Speaker 1: I just told our next guest, I think what is
Speaker 1: happening in Iran is far more important in the grand
Speaker 1: scheme of the security of the United States and the
Speaker 1: security of the world.
Speaker 2: Frankly, because what's.
Speaker 1: Happening in Iran the weakening of the regime that has
Speaker 1: oppressed the people of Iran for almost fifty years now,
Speaker 1: the uprising of the people who have taken to the
Speaker 1: streets by the thousands and thousands and thousands, and unlike
Speaker 1: the suburban women in their minivans who are going to
Speaker 1: protest what happened in Minneapolis, there's a real chance that
Speaker 1: if you go onto the streets in Iran, you're gonna
Speaker 1: be killed by the regime. If not during the protest
Speaker 1: that I'm positive they're going to send the guarden to
Speaker 1: find these people later. This is not a thing to
Speaker 1: be taken and entered into lightly. And joining me now
Speaker 1: to talk about it is. He's the Iran program research
Speaker 1: analyst for the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. Jenatin Sayah,
Speaker 1: welcome to the show.
Speaker 2: Hi, great to be with you. Thank you for covering
Speaker 2: it well.
Speaker 1: I want to give you We were just kind of
Speaker 1: talking off the air about some of your background you
Speaker 1: are intimately involved. You've got arrested in Iran in two
Speaker 1: thousand and nine. First of all, you look like you're
Speaker 1: like eighteen years old, so you must have been nine
Speaker 1: when you got arrested.
Speaker 2: But can we start with that, like, what's your background?
Speaker 3: Sure, I was born and raised in Tehran's Jewish community.
Speaker 3: I was politically active during the two thousand and nine protests.
Speaker 3: I was a teenager then. I'm in my early thirties now.
Speaker 3: But you know, I do appreciate the compliment there. But
Speaker 3: what we see right now is fundamentally different paradigm than
Speaker 3: when it was back in the day. So you're talking
Speaker 3: about a population that is so alienated by this Islamist
Speaker 3: theocracy that they're risking their lives, as you mentioned, by
Speaker 3: the thousands. And it's not just the rural thing. You
Speaker 3: see them in major cities going out and I think
Speaker 3: but really sets this way of apart a fact, aside
Speaker 3: from the fact that the regime's military capacity has been
Speaker 3: destroyed by American Israel, ideologically speaking, they're fundamentally bankrupt. And
Speaker 3: this is in the Iranians people's perspective. The chance that
Speaker 3: they have for absolute freedom, which would be a game
Speaker 3: changer for the world. It would be more significant than
Speaker 3: the collapse of East Berlin.
Speaker 2: Well, it's partially because for us, like why do we care? Right?
Speaker 1: This is one of the things that when we look
Speaker 1: back retrospectively at Iran and Afghanistan, like what did that
Speaker 1: do for the United States of America.
Speaker 2: I would argue that.
Speaker 1: As Iran is the largest funder of fundamental Islamic terror
Speaker 1: in the world, they are funding more stuff around the world,
Speaker 1: not just in Iran, not just in Israel, not for
Speaker 1: the Houtis, and they are funding Islamic terror around the
Speaker 1: world if you can cut off the actual head of
Speaker 1: the snake, as they say, that, for me feels like
Speaker 1: it could be world changing.
Speaker 2: Am I overstating it?
Speaker 3: Not at all of anything, You're understating the significance of it. So,
Speaker 3: as you pointed out, of course we know every terrorist
Speaker 3: in the Middle East has have received either funding or
Speaker 3: training from the Islamic Republic. We mostly talk about the
Speaker 3: Shia Milita, which is like Iraqis and Hisbula that have
Speaker 3: been attacking the Americans and Israelis, but also Al Qaieda
Speaker 3: and Taliban. So a lot of US servicemen, almost all
Speaker 3: of them who have been either attacked or killed in
Speaker 3: Iraq and Afghanistan. That was through Iranian Iranian money. Now,
Speaker 3: going beyond the region, you're talking about Iranian drones and
Speaker 3: missiles that have been arming Russia against Ukrainian civil civilian infrastructure.
Speaker 3: In on mainland America, you have the Islamic Republics really
Speaker 3: terror apparatus, funding different networks, trying to assassinate President Trump
Speaker 3: numerous times. You have them trying to kill Americans on
Speaker 3: US soil. You have them leveraging and exploiting any progressive
Speaker 3: civic cause here in America to advance their own agenda.
Speaker 3: They try to influence elections. So anywhere in the world,
Speaker 3: whether you look at East Africa with whatever has happening
Speaker 3: in Sudan and Somalia, there is Iranian footprints there. It's
Speaker 3: in Europe, it's in America. It would really be a
Speaker 3: game changer if this regime were to collapse, given how
Speaker 3: secular and democratic Iran's opposition is.
Speaker 1: So let me ask about the democracy aspect of this.
Speaker 1: Because we've seen the son of the former shaw of Iran,
Speaker 1: he is Prince pap Lavi. He is now making statements
Speaker 1: urging the people of Iran to rise up, and we're
Speaker 1: seeing some video of people saying we want the Shaw back.
Speaker 1: But the Shaw certainly was not a democratic leader, that's
Speaker 1: absolutely I mean, he was a monarch. He ruled with
Speaker 1: an iron fist himself. So there was issues with the
Speaker 1: Shaw's leadership. Is the Shaw a viable answer to prevent
Speaker 1: a vacuum of leadership? Or should the Iranian people or
Speaker 1: are the Iranian people really agitating for democracy and it's
Speaker 1: being hijacked by the Shaw's movement. That's where I'm like,
Speaker 1: where does the Shaw or or the prince fit into this.
