Iran International
Intermittent US-Iran escalations are giving Iran's anti-US hardliners fresh ammunition, strengthening their case against diplomacy and putting the country's pro-negotiation camp under growing pressure.
The latest exchange of strikes has allowed opponents of the Tehran-Washington memorandum of understanding (MoU) to argue that even a limited agreement cannot prevent conflict or deliver the economic relief promised to ordinary Iranians.
A majority of members of the Assembly of Experts seized on the renewed tensions over the weekend by issuing an unusually political statement questioning key elements of the MoU.
They criticized the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, insisted Iran's nuclear rights must remain outside negotiations and called for those responsible for the killing of former Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei—including US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—to be punished, saying anyone with access to them had a religious duty to kill them.
The statement was followed by a commentary in the hardline newspaper Kayhan, whose editor Hossein Shariatmadari echoed calls for retaliation against Trump.
The intervention marked one of the clearest signs yet that recent military exchanges have emboldened factions that have long opposed negotiations with Washington.
At the same time, hardliners renewed attacks on President Massoud Pezeshkian and chief negotiator Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, arguing that diplomacy has failed to produce either a durable ceasefire or meaningful economic relief.
Throughout the past month, outlets such as Kayhan and Raja News, along with ultrahardline factions including the Paydari Party, have steadily intensified their criticism of the 60-day framework agreement.
Kayhan has described the MoU as "diplomatic capitulation under Western pressure," while Raja News has portrayed it as a retreat from Iran's red lines without securing comprehensive sanctions relief.
By linking economic hardship directly to continuing military pressure, these groups have shifted the domestic debate from how best to implement the agreement to whether negotiations with an adversary still engaged in military action can produce any meaningful benefit.
From their perspective, each exchange of strikes reinforces the argument that Washington cannot be trusted and that diplomacy merely gives the United States and Israel time to regroup.
Renewed maritime incidents and the slow pace of sanctions relief have become central to that narrative.
Hardline lawmakers including Kamran Ghazanfari and Mahmoud Nabavian have likewise criticized provisions allowing the resumption of commercial shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, arguing that Iran has reopened one of its most important strategic levers without securing sufficient concessions in return.
More pragmatic conservatives and state-aligned outlets, including the Ghalibaf-affiliated Khorasan newspaper, have found themselves defending the agreement as a state-approved tactical pause rather than a final settlement—an indication that the political debate is increasingly being fought on hardliners' terms.
The latest military exchanges have not fundamentally altered the balance of power inside the Islamic Republic, but they have strengthened the political position of those who opposed negotiations from the outset.
Whether that advantage proves temporary or enduring will depend largely on whether the ceasefire holds and whether the negotiations begin producing tangible results.
For the government, the immediate challenge extends beyond managing relations with Washington. It must also persuade skeptical political and clerical constituencies that diplomacy can still improve Iran's security and economic position.
Failure to do so could further strengthen arguments that negotiations have produced neither stability nor prosperity, narrowing the political space available to diplomats such as Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and others advocating continued engagement with the United States.
Whether the current ceasefire ultimately survives may prove less significant than what the latest escalation has already changed inside Iran's domestic debate. Each renewed exchange of fire gives opponents of diplomacy another opportunity to argue that negotiations cannot deliver either security or economic relief.
Unless the ceasefire becomes durable and visible economic benefits begin to emerge, the balance of political momentum is likely to continue shifting toward those advocating a more confrontational course.
Iran is preparing an unprecedented security operation for the funeral of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, seeking to prevent a repeat of the deadly crowd crushes that marred the burials of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in 1989 and General Ghasem Soleimani in 2020.
Iran is preparing an unprecedented security operation for the funeral of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, seeking to prevent a repeat of the deadly crowd crushes that marred the burials of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in 1989 and General Ghasem Soleimani in 2020.
More than four months after Khamenei's death, authorities say he will be buried on July 9 following five days of ceremonies across Iran and Iraq.
The unusually long delay, officials say, reflects wartime conditions and security concerns, underscoring the political and logistical complexity of burying the Islamic Republic's longest-serving supreme leader.
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Iran is preparing an unprecedented security operation for the funeral of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, seeking to prevent a repeat of the deadly crowd crushes that marred the burials of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in 1989 and General Ghasem Soleimani in 2020.
Iran is preparing an unprecedented security operation for the funeral of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, seeking to prevent a repeat of the deadly crowd crushes that marred the burials of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in 1989 and General Ghasem Soleimani in 2020.
More than four months after Khamenei's death, authorities say he will be buried on July 9 following five days of ceremonies across Iran and Iraq. The unusually long delay, officials say, reflects wartime conditions and security concerns, underscoring the political and logistical complexity of burying the Islamic Republic's longest-serving supreme leader.
The funeral will also be the first major state ceremony under Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei, making it an important test of the new leadership's ability to project authority and maintain order.
The body will lie in state for three days at Tehran's Mosalla prayer complex before a funeral procession through the capital. It will then be taken to the Shiite holy cities of Najaf and Karbala before returning to Iran for ceremonies in Qom and burial in Mashhad, Khamenei's birthplace, at the shrine of Imam Reza, the eighth Imam of Shiite Islam.
Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi visited Baghdad this week to coordinate with Iraqi officials on the cross-border procession.
Authorities have yet to announce who will lead the funeral prayer, traditionally one of the ceremony's most symbolic moments. If Mojtaba Khamenei, who has not appeared publicly since his father's death, attends, some observers believe he could lead the prayer himself, although officials have given no indication that will happen.
Security takes center stage
Iranian officials have repeatedly stressed that crowd management and security will be their foremost priorities.
Gholamhossein Mozaffari, governor of Razavi Khorasan Province, where Khamenei will be buried, has suggested helicopters could be used during parts of the operation to help control crowds and ensure the safe movement of the coffin.
It remains unclear whether such measures would be confined to Mashhad or employed throughout the ceremonies.
Protecting senior officials, managing crowds and transporting the coffin across several cities in two countries is likely to require one of the largest security operations in the Islamic Republic's history.
First Vice President Mohammad Reza Aref has described Khamenei's funeral as "the most important event of the 21st century," reflecting the political and symbolic significance authorities attach to the occasion.
Lessons from Khomeini's funeral
Iran's caution is rooted largely in the chaotic funeral of Islamic Republic founder Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini following his death on June 3, 1989.
His body lay in state at Tehran's Mosalla before funeral prayers led by Grand Ayatollah Mohammad Reza Golpayegani.
The following day, however, hundreds of thousands of mourners surged toward Khomeini's coffin as it was transported to the burial site. Security forces lost control as people attempted to touch the coffin, damaging it and tearing the burial shroud.
Authorities were forced to evacuate the body by helicopter and return it to Jamaran for re-shrouding before postponing the burial until the following day.
State media claimed attendance reached around 10 million people, although foreign estimates were considerably lower. Numerous people were reported injured and others are believed to have died in the crush, though no official casualty figure was ever released.
Khomeini was initially buried in a simple grave near Tehran's Behesht-e Zahra cemetery. The site was later transformed into a vast mausoleum complex.
Another tragedy
The funeral of Ghasem Soleimani after he was killed in a US drone strike near Baghdad airport on January 3, 2020, became the largest state funeral in Iran since Khomeini's.
His body was carried through several Iraqi and Iranian cities before reaching his hometown of Kerman, where a crowd crush and the collapse of barriers killed at least 56 people and injured more than 200, forcing officials to delay the burial.
The twin disasters at the funerals of Khomeini and Soleimani continue to shape Iranian planning for large state ceremonies.
By emphasizing crowd control, carefully staged processions and extraordinary security, officials appear determined to ensure Khamenei's funeral is remembered not for chaos, but as a demonstration of the state's ability to manage one of the most consequential events in the Islamic Republic's history.
A rare public dispute has erupted inside Iran's Assembly of Experts after a majority of its members issued a statement on the US-Iran memorandum of understanding, prompting an extraordinary public rebuke from the body's own leadership within hours.
The exchange has exposed signs of growing infighting at the highest levels of the Islamic Republic.
The normally quiet body, responsible for appointing and theoretically overseeing the supreme leader, has become the latest arena for disagreement over negotiations with Washington, the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz and the limits of compromise with the United States.
The controversy began after more than 60 of the Assembly's 84 members published a statement on Saturday that ventured far beyond the body's customary role, laying out detailed positions on the memorandum, the Strait of Hormuz, Lebanon, nuclear negotiations and retaliation against the United States and Israel.
The signatories thanked Iranian negotiators but warned them to learn from what they called the failures of previous talks, adding that observing Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei's red lines was a religious obligation and that violating them was "not permissible under any circumstances."
In one of its most inflammatory passages, the statement called for those responsible for Ali Khamenei's killing, including the US president and Israeli prime minister, to be punished, saying anyone with access to them had a religious duty to kill them.
The statement also described reopening the Strait of Hormuz while Israeli operations continued in Lebanon as a "strategic error" and insisted Iran's nuclear rights should be excluded from negotiations.
The intervention was extraordinary because the Assembly almost never comments on day-to-day policy. Better known for infrequent formal sessions and ritual expressions of support for the leadership, it has also come under increased scrutiny following the opaque process that elevated Mojtaba Khamenei after his father's death during the war.
Within hours, however, the Assembly's presidium and secretariat issued a rare public clarification that appeared to rebuke the manner in which the statement had been released.
While reaffirming support for Mojtaba Khamenei and insisting officials must follow his guidance on the memorandum and negotiations, the secretariat said it was unprecedented for a group of members to issue a statement under the Assembly's name outside its established procedures.
It said official positions should be issued through the full Assembly, its chairman, the presidium or the secretariat, and argued that the signatories should have sought broader discussion to preserve the body's unity.
The response immediately drew fire from Raja News, an outlet aligned with ultrahardline factions that oppose negotiations with Washington and are often critical of Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, who has led the talks.
