Iran International
A reformist call for renewed talks with the United States as a way out of Iran’s post-war troubles has laid bare deep divisions within the Islamic Republic, with hardliners accusing the letter’s authors of treason and appeasement.
In their public letter to President Masoud Pezeshkian, published July 28 in multiple outlets, the Reform Front warned that the ceasefire with Israel is fragile and a return of UN sanctions is imminent, urging a fundamental rethink of foreign policy.
“A comprehensive development strategy instead of a strategy of survival and confrontation requires negotiations with the United States and European governments to resolve mutual issues, lift sanctions, and obtain necessary security guarantees,” the letter read.
It warned that unless such a path is taken, Iran faces either a renewed war that would devastate the country’s vital infrastructure, or a prolonged state of neither war nor peace, marked by total isolation that would erode the Iran's capacity to function.
“Minor and piecemeal reforms will not solve the country’s problems,” the authors said. “Today, the nation needs bold and difficult choices.”
Mounting hardship, muted leadership
The call comes amid growing economic hardship, with chronic water and electricity outages fueling public anger and hampering an already strained economy.
The Reform Front accused Pezeshkian of failing to stand up to hardliner overreach, including the recent act of parliament requiring the administration to suspend cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
“The president has remained silent in the face of a war-mongering foreign policy and the state broadcaster’s continuous attacks against his own government,” they wrote.
Hardline backlash was swift and scathing.
‘Discredited losers’
Javan, affiliated with the Revolutionary Guards, called the letter an echo of demands by the Islamic Republic’s opposition. Conservative commentator and former Javan chief Abdollah Ganji rejected the moderates’ advice as “a call for surrender” in daily Hamshahri.
But the harshest attack—as usual—came from Kayhan, whose editor-in-chief is appointed by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.
“What’s striking is that they don’t dare say … what exactly should be done now for these discredited political losers to consider it a ‘revision of policies’ or a ‘correct decision,’” read a Monday editorial.
“Should we hand over our defensive deterrent? Completely shut down the nuclear program? Release the arrested spies and traitors so they can commit more acts of treason?"
"If the CIA and Mossad had commissioned people to translate their unmet demands into Persian, would it have looked any different from this letter?” the editorial asked.
Though short-lived, the war inflicted deep symbolic and political damage on Tehran.
Strikes on strategic infrastructure, the killing of top commanders and damage to air defense systems raised serious doubts about the Islamic Republic’s capacity to provide security.
Far from healing old wounds, the war exposed and deepened the theocracy’s core weaknesses.
From water and power shortages to currency volatility, from political gridlock to widening social divides, nearly every facet of life in Iran bears the mark of dysfunction.
Instability is now normalized. It’s not the exception but the constant.
The new normal
Even before the war, Iran faced a web of interlocking crises: economic collapse, institutional decay, mass emigration, widespread social discontent, and deep political distrust.
Some political actors believed tactical flexibility or resource redistribution might restore order. Others foresaw collapse as inevitable. Both camps, in different ways, assumed that transformation—whether internal or external—was still possible.
The war has shifted that assumption.
Iran’s ruling establishment no longer appears capable of restoring legitimacy or reorganizing itself, but viable alternatives also seem more fractured than ever.
The opposition is scattered, the political class adrift, and grassroots movements are fragmented and organizationally thin.
Much of society is caught in a suspended state: disillusioned but not mobilized, angry but exhausted.
The Islamic Republic has tightened control—erecting checkpoints, increasing Revolutionary Guards and Basij presence and policing public spaces.
The message is blunt: We are still here. But this is not stability born of legitimacy. It is the visibility of power imposed on restless cities.
Today’s urban order rests not on consent, but on continuous police presence.
A collapsing narrative
The 12-day war exposed the hollowness of official narratives: deterrence, security and regional authority no longer carry weight.
Iran’s vulnerability wasn’t just military. It was discursive. The state’s security narrative took a direct hit.
Worse, the war ended without a lasting peace or credible guarantee against future conflict. Peace itself has become unstable. It’s more of an anxious interlude, not a resolution.
With explosions and air defense activity continuing in multiple regions, many expect a new, possibly more intense, confrontation.
Living With Crisis
The long-held notion that the Islamic Republic feeds on crisis is no longer sufficient.
In the past, crises were instrumental—tactics to manage society and consolidate power. Today, crisis is not just a means of rule but the system’s very foundation.
Crises are no longer resolved; they are extended, normalized, and embedded into daily life. The system doesn’t merely survive crisis—it is sustained by it.
This condition has been made possible by a combination of factors: the absence of a unifying alternative, the suppression of public discourse, the fragmentation of dissent, and the systematic blocking of political imagination.
The state has succeeded in minimizing mobilization through control—but it offers no vision for legitimacy in return.
Power has become form without content—a hollow repetition of authority sustained by imposed hopelessness.
Yet this persistence is not stability.
Chronic instability may appear contained—thanks to force and habituation—but the cracks are widening. The theocracy is more detached than ever from the economic, social and institutional foundations that once upheld it.
The drift into slow, grinding dysfunction leaves the country vulnerable to sudden shocks: social uprisings in neglected regions, systemic failures in water, health, or energy, or collective protests triggered by seemingly small sparks.
The Islamic Republic may still be standing—but the ground beneath it has never been shakier.