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Order Michael Finch’s new book, A Time to Stand: HERE. Prof. Jason Hill calls it “an aesthetic and political tour de force.”
Saeed Ghasseminejad is an adviser on Iran’s economy at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. He’s been looking at the country-wide protests in Iran, now in their second week, and has concluded that even if the regime somehow survives this round of protests, as it did those in 2017, 2019, and 2022, it will nevertheless soon crumble into dust. More of his thoughts on his native land can be found here: “Not for Gaza, but for Iran: Protesters reject regime’s global proxy wars – opinion,” by Saeed Ghasseminejad, Jerusalem Post, January 5, 2026:
For a week, the Islamic Republic has tried to tell itself, and the world, that the protests in Iran are merely about the price of the dollar. They are wrong.
As the shutters rolled down in Tehran’s Grand Bazaar in protest, a different sound rose up from the universities and the streets of Isfahan, Mashhad, Qom, Kermanshah, and Hamadan. It was not a cry for subsidies. It was a chant for the death of the Islamic Republic and the return of Pahlavi.
Cautious Western observers are mislabeling the protests rocking Iran today as “economic riots.” While the trigger was indeed the rial’s catastrophic freefall, decimating the life savings of millions overnight, the fuel is something far more combustible: a decade of accumulated revolutionary demand.
The distinction between “economic grievances” and “political demands” in Iran has been dead for a decade now. When protesters in Delijan set fire to the statue of Qasem Soleimani on the very anniversary of his death, chanting “This is the final battle, Pahlavi will return,” they are not negotiating for lower bread prices.
They are burning the regime’s most sacred icons and rejecting its right to exist.
This uprising marks a critical evolution from the protests of 2017, 2019, and 2022. Today, the merchant and the student are marching in lockstep, joined by Iranians from diverse backgrounds across 100 cities and towns so far.
The universities, historically the bastions of anti-monarchist Marxism, are now echoing with chants of “Down with the three corrupts! Mullah, leftist, Mujahid.”…
The university students protesting now are not anti-monarchists, as they were in 1978. They are now shouting for the crown prince, Reza Pahlavi, to return and rule as head of state. Nor are they Marxists: it’s not Russia or China that has won their allegiance, but the capitalist West, headed by the Great Satan itself.
Pezeshkian’s attempt to stem the tide by sacking Central Bank Governor Farzin and recycling the previously impeached Abdolnasser Hemmati is a desperate reshuffling of deck chairs on a sinking ship….
A change at the head of the Central Bank will not prevent the rial from sinking still further, nor change the percentage of Iranians who have fallen below the poverty line, nor the number of university graduates who cannot find jobs. And even if the economy were magically to improve, the popular fury on the streets is no longer about economic conditions, but is aimed at ending the regime itself. The Iranians are sick of the theocracy; they want secularism; they want freedom.
The Iranians know that billions of dollars have been spent arming, and financing, Iran’s proxies — Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen. They aren’t interested in the Islamic Republic’s dream of creating a Shi’ite crescent around Israel; they aren’t interested in destroying the Jewish state. They want Iran’s money to be spent not on terror groups far away, but at home, and only to improve the well-being of the long-suffering Iranian people.
The stakes have now transcended Iran’s borders. By murdering demonstrators and hunting down dissidents, Khamenei is directly testing the red lines established by President Trump, who explicitly warned the regime about killing protesters. The White House has stated it is “locked and loaded.”
That statement alone has caused the regime to use batons rather than bullets on protesters; the Iranian leaders know now, after the American attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities last June, and even more spectacularly, after the seizure of Nicolás Maduro in Caracas, that Trump means what he says.
The protests continue in Iran, with ever-swelling numbers, chanting “No to Gaza.” “No to Lebanon.” “Death to the dictator!” “Reza, Reza Pahlavi!”
As Michael Ledeen was fond of saying , “Faster, please”.
I agree, but I have my doubts that it will happen. Let’s face it, Muslims love to be controlled by their clerics. They’ve been so thoroughly brainwashed by the Quran that it is almost impossible for them to change.
