Iran International
The Iran war left the Islamic Republic weaker than it had been in years. The question now is whether Washington will turn that weakness into leverage – or give Tehran room to recover through a new deal.
That debate is becoming increasingly urgent as Washington and Tehran move closer to a potential agreement that could extend the current ceasefire and launch a new phase of negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program.
President Donald Trump has suggested a deal may be within reach, while officials on both sides have signaled progress despite major unresolved disputes.
For supporters of the military campaign, the logic is straightforward: Iran entered the talks weaker than it has been in years. For critics, the concern is that diplomacy could give Tehran breathing room just as years of economic pressure, domestic unrest and military setbacks had left it vulnerable.
Speaking to Eye for Iran, former US Treasury official Miad Maleki and national security expert Thomas Juneau offered different answers to the same question: what exactly did the war achieve?
A Regime under pressure
While the two experts differ on what should happen next, both agree that the Islamic Republic emerged from the conflict significantly weakened.
"They've never been so weak. They've never been so vulnerable that they are today, militarily, politically, economically," Maleki said.
The Islamic Republic, he argued, faces mounting economic pressure at home while struggling to maintain the image of strength it has projected for decades. Tehran’s military infrastructure has suffered significant damage, senior figures have been killed, and the economy was already under strain before the conflict began.
Juneau reached a similar conclusion, though from a different angle.
"The regime was clobbered," he said.
Beyond the military and economic damage, Juneau argued that one of Tehran’s core strategic assumptions collapsed during the conflict.
For decades, Iran invested heavily in Hezbollah, Hamas and other regional allies as part of what officials often described as a forward defense strategy. The idea was that any direct attack on Iran would trigger retaliation across the region, deterring adversaries from striking the country itself.
"That failed," Juneau said.
Maleki argues that the regime's losses go beyond military hardware.
The conflict exposed weaknesses in Iran’s air defenses, damaged key infrastructure and further strained a system already struggling with economic collapse, inflation and public discontent. In his view, Tehran entered negotiations not from a position of strength, but because it had few alternatives.
Victory, leverage or lifeline?
Where the two experts diverge is over what happens next.
For Maleki, the central question is why negotiations are taking place now, at a moment when many observers believe the Islamic Republic is under greater pressure than at any point in recent years.
He pointed to growing frustration among some Iranians who believe the conflict exposed vulnerabilities that could have accelerated political change.
"There's some level of disappointment that the fact that the US is negotiating with this regime is bad for the future of a free Iran," he said.
The concern is not that Iran emerged stronger from the war. Rather, it is that Tehran survived a period of extraordinary pressure and may now receive economic or diplomatic relief before those pressures fully take effect.
Juneau sees a different risk.
While acknowledging that the regime has been weakened, he argues that ordinary Iranians may ultimately bear the greatest cost.
"The Iranian people have been thrown under the bus," he said.
The economy, already battered by sanctions, corruption and years of mismanagement, now faces the additional burden of reconstruction. At the same time, Juneau warns that a weakened regime does not necessarily become a more moderate one.
In fact, he believes future protests could face even harsher repression than previous waves of unrest.
"This is a regime now that will have even less tolerance for any kind of popular protests in the future," he said.
The disagreement reflects a broader uncertainty surrounding the talks themselves.
If the objective of the war was to weaken the Islamic Republic’s military capabilities, there is broad agreement that it succeeded. Iran’s regional posture has been damaged, key infrastructure has been hit and some of its most senior figures are gone.
But if the objective was to fundamentally alter Tehran’s behavior, improve conditions for ordinary Iranians or create a pathway toward meaningful political change, the answer remains far less clear.
Maleki believes the conflict became unavoidable as Iran expanded its missile, drone and regional capabilities.
"The conflict was unavoidable. It was coming sooner or later," he said.
Juneau is more cautious.
Asked whether the war was ultimately worth it, he declined to offer a simple yes-or-no answer.
"The negative implications of the war outweigh the positive implications," he said.
That may ultimately be the central dilemma facing policymakers in Washington and the region.
The war weakened the Islamic Republic. Few dispute that.
The unanswered question is whether the diplomacy now taking shape will build on that weakness or alleviate it.
The poster, announcing a memorial ceremony at the Abdol-Azim shrine in Rey, south of Tehran, lists Zahra Sadat Haddad-Adel, Boshra Hosseini Khamenei, Mesbah al-Hoda Bagheri and Zahra Mohammadi Golpayegani as among the dead.
Each name connects the Khamenei household to one of the families or institutions that have shaped the Islamic Republic’s political, cultural and administrative elite for decades: the parliament, the Supreme Leader’s office, the Supreme Council of the Cultural Revolution, Imam Sadegh University and the network of institutions around the leader’s office.
