This text is being written under conditions in which the undeclared military rule of the criminal regime of the Islamic Republic continues to dominate Iran; at a time when the internet is shut down, schools and universities are closed or only partially functioning, and society is living under total repression.
Fragmentary information, some of it injected by the regime, so far reports the piling up of the bodies of approximately 5,000 people in Iran and the arrest of 20,000 individuals, figures that undoubtedly represent only the tip of the iceberg of the regime’s crimes. These data, largely published by security agencies and regime-aligned media, are produced under conditions of total censorship and are deliberately controlled and manipulated in the service of the targeted repression project against the current protest movement.
Yet repression does not come only from the mouthpieces of the regime’s official media. Beyond the borders, media outlets have lined up that describe themselves as “neutral,” “independent,” and as “mainstream media.” Outlets such as Iran International Television, the BBC, and Radio Farda appear, on the surface, to stand against the Islamic Republic, but in practice they operate on the very terrain mapped out by the regime.
What is taking place here is not a “war of narratives,” but a division of labor in repression. Imperialist media and the loudspeakers of monarchist-fascist forces pursue, with different language, the same mission: removing the people from the political arena, disarming the movement of consciousness and organization, replacing collective power with a symbolic leader, and turning a social uprising into a headless, programless, and expendable mass.
At this point, Iran International Television—through its leader-manufacturing, the spreading of false hopes of salvation from above, the promotion of foreign intervention, and the selling of illusions, falls into a historic alignment with the regime. The repressive regime of the Islamic Republic takes the life of the movement with bullets, and these take it through narrative-making. The result is the same: silencing the protest movement before it can transform into power.
These media outlets, which consider themselves professional, do not even outwardly adhere to the academic and legal theories of liberal democracy. According to these theories, and even under some laws governing the press and media in advanced capitalist countries, the media, alongside the judiciary, executive, and legislature, are called the “fourth estate”: a pillar that is supposedly meant to monitor power, not serve it.
What we observe in practice, especially in the case of Iran International Television, once again shows that this elegant and pleasing definition conceals a fundamental truth: real media independence is only possible in a society where power and wealth are not concentrated in the hands of a minority. In a class society, the media, like other institutions, either serves the interests of the ruling class, is eliminated, or at best is pushed to the margins without financial backing.
“Media neutrality” is nothing but a myth. Media freedom has never been and is not neutral; a media outlet either serves power or stands in opposition to it. There is no middle ground. In today’s world, shaped by class relations, no media- from the largest newspapers and news networks to agencies and international TV channels- exists outside the logic of power and capital. All operate, more or less, within this general framework.
Yet even within this context, Iran International Television- compared with other so-called Persian-language “mainstream media” abroad- has taken the lead and openly and crudely pursues a policy of exclusion, censorship, and distortion. This outlet deliberately silences the voices of other currents while simultaneously amplifying a reactionary and fascist current- namely monarchism centered around Reza Pahlavi- and seeks to impose it as the dominant voice.
This is the same policy of exclusion and censorship that the authoritarian regime of the Islamic Republic has practiced for years- with the difference that here censorship is exercised not through silence but through noise; not from the position of government but in the garb of opposition. A media outlet that, instead of breaking monopolies, creates its own monopoly- and even exploits domestic censorship to present its own voice as unique and unrivaled.
Such a monopoly is neither accidental nor the product of “professionalism,” but has been made possible by massive financial backing from imperialist powers- resources that revolutionary media and left-wing broadcasters, due to their class orientation in favor of workers and toilers, have neither possessed nor sought.
The matter does not stop at political bias. Through methods such as manipulated voice-overs on videos, the spread of false news, the selective amplification of certain statements, and the conscious censorship of other voices, Iran International has made the promotion of a reactionary current the محور of its policy of “top-down alternative-building”- a false alternative that is inverted and repackaged as the supposed “popular will from below.”
Meanwhile, the recent protest movement in Iran emerged on the basis of deep and chronic crises and entered the stage with a clear demand: a fundamental transformation of an inhuman condition- a demand whose realization lies neither within the capacity nor the will of the ruling system nor on the agenda of any other bourgeois alternative.
On this basis, the protests deepened and expanded step by step; progressive movements- from students and teachers to independent labor organizations and other social sectors- joined in varying degrees. Unlike previous waves, the labor movement did not retreat and continued its struggle. There was hope that, through the mass presence of people in the streets and its linkage with nationwide strikes, the movement would rise to a revolutionary level.