Meanwhile, the Mullahs are airing Tucker Carlson as the citizens of Iran take to the streets, risking their lives, to overthrow these tyrants. (Saw this news linked at The Right Scoop.)
The US politicians had forgotten that to remain a dominant power it is necessary to exercise that power to remind the help that it is in power.
For “the end of the line “ is coming ,not soon enough for those Muslim dictators and their tyrannical Islamic regime of Iran.
That tyrant Ayatollah Khamenei is an enemy the Iranian people, through that misery and death inflecting horrific Islamic tyranny of Iran, which is evil in sense of that word. Therefore, that Islamic tyranny should be overthrown and replaced with a genuine government which respects and safeguards that natural human rights of the people of Iran.
For that horrifically, cruel oppressive malicious and murderous Islamic regime of Iran, denies the Iranian, people their basic natural human rights. As in consequence the people of Iran would and should revolt against that viciously brutal tyrannical “’mullah regime” of Iran.
Accordingly, the Iranian people are right and righteous by engaging in bitter and strong protests against those cruel malicious and murderous tyrants in power of that cruel and oppressive Sharia based dictatorship of that Islamic regime of Iran.
In other words, those vicious despots of that horrendously horrific Islamic regime have provoked the people excessively too far.
In addition, some of the people who trapped in and forced to exist in the Islamic dictatorship of Iran might not know about the intellect philosopher John Locke, but his ideas do apply to them. For Mr. Locke taught that any good government has the duty to ensure the security and safety of its citizens. Yet when a tyranny is the people in the tyrannical government do have every natural and ethical right to overthrow that terrible and oppressive tyrannical government.
True, but if it ever happens, I’m betting it will be taken over by someone just as bad, and the foolish Muslims will be happy about it.
They have memories of a secular state, though. They may not want an absolute monarchy, but they can remember that they were nonetheless better off before 1979 than after.
This really and rightly should be “the end of the line” for those evil despots and their Islamic tyranny of Iran.
Ayatollah Khamenei is very much viciously against the Iranian people, For he and the other ayatollahs mullahs and similar Muslim despots in tyrannical control in that Islamic regime of Iran terribly oppress the Iranian people through their thugs in uniform who are called the “Islamic Revolutionary guards.”
All those years of miserly oppression suffering and murder imposed on the Iranian people by those despots of that Islamic tyranny of Iran is coming back down on those evil dictators of that horrific regime. Therefore, the old saying might a valid statement, which is “What goes around comes around.”
For the Iranian people are right and justified for hating that brutal cruel oppressive and even murderous Islamic tyrannical regime of Iran.
For example, the many arrest and imprisonment and even execution of people , repeatedly, who had peacefully protested that “mullah tyranny” of Iran only further exposes the weak ,fearful and intolerant nature of those in power in the oppressive and brutal “mullah regime “ of Iran.
Therefore, the Iranians people are more than justified in wanting that brutal cruel oppressive Islamic tyranny to be overthrown and replaced with a genuine government.
As a former Muslim revealed an important reality when he wrote, “The Islamic republic of Iran exists and operates as what every fundamentalist dreams of, an Islamic state ruled by Sharia …” He further exposes that “What followed its establishment was the inevitable consequence and inexorable logic of its Islamic premise; state terrorism, a merciless tyranny.” [1]
[1] THE ISLAM IN ISLAMIC TERRORISM by Ibn Warraq page 347.
(Smirk!) …. A bloke and a babe just “doing their thing” on the bus….
…. And the sign on the side of the bus asks,
“CAN YOU KEEP A SECRET?”
Well, maybe yes, maybe no …. maybe it depends on the circumstance.
Ayatollah Khamenei’s Financier Obama third term ended. No more pallet loads cash. We had “Satan” for three terms and look what that Marxist did to this country.
I’ve met a few Iranians who had converted to Christianity and escaped after the Mullahs came to power. Many of their friends were tortured and executed.
It is necessary for both islam and communism to be expunged from all Western countries. These two pestilences feed off each other, mainly because they have so much in common.
However, getting rid of one of them without getting rid of the other is a job only half done.
From your lips to Allah’s ears