Who makes up Iran’s fragmented opposition?

TEHRAN - Iran’s ruling establishment is under intense pressure from Israeli strikes that continue to target senior figures, the security apparatus and the state media.

However, despite repeated bouts of nationwide protests stretching back decades, Iran’s opposition is fragmented among rival groups and ideological factions and appears to have little organised presence inside the country.

Here are some opposition groups or blocs:

Monarchists

Iran’s last shah, Mr Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, fled in 1979 as the revolution took hold. He died in Egypt in 1980.

His son, Mr Reza Pahlavi, was heir to the Peacock Throne when the dynasty was ousted and, now based in the United States, he calls for regime change through non-violent civil disobedience and a referendum on a new government.

However, while Mr Pahlavi has plenty of admirers in the Iranian diaspora who support a return to the monarchy, it is uncertain how popular that idea might be inside the country.

Most Iranians are not old enough to remember life before the revolution and the country looks very different from the one Mr Pahlavi’s father fled from 46 years ago.

While many Iranians look back with nostalgia on that pre-revolutionary era, many others also recall its inequalities and oppression.

Meanwhile, there are splits even among pro-monarchist groups.

People’s Mujahideen organisation

The Mujahideen were a powerful leftist group that staged bombing campaigns against the Shah's government and US targets in the 1970s but ultimately fell out with the other factions.

The group is often known by its Persian name, the Mujahideen-e Khalq Organisation, or by the acronyms MEK or MKO.

Many Iranians, including sworn enemies of the Islamic Republic, cannot forgive it for siding with Iraq against Iran during the war of 1980-88.

The group was the first to publicly reveal in 2002 that Iran had a secret uranium enrichment programme, but it has shown little sign of any active presence inside Iran for years.

In exile, its leader Massoud Rajavi has not been seen for more than 20 years and his wife, Ms Maryam Rajavi, has taken control. Rights groups have criticised it for what they call cult-like behaviour and abuses of its followers, which the group denies.

The group is the main force behind the National Council of Resistance of Iran, led by Ms Maryam Rajavi, which has an active presence in many Western countries.

Ethnic minority groups

Iran’s mostly Sunni Muslim Kurdish and Baluch minorities have often chafed against rule from the Persian-speaking Shi’ite government in Tehran.

Several Kurdish groups have long organised opposition to the Islamic Republic in the western parts of the country where they form a majority, and there have been periods of active insurgency against government forces.

In Balochistan, along Iran’s border with Pakistan, opposition to Tehran ranges from supporters of Sunni clerics seeking to carve out more space for their followers within the Islamic Republic to armed jihadists linked to al Qaeda.

When major bouts of protest have spread across Iran, they have often been fiercest in Kurdish and Baluchi areas, but in neither region is there a single, unified opposition movement that poses a clear threat to Tehran’s rule.

Protest movements

Hundreds of thousands of Iranians have taken to the streets in mass protests at successive points for decades.

After the 2009 presidential election, demonstrators filled Tehran and other cities accusing the authorities of rigging the vote for the incumbent Mahmoud Ahmadinejad against rival candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi.

Mr Mousavi’s “Green Movement” was crushed, and he was put under house arrest, along with political ally and former parliament speaker Mehdi Karoubi.

The movement, which sought democratic reform within the existing system of the Islamic republic, is now widely seen as defunct.

In 2022,

major protests again gripped Iran centred on women’s rights.

The Woman, Life, Freedom demonstrations continued for months but without resulting in an organisation or leadership and many of the protesters were ultimately arrested and jailed. REUTERS