Iran Analysts Praise Hamas In ‘Politically Correct’ Style

"Armita Geravand's vital signs, which were relatively stable, have changed over the past few days and have somewhat worsened," reported the news agency linked with the Islamic Republic's Ministry of Sports, without providing further details. It stated that the medical team is still working to improve her condition.

The teenager allegedly fell into a coma after being assaulted by hijab enforcers on her way to school at Tehran subway ten days ago. Authorities have significantly restricted the family's access to Armita at Fajr military hospital in Tehran.

Armita’s serious head injury, which authorities claim she sustained when she fainted on a subway car, serves as a stark reminder to many Iranians of the death of Mahsa Amini in September last year. Mahsa's death ignited months of protests and unrest across the country, and the government is still refusing to accept responsibility for it.

Armita’s mother was briefly detained by security authorities last week ago after protesting their refusal to allow her to see her daughter. Armita’s father was only permitted to see her after agreeing to a televised interview in which he endorsed the official account of the incident, which excludes the role of hijab enforcers.

Independent media outlets have been denied access to the hospital, and they are not allowed to speak with the family. Maryam Lotfi, a reporter who tried to interview Armita’s mother on the day of her hospital admission, was briefly detained. She has refrained from making any comments about her arrest or the incident since then.

The news of another young girl's life-threatening injury, along with televised interviews with her parents and classmates, which many believe were "forced," has outraged many Iranians who are being kept in the dark about her circumstances.

"The Islamic Republic has no legitimacy in the eyes of the people who are certain that the regime is lying about Armita Geravand, as it has always done. The regime has been using forced interviews with Armita's family and friends in an attempt to convince the public that the incident was only an accident," a representative of the United Youth of Iran (UYI) told Iran International.

Iranian social media users have extensively alleged in the past ten days that authorities are deliberately withholding all information about Armita and making every effort to silence her family, with the hope that her case will eventually fall into oblivion amidst the news of the war in Gaza and Israel.

Footage of Armita's presence at the subway station and an audio file of the call made by an employee of the Tehran Metro to the emergency services, which state media have released, have not been able to convince the public that hijab enforcers were not involved in the incident.

Serious suspicions that the footage and audio file were doctored by the authorities to conceal the truth were raised in a long tweet on October 9 by an anonymous user who posts as Avand Fardi.

Fardi, who claims to have meticulously examined and analyzed the video footage and audio file, concluded that either three black-veiled women, who were hijab enforcers on the platform, or a fourth person in the car must have been responsible for assaulting Armita. However, he believes the audio and visual evidence was doctored to conceal this fact.

Furthermore, he has highlighted a discrepancy in the audio file concerning the explanations provided by the metro staff regarding the circumstances leading to the young girl's injury, presumably inside the car where the authorities claim there was no CCTV.

The party first emerged in Iran during the presidency of populist Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (2005-2013) but has continued to exert its influence on the political landscape throughout the tenures of Presidents Hassan Rouhani (2013-2021) and Ebrahim Raisi (2021 onward).

While the party's leadership remains somewhat opaque, its influence extends over both the parliament and in the presidential administration. Paydari frequently faces criticism for its role in many of the country's political, economic, and socio-cultural challenges, including hijab enforcement.

"The promised day and the eventual displacement of Israelis, along with the celebration of victory in Jerusalem, draw near," read Paydari's statement issued on Wednesday.

A significant number of cabinet members in President Raisi's administration, particularly within his economic team, are reportedly prominent figures in the Paydari party. Its association with Raisi became evident during his presidential election campaign, where key members such as former nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili played active roles. However, as is common in Iranian politics, it remains challenging to discern who is driving the agenda and who is following it.

On Wednesday, the Israeli death toll from Saturday's attack by Hamas exceeded 1,200. Meanwhile, desperation engulfed Gaza, where the aftermath of Tel Aviv's response to the brutal Hamas attack has left neighborhoods in ruins, homes without electricity, and hospitals running critically low on medical supplies.

Fereydoun Abbasi, in a statement to local media on Wednesday, asserted, "The current moment demands a devastating blow against Israel, and we require an even stronger strike; this is currently a prelude to a final strike."

Abbasi is the former head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization.

He further suggested that Israel's involvement in its own issues will reduce hostile actions within Iran, adding, "If we look at our region, we can observe that all the disruptions are rooted in the policies of the Zionist regime, which sometimes benefits from American support, and these actions' adverse effects will undoubtedly affect other regional countries."

In the official Iranian regime terminology, Israel is referred to as "the Zionist entity" or the "Zionist regime."

Meanwhile, 97-year-old cleric Ahmad Jannati, the Secretary of the Guardian Council, characterized Hamas assault on Israel as a "victorious and promising operation," and said, "The operation has demonstrated that Israel is on a path to destruction, and any government aligning with it will become complicit in its demise."

Such remarks come as the death toll in the Israel-Hamas conflict continued to rise on the fifth day since the Palestinian militant group launched a large-scale. The brutal assault has resulted in over 1,200 deaths in Israel, among them at least 22 Americans. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has declared, "We are in a state of war."

