Following the appointment of Ebrahim Raisi as president of the regime ruling Iran by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, the mullahs’ propaganda machine began portraying him as a savior on a mission to resolve all crises riddling the country. Less than year in office, people from all walks of life are taking to the streets of cities throughout Iran and chanting “Death to Raisi!” on a daily basis.
More recently, demonstrations by retirees and pensioners have entered its second week and on June 16, teachers in 38 cities of 22 provinces poured into the streets, also chanting “Death to Raisi” and “Imprisoned teachers must be freed!” These rallies are yet another indication that any and all protests in Iran quickly evolve and become a political issue troubling for the mullahs’ regime.
The society in Iran is currently undergoing special circumstances that can be analyzed from four different perspectives:
1) Popular protests are expanding with significant pace. The lapse between these demonstrations, rallies, protests, and uprisings are decreasing and such events are becoming daily issues before the mullahs’ regime. The slogans chanted by the protesters are also becoming all the more political and specifically targeting the regime’s senior ranks and files; most notably “Death to Raisi!” This trend will witness a sudden surge and erupt in nationwide uprisings similar to that of November 2019.
2) Various sectors of Iran’s society are uniting, and this unity is strengthening by the day. The reason is that people from all walks of life in Iran share a common dilemma. All are being oppressed and plundered by the ruling regime. As a result, the solution is becoming all the more obvious: confronting the root of their miseries, being the mullahs’ regime, as an allied force. This is exactly why we are witnessing coinciding protests by retirees, teachers, storeowners, and other sectors of Iran’s populace.
3) The regime’s massive crackdown machine, despite its vicious practices, is showing cracks and weaknesses in the face of growing protests in cities across the country and a society expecting answers and solutions to basic economic issues, let alone politics. Authorities arrested at least 20 teachers prior to their rallies on Thursday, June 16, only to see thousands of their colleagues launching rallies, gatherings, demonstrations, and marches while chanting: “Imprisoned teachers must be released!”
4) “Death to Raisi!” is becoming a popular slogan in all protests and delivering a major blow to Khamenei’s strategy of grooming Raisi as his successor and appointing a “young, Hezbollahi government” to confront the regime’s crises. This is exactly why Khamenei had nearly all his political rivals eliminated from holding political office and unified the ranks and file of his regime’s Majlis (parliament). He completed his strategy in August 2021 by appointing Raisi as his regime’s president, all with the utmost priority of confronting Iran’s powder keg population with an iron fist.
Iran’s society, however, has not succumbed to the mullahs’ demands and in fact escalated their protests and demonstrations. The nationalization of the “Death to Raisi” slogan is the coup de grace to Khamenei’s strategies.
This portrays dangerous possibility for the mullahs’ regime in the not-so-distant future. While the international community is currently focusing on the regime’s controversial nuclear program, Khamenei know his Achilles’ Heel is Iran’s escalating protests. The question is, how can Khamenei guide his regime through these troubled waters as popular anti-regime protests continue to escalate?
