Domestic Politics

Signs of a possible breakthrough between Tehran and Washington have triggered sharply divergent reactions across Iran’s political and media landscape.

A hardline cleric’s attack on unveiled women, even as Iranian state media showcased them at pro-government rallies to signal broad wartime support, has exposed tensions within the establishment over hijab enforcement.

Iranian media are now openly discussing the war’s impact on livelihoods—a subject largely avoided until recently, when journalists resorted to indirect language to navigate censorship.

Exclusive information obtained by Iran International points to a growing clash between Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian and its military leadership over Monday’s escalation in the Persian Gulf and attacks on the United Arab Emirates.

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.

The most important question in Tehran may also be the one least possible to answer with confidence: who is making decisions?

The Canadian opposition has accused the government of bypassing its own rules after Iran International reported that an IRGC-linked Iranian football official was granted special permission to enter the country despite being inadmissible.

Iran’s leadership is hardening its stance on the Strait of Hormuz, framing the waterway as a strategic and non-negotiable asset amid rising tensions and US pressure.

Iran's president and parliament speaker are seeking Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi’s removal, accusing him of following the Revolutionary Guard chief’s instructions in nuclear talks without informing the president, two sources familiar with the matter told Iran International.

As Iranian officials continue to tout a “strategic partnership” with Russia, rare public criticism has emerged over Moscow’s muted response to the recent war.

Iran’s worsening economic crisis is drawing unusually blunt warnings from state media and establishment voices as war, inflation and shortages squeeze households and expose the limits of the government’s response.

A widening split over how to deal with the United States has reached the deepest layers of Iran’s hardline establishment, surfacing in state-linked media and among factions that have long presented a united front under the banner of revolutionary loyalty.

As efforts continue to revive talks with the United States, Iranian lawmakers and state-linked outlets are increasingly calling for secrecy around negotiations.

Iran’s Supreme National Security Council has held a meeting to address growing concerns among security agencies over a possible resurgence of protests, sources familiar with the discussions told Iran International.

Reports that Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf may have been sidelined from Iran’s negotiations with the United States have revived an old question from Soviet history: can an insider reform a rigid ideological system without becoming one of its casualties?

The Islamic Republic that has emerged from the killing of Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei may prove more operationally aggressive than the one it replaces, analysts say.

Assertions by US President Donald Trump that Iran’s leadership is divided, and Tehran’s increasingly coordinated effort to deny it, have thrust the issue of unity to the center of the standoff between the two countries.

The real story behind Tehran’s sudden “unity” campaign did not begin with Donald Trump’s accusations of disarray within Iran’s leadership. It began with a secret letter to Mojtaba Khamenei.