Tom Stevenson in LRB: ‘In the US, professional diaspora politics is a lucrative game wherever the players are willing to align with American imperial interests.
By contrast, the organised domestic opposition, which for the most part is either incarcerated or forced to keep a very low profile, has tended to be strongly against external military intervention. Mir-Hossein Mousavi, an opposition leader under house arrest (and sometimes more) since 2009, has consistently spoken out against it. On 3 March, a statement published by Haja, a secular and republican opposition group, condemned ‘the military aggression by the United States and Israel’ and described Khamenei’s assassination as an escape from justice. Reformist figures in Iran responded to the attack with a sense of defeat.’

It's difficult to know how popular the war is among the Iranian people who despise the ayatollahs.

The longer the war lasts, the less popular it will be. Inside and outside Iran.

(a sf 2074)