadly crackdown on nationwide protests, Islamic Republic marked its anniversary with state-organized rallies that appeared designed to project strength even as anti-government chants reverberated across neighborhoods nationwide.
The arrest of several prominent reformist figures in Tehran appears less aimed at silencing dissent than at tightening control at a moment of acute vulnerability for the state, as Iran navigates renewed talks with the United States under the shadow of war.
Tehran appears to be speaking in two voices about diplomacy with Washington: one calibrated for foreign capitals, the other aimed inward, shaped by fear, factionalism, and propaganda.
As Iranian and US negotiators met in Oman on Friday to discuss the framework for renewed talks, Friday prayer leaders across Iran used their sermons to dismiss the process, expressing near-uniform pessimism about the prospects for diplomacy.
As hopes for talks with the United States flicker and fade, Iran’s chronic factional infighting once again appears to have torpedoed a diplomatic opening—even before it properly began.
Conflicting voices in Tehran on the competing prospects of war and diplomacy with Washington may be deliberate, but they more likely reflect an absence of consensus at the top.
Tehran’s violent mid-January crackdown was accompanied by a quieter but sweeping campaign to silence the press and control information about the killings.
The protests that erupted across Iran in January 2026 may have appeared sudden to outside observers but inside the country, they were anything but.
Iran’s parliament has halted impeachment proceedings against several cabinet ministers, a member of the parliament’s presiding board said on Monday, citing guidance from the Supreme Leader to support the administration.
Iranian lawmakers on Monday likened US President Donald Trump to the biblical Pharaoh and praised Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei as Moses, in rhetoric aired during a parliamentary session amid heightened tensions with Washington.
Tehran on Monday conducted large pro-government rallies in several cities intended to counter the nationwide protests challenging its rule, in a strategy it has deployed against previous bouts of mass unrest ultimately crushed by deadly force.
Iranian officials have begun publicly blaming one another and foreign foes for ongoing unrest across the country, exposing sharp divisions in Tehran on one of the greatest challenges yet to the Islamic Republic.
Iran’s protest slogans have shifted from reformist appeals in the 2009 Green Movement demonstrations to more prominent calls to reinstate the monarchy ousted in 1979, transcending Tehran's central political divide between moderates and hardliners.
The seizing of Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro by US forces over the weekend has sharpened debates in Tehran about President Donald Trump’s endgame in Iran, as anti-government protests across the country enter a second week.
No one can say with certainty whether the current protests will spiral into a revolution. But analysts tell Eye for Iran it is becoming harder to ignore signs that Iran’s theocracy may be entering a period of repeated crises that challenge its ability to function as a state.
As protests once again ripple across Iran, the country’s political establishment is moving quickly to revive an economic reform agenda that many Iranians say no longer speaks to the core of their anger.