The ceremony itself is religious and familial. But the names on the poster point to something larger: a closed circle of family relationships through which access, influence and institutional power have long moved inside the Islamic Republic.
The Haddad-Adel connection
One of the most recognizable names is Zahra Sadat Haddad-Adel, wife of Mojtaba Khamenei and daughter of Gholam-Ali Haddad-Adel.
Haddad-Adel served as speaker of Iran’s seventh parliament from 2004 to 2008 and is known as the first non-clerical speaker of the Islamic Republic’s parliament. He also served as a lawmaker in several parliamentary terms and remains head of the Academy of Persian Language and Literature.
His influence extends beyond parliament. He is a member of the Supreme Council of the Cultural Revolution, an adviser to the slain Supreme Leader and founder of the private Farhang school, which critics have described as one of the symbols of special educational access for families close to the ruling system.
For critics, Haddad-Adel’s presence across political, cultural and educational institutions, combined with his family tie to the Khamenei household, reflects the concentration of power within a limited circle of families close to the state.
His name also appears on the US Treasury Department’s sanctions list.
Imam Sadegh University and the Bagheri Kani family
The name Mesbah al-Hoda Bagheri draws attention to another powerful network: the Bagheri Kani family and the institutions around Imam Sadegh University.
Mesbah al-Hoda Bagheri Kani was the husband of Hoda Khamenei, Ali Khamenei’s daughter, and the son of Mohammad-Bagher Bagheri Kani, an influential cleric who served in the Assembly of Experts and headed Imam Sadegh University.
The same family also includes Ali Bagheri Kani, a senior diplomat who has held key posts in Iran’s foreign policy establishment, including political deputy foreign minister, acting foreign minister, senior nuclear negotiator and senior positions in the Supreme National Security Council.
Their uncle, Mohammad-Reza Mahdavi Kani, was one of the Islamic Republic’s most influential clerics. He served as head of the Assembly of Experts, secretary-general of the Combatant Clergy Association, briefly as prime minister in 1981, and for decades as head of Imam Sadegh University.
Imam Sadegh University expanded after the 1979 revolution and became one of the main training grounds for state managers. Many officials in Iran’s political, security, media and diplomatic institutions are graduates of Imam Sadegh University.
Through these links, the Bagheri Kani family connects the Khamenei household to one of the Islamic Republic’s most important pipelines for training and placing loyal officials in diplomacy, security, politics and state administration.
The Supreme Leader’s office
Another name on the poster, Zahra Mohammadi Golpayegani, points directly to the Supreme Leader’s office.
The 14-month-old child was connected to two of the most influential families in the Islamic Republic. On one side, she was the granddaughter of Mohammad Mohammadi Golpayegani, the longtime head of Ali Khamenei’s office. On the other, she was a granddaughter of Ali Khamenei.
Mohammad Mohammadi Golpayegani headed the Supreme Leader’s office since 1989, the year Khamenei became leader. He is one of the most influential but least publicly visible figures in the Islamic Republic’s power structure.
Because of his position, Golpayegani has played a central role in the messages, decisions and administrative machinery of the leader’s office. The US Treasury sanctioned him in 2019 over his role acting on behalf of that office.
His family link to Khamenei, as reflected in the name of Zahra Mohammadi Golpayegani, shows how the leader’s office is not only an institution but also part of a wider web of personal and familial ties.
Boshra Khamenei
The poster also lists Boshra Hosseini Khamenei, Ali Khamenei’s eldest daughter.
Unlike some other members of the Khamenei family, Boshra Khamenei has rarely appeared in public, and little information has been published about her personal life or activities.
In recent weeks, state media have referred to her as “martyr Boshra Khamenei.” Some reports have mentioned her educational background and interest in literature.
Tabnak, in a report framed as a student’s note for “martyr Boshra Khamenei,” referred to her as “Ms. Hosseini” and described her connection to education and literature.
Her presence on the poster alongside the other names brings the focus back to the Khamenei family itself, a household that has remained mostly shielded from public life while remaining central to the structure of power.
A compressed image of power
The memorial poster is striking because it brings together four names that would otherwise appear in different corners of the Islamic Republic’s elite: the Haddad-Adel family, the Bagheri Kani family, the Mohammadi Golpayegani family and the Khamenei household.
Together, they form a compressed image of how power has been organized around the leader’s family and its closest allies.
For critics of the Islamic Republic, the connections point to a familiar pattern: influence concentrated among a small circle of trusted families whose proximity to the leader’s office can open paths across the state.
The memorial in Rey is therefore more than a family or religious ceremony. It offers a glimpse of how, at the top of the Islamic Republic, family names often double as signs of political access, institutional reach and long-standing power.
