Iran International
The war with the United States and Israel has exposed unusually open divisions within Iran’s clerical establishment, with hardline calls for escalation clashing with warnings over the cost of continued conflict.
Proposals aimed at de-escalation have been exchanged in recent weeks, according to officials on both sides, but the gap between Washington and Tehran remains wide, with core disagreements unresolved.
Hardline cleric and MP Mahmoud Nabavian said Iran would escalate sharply if attacked again.
“If the United States launches another attack, Iran would strike residential areas housing kings and heads of state in Arab countries” south of the Persian Gulf, he said, while also urging President Donald Trump to “admit defeat.”
In contrast, liberal cleric and human-rights lawyer Mohsen Rohami argued that those opposing negotiations with Washington should be held accountable for the human and material toll of the war.
While ultraconservatives insist Iran must not negotiate, Rohami said “people in the streets of Iran are not opposed to negotiations,” casting diplomacy as both a public demand and a strategic necessity at a time when the costs of war are mounting.
The divide extends beyond the clergy. Hardline MP Ali Khezrian said Iran “will certainly support the war” and has chosen to halt talks with Washington, adding that even indirect messaging through media or intermediaries should stop.
Rohami pushed back, warning lawmakers against presenting personal views as state policy. Decisions on negotiations, he said, rest with Iran’s leadership and are coordinated through the Supreme National Security Council and senior state bodies.
“The decision to negotiate is supported by the nation,” he said in remarks to Khabar Online.
He described Iran’s military actions as defensive but warned that the damage from a prolonged conflict could take years to repair. Steel plants, refineries and major electricity and gas infrastructure have been hit, he said, adding that much of Iran’s industrial base was built over the past century.
“Peace is the norm, and war is the exception,” Rohami said, cautioning that public mobilization in support of the state cannot be sustained indefinitely. “Their presence does not mean they oppose negotiations or agreements.”
A separate commentary on the Asr Iran website identified four “strategic mistakes” by hardliners, including underestimating US and Israeli power and focusing on the enemy’s losses rather than Iran’s own costs.
It also warned against portraying Western adversaries as internally collapsing, arguing that political divisions in democracies tend to narrow in wartime.
If such miscalculations shape decision-making, the commentary said, Iran risks losing both its current position and its chance to bring the conflict to a favorable end..
Tehran’s unveiling of a towering statue depicting the Roman Emperor Valerian kneeling before pre-Islamic Persian King Shapur I has renewed criticism of the Islamic Republic’s appeal to nationalist sentiment following the June war with Israel.
For over forty years, the theocracy purged ancient Persian history from schoolbooks, replacing it with post-Islamic narratives. But after the 12-day conflict with Israel, officials have turned to the distant pre-Islamic past to rally a divided society.
From murals of ancient kings and soldiers to patriotic songs added to Shi’ite mourning ceremonies performed before Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, Tehran now embraces imagery once deemed heretical by its own revolutionary ethos.
'Kneel before Iran' campaign
Tehran’s Revolution (Enghelab) Square was the scene of an unusual spectacle on Friday as officials unveiled a massive bronze statue depicting Roman Emperor Valerian kneeling in submission before Sassanid King Shapur I, commemorating Iran’s victory at the Battle of Edessa (260 AD).
The event was held under the slogan “Kneel before Iran,” part of what authorities describe as a campaign to project “national unity and historical pride” following the June war with Israel.
Tehran Mayor Alireza Zakani, a staunch ultraconservative, said on X: “Enmity with Great Iran can only end in kneeling before this historic nation.”
Municipal official Davood Goodarzi said the installation would be accompanied by visual displays depicting “other victories of Iranians over foreign aggressors,” including the defeat of British forces by local commander Rais-Ali Delvari, Mirza Kuchak Khan’s resistance against Russian troops, and Surena’s triumph over Rome at the Battle of Carrhae in 53 BCE.
The goal, Goodarzi said, is “strengthening concepts such as national dignity, social unity, and Iranian identity.”
The statue, he said, would remain temporarily at Revolution Square before being moved to a city gateway “where it will stand as the first emblem of Iran before diplomats and foreign visitors.”
Unveiled women were allowed to attend the unveiling ceremony—an uncommon scene at events organized by Tehran’s ultra-hardline municipality.
The turn to the pre-Islamic past
The sharp reversal also recalls remarks once made by Khamenei. In a 2011 speech, he asserted that “all the great military victories of this nation came after Islam,” dismissing pre-Islamic accounts as “things that are not documented.”
In 1987, he had said that prophets triumphed over kings such as Cyrus and that “nothing remains of these monarchs in history but names remembered with derision.”
Nevertheless, pro-government social media accounts have now gone so far as to circulate posters equating Khamenei himself with Shapur, showing him standing with a staff as Benjamin Netanyahu and Donald Trump kneel before him. The caption reads: “You will kneel before Iran.”
'Hypocrisy'
Pro-government figures have hailed the move as a patriotic success. Conservative political reporter Hossein Saremi posted: “Today’s grand Iranian gathering showed that people and the state share one essence: Iran itself. Nothing can take our homeland away.”
Others, however, called the spectacle “hypocrisy.” Journalist Gholamhossein Pashaei wrote on X: “Every year you close Pasargadae to stop people from celebrating Cyrus Day, yet you unveil Shapur’s statue in Enghelab Square with drums and fireworks during Fatimiyya (mourning period)!”
Dissident commentator Hamid Asafi called the ceremony “a perfect snapshot of the Islamic Republic’s contradictions.”
On Telegram he wrote: “A week ago they closed Cyrus’s tomb out of fear of the crowds, and now they glorify Shapur in the same breath. The Islamic Republic fears living history but poses for selfies with its corpse.”
He added: “They know people no longer respond to rosaries and sermons. That’s why they’ve brought history back to the stage—in a controlled costume. If they can’t erase the past, they’ll try to own it.”
The irony deepened as UNESCO formally recognized Cyrus’s Charter as one of the earliest human-rights documents.
President Masoud Pezeshkian wrote on X: “Iran, the cradle of dialogue, justice, and coexistence, can still inspire peace today.”
Users swiftly replied, questioning how such pride could coexist with a government that blocks access to Cyrus’s tomb each year to those wishing to visit it on his birthday.