It's time for the US to fight against Iranian propaganda - opinion

This week it will be two years since the bloody Iranian uprising that followed the murder of Mahsa Amini and spawned the international solidarity movement of Woman, Life, Freedom.

 With no clear direction from the White House, it is also two years that the Islamic Regime has us running in circles while we twirl our thumbs on what to do with Tehran.

Our lack of a comprehensive Iran strategy will be on woefully sad display on another upcoming anniversary: the October 7 attacks by Hamas on Israeli citizens.

The question of Tehran’s clear involvement in Hamas attacks – as in fingerprints on a smoking gun – is meaningless in the murky world of Islamic terrorism. Propaganda, fatwas, sermons, and pamphlets now mostly in cyberspace, were and still remain a powerful recruiting tool in the Islamic Regime’s turbaned tool box.

 As Ruhollah Khomeini, the leader of the Islamic Revolution, had told a gathering of his ministers soon after he returned to Iran from exile in 1979: “Do not think that your words are useless. Get out and spread your propaganda. I have tried it myself and, God-be-praised, it works.”

But in the face of a strong American leadership no amount of propaganda should work this way. “America’s weakness is a provocation,” former national security advisor H. R. McMaster declared recently. Characterizing US President Joe Biden’s approach towards Iran as “feckless,” McMaster has argued that Tehran is essentially “very weak” but continues to act brazenly because we are “letting them get away with it.”

The famed British historian Arnold Toynbee, his antisemitic views notwithstanding, has a similar cautionary statement: “civilizations do not die by murder, but by suicide.”

So what is this suicidal tendency that has emboldened our homicidal enemies?

An asymmetry of intentions is one. While the Islamic regime has clearly stated its objective of replacing the Western-led world order with a global Islamic caliphate, we prevaricate in dealing with Tehran between throwing fists (sanctions) or offering flowers (lifting or not enforcing the sanctions.) Such inconsistent and incoherent approach has us stabbing ourselves, not our enemy’s, in the back.

That is the reason why the past decade has been increasingly punctuated by the regime’s attempts to kill Americans on American soil. From the former president Donald Trump, to current American and foreign diplomats and resident Iranian activists, Tehran has been busy planning its next murderous move.

Tehran is also inflaming divisions within America itself. The regime is financing the anti-Israel protests now coursing through major American cities, according to the US Director of National Intelligence Avril Haine.

The Justice Department has also “observed increasingly aggressive Iranian [disinformation] activity during this [presidential] election cycle” according to US Attorney General Merrick Garland last week.

The Islamic regime can certainly afford its malevolent foreign policy as nearly $100 billion in illegal oil sales have poured into Tehran’s coffers since Ms. Amini’s killing – primarily from China.

AT THE expense of Iranians’ livelihood, Hamas, Iran’s most belligerent surrogate receives some $350 million from Tehran each year, according to US Rep. Bill Huizenga (R-Michigan), chairman of the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations. That’s 93% of its entire annual budget.

Iran is also generous to Hezbollah which received roughly $700m. just in 2020, according to State Department estimates, while it provides stipends to thousands of Houthi soldiers in Yemen to mount their war against Israel and the international shipping trade.

Have Amini’s death and the ensuing torrent of backlash deterred the regime in any way? Not really. Directed by the Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, the security forces continue their brutal crackdown on Iranians who defy the regime’s draconian rules.

Just this past week, an Iranian activist was sentenced to 12 years for replying with a single dot to Mr. Khamenei’s unfinished tweeted sentence. The dot, according to the prosecutor, symbolized Mr. Shanbehzadeh’s wish to end the Islamic Republic.

Not surprisingly, the regime’s unpopularity has been on the rise: less than half of registered voters participated in the presidential election this summer, the lowest-ever turn-out.

Nevertheless at 85, Mr. Khamenei is still holding his long view that the demise of the West is at hand. “With enough patience you can turn sour grapes into sweet molasses,” a Persian proverb he is fond of repeating in his weekly sermons, which are not about cooking or recipes.

Patience may have already rewarded the Machiavellian ayatollah. Iran is mere weeks from producing the enriched material required to build a nuclear weapon, according to a late July assessment by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken. That figure continues to shrink as both candidates for the US presidency Donald Trump and Kamala Harris have yet to deliver long-overdue Iran strategies.

With its proxies surrounding Israel, its agents encroaching on American soil, and its leadership tightening its grip on power, the Islamic regime has become a super pariah, not a superpower it claims to be.

Two years ago, the Iranians started a movement to take on the mullahs. 

The time is now for American leaders to finally follow suit and stop the Islamic Republic’s malign power and virulent propaganda.

The writer is an adjunct fellow in the Middle East Institute and the author of a forthcoming book on Iranian foreign policy. She holds a PhD in Iranian studies from the University of St. Andrews, Scotland.