The head of the National Security Committee of the Iranian Parliament announced on Wednesday that they held a meeting with representatives of the Islamic Jihad, Hamas, and relevant organizations to evaluate the developments in Gaza and Palestine.

According to Vahid Jalalzadeh, they also discussed “future operations.”

"We have informed the authorities that the parliament is ready to provide any support in this regard. The Islamic Republic undoubtedly has its own policies, and parliamentarians are at the forefront of the struggle against the Zionist regime and will not hesitate to offer their support," he added.

In the official terminology employed by the Iranian government, Israel is referred to as "the Zionist entity" or the "Zionist regime." Over the course of its 44-year history, Iran's clerical leaders have consistently advocated for the "elimination" or "destruction of Israel."

In 2015, Iran's ruler Ali Khamenei declared that Israel would no longer exist within the next 25 years. Subsequently, in 2016, the Iranian government installed a countdown clock in Tehran's Palestine Square, symbolically marking the time remaining. This followed the signing of a nuclear agreement between Iran and global powers in July 2015.

The comments by Jalalzadeh came amid growing suspicions regarding Iran's involvement in a surprise attack by Hamas on Israel on a Saturday morning. Since the start of the conflict, it has resulted in more than 1,200 Israeli casualties, with over 2,000 individuals sustaining severe injuries and dozens being taken hostage in Gaza.

Intense expert debates over whether Israel will launch full-scale war against Iran’s main strategic ally, Hezbollah, is underway amid the Lebanese terrorist entity’s aerial incursions into Israel.

Iran International contacted a number of leading Israeli and American experts about the possibility of a military clash between Israel and the clerical regime in Tehran.

Yigal Carmon, the former Israeli counter-terrorism adviser who predicted Hamas’ war against Israel in early September on Iran International, said “The Americans are there to preempt Iran.“

The US military sent additional naval groups to the Eastern Mediterranean, including the aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford. Iran International was the first news organization to report on Carmon’s prescient MEMRI article from August 31.

Carmon, whose voice has been ubiquitous in the international and Israeli media since the outbreak of the war, said, “Hezbollah is deterred,” but he quickly noted that the Lebanese Shiite terrorist movement could flip and lash out at Israel. Carmon, who served as the counter-terrorism advisor to Israeli Prime Ministers Yitzhak Shamir and Yitzhak Rabin, added “Hezbollah is still listening to Tehran” and “Tehran wants to use everyone else to fight for them.”

According to a report in the Wall Street Journal, Iran’s regime directly helped Hamas prepare its massacre of over 1,200 people in southern Israel.

In a debate on Israel’s channel 13 on Wednesday, one of the panelists argued for an Israeli preemptive military strike against Hezbollah in Lebanon.

Yaakov Katz, the former editor-in-chief of the Jerusalem Post and defense expert, said, “I don’t see Israel initiating an attack against Iran right now. There is no benefit for Israel to expand this conflict and this war beyond what is happening in Gaza.”

He continued that “On the contrary, Israel wants to contain the war to one place and to Gaza. However, if Iran were to attack Israel, and to think they can take advantage of the situation, in that case, I think we would definitely see a significant Israeli response, if Iranian missiles, for example, were fired at Israel.”

Katz is the author of “Shadow Strike: Inside Israel's Secret Mission to Eliminate Syrian Nuclear Power.”

David Wurmser, a former Senior Advisor for nonproliferation and Middle East strategy for US vice president Dick Cheney, said, “Israel needs to reverse fundamentally the strategic momentum regionally, which accelerated against it dramatically following the catastrophe of the last few days. To do so, it cannot sufficiently deliver such a tectonic geostrategic shift within the confines of Gaza alone, although this must clearly result in a thorough exorcism of Hamas from Gaza.”

Wurmser, who was also the National Security Advisor to John Bolton, added, “Iran’s strategic vulnerability emanates from its most critical assets. First its deployment via Hezbollah in Lebanon, and Assad’s regime in Syria, which in turn also relies heavily on Hezbollah’s and the IRGC presence in Syria. Their destruction, and the destabilization of Assad’s regime, thus can administer a devastating blow that begins to seize the geostrategic momentum and turn the tide from last weekend’s disaster into anxiety in Iran’s regime.”

According to Wurmser, “This in turn can encourage Iranians to escalate their own quest for freedom, thus devastatingly exacerbating Tehran’s anxiousness, and the resulting image of besieged weakness. In this way, the war began in Gaza, but must end in Tehran.”

Wurmser warned that “Israel just learned that waiting to allow your enemy to get close or to amass great power must not inform action. Iran’s nuclear program cannot be allowed to remain at the level it currently is. It will not yield voluntarily, any more than Hamas, akin to a cobra, can be tamed.”

Carmon argues that Hamas should not be compared to the terrorist Islamic State movement, rather to the German Nazi paramilitary Einsatzgruppen. He wrote that “The mission of Hamas was to carry out a typical Hamas Einsatzgruppen attack: They hunted down Jewish women, men, children, Holocaust survivors, and the elderly, and murdered them with unspeakable cruelty.”

Carmon continued “Videos of the horrific crimes carried out by Hamas were published for public consumption. MEMRI is creating a quasi-Yad Vashem repository of the atrocities, so that no one forgets, and no one is allowed to forget.”