In an editorial, Raja News argued it was the secretariat—not the signatories—that had undermined the Assembly's unity. It noted that the secretariat itself acknowledged that non-signatories did not necessarily disagree with the statement's substance.
The outlet mocked the suggestion that senior clerics should have sought permission before explaining the supreme leader's red lines to the public and asked why such an overwhelming majority had felt compelled to bypass the body's leadership in the first place.
Rather than criticizing the signatories, Raja News argued, the Assembly's leadership should explain why confidence in its handling of sensitive issues had deteriorated to that point.
In its sharpest criticism, the outlet suggested similar questions had surrounded the Assembly leadership's handling of the selection of Iran's third supreme leader following Ali Khamenei's death—an unusually direct challenge to one of the Islamic Republic's most closely guarded episodes.
President Masoud Pezeshkian, meanwhile, was reported to have traveled to Qom, Iran's center of religious authority, where senior officials often seek the backing of influential clerics during periods of political tension.
The visit suggests the government is also seeking to shore up clerical support as it navigates the increasingly contentious politics surrounding the post-war settlement.
The competing statements—and the storm they triggered within the hardline camp—suggest that arguments over the memorandum with Washington, and over who has the authority to define and defend Mojtaba Khamenei's red lines, have reached institutions that traditionally operate behind closed doors.
For a body long associated with silence and unanimity, the public split offers a rare glimpse into the political strains emerging inside the Islamic Republic's highest clerical establishment.
The return of Iranian-American academic Hooshang Amirahmadi, a longtime advocate of US-Iran normalization, has stirred debate in Tehran, with establishment media divided over the merits of welcoming him back and the signal his visit sends.
Amirahmadi is a retired Rutgers University professor and founder of the American Iranian Council, whose shifting political positions over the years have made him a controversial figure.
Before his latest trip, Amirahmadi said his goal was not friendship between Tehran and Washington but the normalization of diplomatic relations.
"Friendly relations are different from normal relations," he said in an interview with Voice of America before traveling to Iran, adding that he hoped his ideas could help normalize ties between the two countries.
Read the full article here.
The return of Iranian-American academic Hooshang Amirahmadi, a longtime advocate of US-Iran normalization, has stirred debate in Tehran, with establishment media divided over the merits of welcoming him back and the signal his visit sends.
Amirahmadi is a retired Rutgers University professor and founder of the American Iranian Council, whose shifting political positions over the years have made him a controversial figure.
Before his latest trip, Amirahmadi said his goal was not friendship between Tehran and Washington but the normalization of diplomatic relations.
"Friendly relations are different from normal relations," he said in an interview with Voice of America before traveling to Iran, adding that he hoped his ideas could help normalize ties between the two countries. He declined to say which groups inside Iran he had been speaking with.
While some pro-government media portray him as an opposition figure, some government opponents view him as an apologist for the Islamic Republic, citing his occasional defense of its leadership and institutions, including the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
In 2019, he attended rallies organized by Iranian opposition groups abroad and described himself as a supporter of regime change. After the killing of Qassem Soleimani, however, he publicly defended both the late commander and the IRGC in media interviews.
In a recent interview with Iran's hardline Student News Network (SNN) following his return, Amirahmadi referred to slain Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei as a "martyr" and argued that "history will gradually prove that Iranians misunderstood him."
He also accused government opponents of failing to understand the realities of Iranian society.
Some conservative outlets portrayed his visit as evidence that critics of the Islamic Republic were recognizing political realities inside Iran.
SNN wrote that Amirahmadi's return "is not an ordinary event," arguing that remaining within the opposition abroad without clearly distancing oneself from groups hostile to the Islamic Republic risked being interpreted as indirect alignment with the country's enemies.
"In these circumstances, returning to the embrace of the Iranian nation and redefining one's relationship with the realities inside the country has become an unavoidable necessity," it wrote.
Not all conservative media welcomed his return. Hardline newspaper Kayhan questioned why authorities had allowed Amirahmadi into the country.
"What is Houshang Amirahmadi, America's broker and Western operative, seeking by traveling to Iran?" the newspaper wrote. "Officials must remain vigilant against this longtime spy of the Great Satan."
Some social media users rejected attempts to portray him as an opposition figure and argued that his return served the government's efforts to weaken the exiled opposition.
"They brought Houshang Amirahmadi back to Iran so they can claim the country has become a paradise and tell all opponents to return as well," one X user, Omid Roshan, wrote. "They want people to believe resistance against the government no longer works and that everyone should repent and come back."
Describing himself as a reformist, Amirahmadi unsuccessfully sought Iran's presidency in 2005, 2013 and 2017, but the Guardian Council disqualified him on each occasion.
Reports surrounding the 2005 election cited his US citizenship and some of his political positions among the factors believed to have contributed to the decision.
Some linked his return to growing speculation that Tehran and Washington could eventually restore full diplomatic relations and reopen their embassies.
"The interests of the Iranian and American people require normal diplomatic relations between the two countries," Siamak Shojaei, a university professor in Iran, wrote on X. "I hope Amirahmadi succeeds this time."
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