But precisely at this point, the media offensive of the reactionary monarchist opposition- whose core approach to dictatorship differs in no essential way from the regime of the “Velayat-e Faqih”-intensified in order to appropriate the movement. Iran International played a central role by inflating Reza Pahlavi’s profile and repeatedly broadcasting his irresponsible calls, accompanied by the praise and flattery of his allies.
After days of continuous street presence by the people and the spread of protests across professions, regions, and social strata, new calls for “street presence” were nothing but a bitter farce to satisfy the leadership mania of Reza Pahlavi and his circle- a bitter farce for the monarchists and their megaphones, and a bloody tragedy for people who had at least hoped for improvement or even fundamental change in their lives.
Among the latest examples- before the start of the new protest wave- was Reza Pahlavi’s Yalda call, which in practice met public indifference and showed that such appeals had already failed to gain social traction. Nevertheless, riding the wave of popular protests and relying on the false backing of alleged “Trump support”, which, like other imperialist powers, has never genuinely supported the people’s struggles provided the regime with a pretext for broad repression, at a moment when the government had been forced into relative restraint due to the scale of the protests.
It was no coincidence that these very calls were effectively promoted that same Thursday, January 8 (18 Dey), on the state broadcaster of the Islamic Republic in the form of a ridiculous discussion. It is highly likely that the regime itself, by infiltrating gatherings and initiating violence under the guise of protesters, deliberately sought to push the protests toward violence.
As the enraged masses were provoked, the flames were ignited and defensive and offensive actions took shape. And it was precisely here that unorganized and unarmed people faced a regime armed to the teeth and the blood of tens of thousands of protesters flowed in the streets.
Meanwhile, the deliberate shutdown of the internet in Iran effectively turned satellite television into the only channels of information. In this imposed vacuum, Iran International deployed its full capacity to mass-produce and reproduce artificial and manipulated information and to stage a loud spectacle of Reza Pahlavi’s hollow “popularity.”
Thus, the protesting masses in the streets were driven into a bloody dead end: before them the monster of the Islamic Republic with jaws wide open to devour them and behind them the daggers of the monarchists striking their bodies and pushing them forward.
Reza Pahlavi’s cynical response regarding his responsibility for this crime was to normalize it by calling it “war casualties.” This was his answer to the 1,500 eye-injured victims in Farabi Hospital in Tehran alone, to the enduring suffering of tens of thousands of bereaved families, to the tortured, to the prisoners of the system, and to all those still able to take an active role in the struggle.
At this point it became clear that, in ruthlessness, Reza Pahlavi is no less than the regime of the Islamic Republic and is prepared, in pursuit of power, to step over the bodies of thousands and tens of thousands. This is the real face of a contemptible figure and political clown whom Iran International seeks to impose on society as an alternative.
Therefore, it must be said plainly: in the mass killing of protesters, the Islamic Republic is not the only responsible actor; Reza Pahlavi and his flattering media organ are aligned and complicit in this crime. This alignment is not accidental. A glance at the personnel composition of this outlet is itself telling managers and editors who previously worked within official regime structures or regime-affiliated media. But the issue is not individual. It is policy: a policy that, despite oppositional posturing, in practice aids the suppression and neutralization of protest movements.
During the revolutionary “Woman, Life, Freedom” movement as well, this outlet attempted to appropriate the movement through leader-manufacturing and course diversion and failed. It appears that in the recent protests, learning from previous failures, it has pursued the leader-manufacturing project more aggressively, even to the point of silencing voices that, due to shared class interests, could potentially have stood alongside that very project.
This too is another sign of the alignment between this outlet’s monopolistic and totalizing policy and the repressive policy of the bloody authoritarian regime of the Islamic Republic.
At this critical and decisive juncture, what once again clearly emerges from this bloody experience is a lesson history has repeated time and again; a lesson expressed in „The Internationale”:
“No savior from on high delivers,
No faith have we in prince or peer.
Our own right hand the chains must shiver,
Chains of hatred, greed, and fear.”
Only through a deep understanding of the meaning of these words can these bitter experiences be transformed into a conscious resource for continuing the arduous and winding path of struggle; a path that understands liberation from suffering and bondage not as a gift from above, but as the result of the conscious action of those below.
Full text of the journal Kār (Labor), No. 1154, 19.01.2026