Speaker 3: So you're talking about a population in Iran that is
Speaker 3: about sixty percent under the age of thirty, So mostly
Speaker 3: Iranians that are protesting right now have been born under
Speaker 3: the Islamik Republic's rule. And there is absolutely no comparison
Speaker 3: between the repression that the regime does against what the
Speaker 3: Shaw did. The accusations against the former monarch, the path Levi,
Speaker 3: was that he was perhaps too aggressive with certain Islamist factions,
Speaker 3: who were those Islamis factions the ones that are in
Speaker 3: charge right now. So ultimately it was an iron fist
Speaker 3: against those that were against democratic values. Lashaw was not
Speaker 3: putting in prison women's rights activists who wanted to have
Speaker 3: the freedom to choose whatever they want to wear. It
Speaker 3: was specifically going after communist rebels, terrorists and of course
Speaker 3: Islamists in that case. Now, what we see right now,
Speaker 3: of course, with the new wave, is that the Iranian population,
Speaker 3: as I mentioned, is so alienated by its by its
Speaker 3: current leadership, that would look forward for any capacity, any
Speaker 3: leader that would enable it to move towards the next phase.
Speaker 3: And Prince path Lav right now is the only figure
Speaker 3: that we have that would one mobilize the masses and
Speaker 3: who believes in democratic values of allowing women's rights activists
Speaker 3: and what not to flourish. But more importantly, it's important,
Speaker 3: it's key for us to be engaging that opposition because
Speaker 3: that is the only thing that could fill in a
Speaker 3: vacuum until we have elections societyran for Iranians to decide
Speaker 3: whether they want to move forward the constitutional monarchy or
Speaker 3: republic or what form of governance.
Speaker 1: Does this feel different than the last round of protests
Speaker 1: in twenty nineteen, and if so, how it does.
Speaker 3: One angle, as I mentioned is the fact that this
Speaker 3: movement is not leader less. In the past, it was
Speaker 3: a bit more scattered. What unified Iranians was simply the
Speaker 3: end to the regime, But now what unifies Iranians is
Speaker 3: not just regime change, but also what comes after it.
Speaker 3: So if you look at every protest wave anywhere, like
Speaker 3: any protest movement within the last three weeks now, and
Speaker 3: you look at any city, there's always flags of the
Speaker 3: pre revolution, the Sun and the Lion. You see a
Speaker 3: chance of longling the king, and you hear a chance
Speaker 3: of this is the final battle path, leav will return.
Speaker 3: So that is really a game changer. That's the main difference.
Speaker 3: The other difference compared to the previous waves is the
Speaker 3: fact that the regime's image has been shattered because of
Speaker 3: the Twelve Day War. So prior to that, Iranians were
Speaker 3: really deeply afit of this regime because they genuinely believed
Speaker 3: in its capacity, capability, and capacity to counter American and
Speaker 3: Israeli influence. But now we saw that their nuclear program
Speaker 3: and their ballistic missile stockpies were decimated and they couldn't response.
Speaker 3: So you're talking about a fearless population that has a
Speaker 3: leader in mind. That's what sets this wave apart.
Speaker 1: I saw a large billboard that had been painted over
Speaker 1: and it said.
Speaker 2: We are no longer afraid.
Speaker 1: So to your point, I mean, what realistically do the
Speaker 1: Iranian people have to fight with. They are a disarmed population, correct.
Speaker 2: They are.
Speaker 3: That's why external support is really crucial right now. The
Speaker 3: momentum is going on despite the heavy, heavy crackdowns internet shutdowns.
Speaker 3: It has been shot down for about a week now.
Speaker 3: In addition to that, they shut down electricity as well
Speaker 3: as landlines, so they're really blocking full of information to
Speaker 3: and from Iran. But also they're disconnecting Yuranians from each other.
Speaker 3: And yeah, as you mentioned, you know, I Runian civil
Speaker 3: society is not extremists. They're not going to blow themselves
Speaker 3: up like other Islamus in the Middle East. So you know,
Speaker 3: we talked about an educated, educated, and young population going
Speaker 3: to fight this brutal regime that's opening fire on them.
Speaker 3: Not with just automatic weapons, mind you, they're using all
Speaker 3: these proxies that we talked about to suppress protests at home.
Speaker 3: So you have Irockum militias, you have Libanese as well
Speaker 3: to go fight them. And that's why increasingly from the
Speaker 3: ground people are demanding and you know, international support. They're
Speaker 3: asking President Trump to come and, as they say, quote unquote,
Speaker 3: to do the final knockout of this regime that would,
Speaker 3: as we said, be a game changer for the world.
Speaker 1: I really really appreciate your time. Janatin Sayah from the
Speaker 1: Foundation for the Defensive Democracies Around program, thank you so much.
Speaker 1: I appreciate you making time for us today.
Speaker 3: Thank you for having me in the insightful question.
Speaker 1: All right, thank you, sir, and we'll continue having a
Speaker 1: conversation about that stuff. I'm wondering if any of you
Speaker 1: and you can text me at five six six nine oh,
Speaker 1: is anybody else following along.
Speaker 2: On X like I am, because that is where you are.
Speaker 1: The revolution is being televised on X, but it's very,
Speaker 1: very difficult to get out information. Text me five sixty
Speaker 1: six and nine O check it out. Let me know
Speaker 1: what you think about it.