Iran's Shattered "Axis of Resistance"

"The Syrian debate is happening at all levels of Society."

"People are asking: Why did we spent so much money there? What did we achieve?"

"What is our justification now that it's all gone?" 

Hassan Shemshadi, Iranian analyst

AP Photo

 

Iranians appear to be awakening from their stupor of victimization by their theocratic regime; influential critics in the country now speaking out publicly of the futility and regional destabilization fomented by the Islamic Republic of Iran, short-changing the great Iranian people living in poverty and repression crushed beneath the fist of the Islamist Khomeinist regime under Ruhollah Khomeini's successor Grand Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, carrying on the vision of his predecessor.

The sudden collapse of the Alawite regime of President Bashar al-Assad, propped up by Tehran, has taken the Iranian Mullahs and their Republican Guard Corps by surprise; no longer can they rely on Syria as a conduit for weapons meant for the terror groups founded and funded by Iran and others dependent on its support; Tehran's infamous 'axis of resistance'. 

The public has always grumbled in fruitless frustration over billions spent by their government to recruit, train and arm their proxy militias, while depriving the people of Iran of basic necessities of life. That, and the Iranian lives sacrificed to help support the Syrian regime in its long-standing civil war against Syria's Sunni population, and its and conflict with foreign Sunni-led Islamist groups like the Islamic State; all to naught. 

 

AP Photo

 

"No one will be able to waste Iran's dollars for maintaining a spider web anymore", stated former lawmaker Heshmatollah Falahatpisheh in a social media post, urging Iranians to celebrate the fall of Bashar al-Assad. A professor of international relations at Tehran University, Ebrahim Motaghi stated that Iran had been reduced from regional power to merely another country, on a talk show viewed widely.

The Iranian regime's strategy to become a dominant regional force capable of confronting Israel and the United States, its support of militant Islamist groups across the Middle East it named the axis of resistance, is being questioned not only by an incensed public, but also by well-placed authority figures. Mohammad Shariati Dehghan, former Iranian representative to the intergovernmental Organization of Islamic Cooperation wrote in a front-page opinion piece that the Assad defeat exposed Iran's strategy as misguided, "built on weak foundations".

A new approach was required, to prioritize building alliances with other countries rather than propping up militant groups, while redirecting funding and resources back to the people of Iran. This open public debate is a departure from the norm since for many years leaders of Iran placed support for Syria and allied terrorist groups fighting Israel to be a non-negotiable focus of the Islamic revolution, which national security demanded.

These open comments, infuriating to Ayatollah Khamenei, were, he said, "a crime", having the effect of sowing fear and uncertainty in the public mind. Iran's judiciary responded by announcing a criminal investigation into specific prominent figures and news outlets identified as leading the criticism. Among them, former lawmaker Heshmatollah Falahtpisheh who had revealed the Syrian debt to Iran came to $30 billion.

Syria had become Iran's central command base in the region for over 40 years. Military bases, missile factories, tunnels and warehouses were all controlled by Iran. Weapons, cash and logistical support to Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza and terrorists in the West Bank and Iraq were all beneficiaries of Tehran's largess in building its 'axis of resistance'. 

When the Assad regime was deposed, Syrians stormed the Damascus Iranian Embassy, smashing photographs of Iranian leaders, and hauling down the Iranian flag. The Islamist rebel leader, Ahmed al-Shara, who spearheaded the insurgents, warned Iran he would not tolerate continued Iranian interference in Syria's affairs. Gone forever, the Assad regime's complicity with the Republic.

AP Photo

"Why were you spending billions of dollars of oil revenues that belong to the Iranian people on Assad until the very end if he wasn't even listening to you?"

"At least on the topic of Syria, stop lying and be honest with the people."

Alireza Mokarami, Iranian, Syrian civil war veteran