By Sara Flounders
January 20, 2026

Washington’s latest criminal attack, following decades of nonstop efforts to overturn the Islamic Republic of Iran, a country of 92 million people, has failed.

Since the powerful 1979 Iranian Revolution overturned the corrupt Pahlavi monarchy, kept in place by U.S. and British imperialism, Washington has used invasions, bombings, assassinations and sabotage to try to reestablish its domination of this resource rich country.

The Revolution — and with it the utilization of Iran’s own resources — transformed Iran, modernizing industry and providing health care, electrification, sanitation and free universal education. Old feudal land holdings were broken up, and land was distributed to the people. Today, 70% of Iran’s science and engineering students and more than half of the doctors are women. (forbes.com, Dec. 9, 2015)

The Iranian Revolution inspired resistance to imperialist domination across West Asia, Africa and throughout the Islamic world. These revolutionary movements have been Iran’s natural allies.

Therefore, in an effort to erode confidence in the government’s ability to keep improving the lives of millions of people, the U.S. has utilized asset seizures, currency manipulations, economic sanctions and secondary sanctions to any countries trading with Iran. These intentionally disruptive measures cause inflation spirals, wage erosion, escalating housing costs and chronic shortages.

Often these multi-pronged efforts of sabotage are hidden and denied. The latest round of sabotage, however, was so bold that U.S. and Israeli politicians bragged about their role and openly called for an overturn of the Iranian government.

What is real? What is AI created?

The current upheaval began as a small protest on Dec. 28 calling for the government to take actions against rising prices and currency devaluation. But these actions were immediately hijacked, and they ballooned into something entirely different, with thousands supposedly calling for an overthrow of the government. Suddenly armed gangs were among the protesters, shooting randomly at police and at other protesters.

Buildings were burned. U.S. corporate media amplified every protest. Photos were everywhere. Were they real or were they AI generated? It didn’t matter.

Was the stated number of Iranians killed accurate? Or was this a way to send a media message back into Iran to further inflame the situation? Was any of this a grassroots movement that naturally sprang up?

These demonstrations were quickly supported and signal-boosted by the U.S. and Israeli national security. Israel’s intelligence agency, Mossad, posted a message in Farsi on Dec. 29 on its official social media accounts instructing Iranian protesters: “Go out together into the streets. The time has come. … We are with you. Not only from a distance and verbally. We are with you in the field.” (jpost.com, Dec. 29, 2025)

On Jan. 2, President Donald Trump wrote on his Truth Social: “If Iran shots (sic) and violently kills peaceful protesters, which is their custom, the United States of America will come to their rescue. We are locked and loaded and ready to go. Thank you for your attention to this matter!” (x.com/WhiteHouse/status)

The same day, former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo posted on X: “The Iranian regime is in trouble. … Happy New Year to every Iranian in the streets. Also to every Mossad agent walking beside them.” (jpost.com, Jan. 3)

The attacks escalated on Jan. 8 when coordinated attacks targeted public, state and religious sites. Armed groups attacked shops, banks, bus stations and mosques, killing a number of security personnel and civilians along with arson attacks on medical facilities and public institutions and attacks on emergency services facilities.

Iranian authorities said their evidence showed that foreign-backed terrorist groups distributed weapons, deliberately targeted civilians and security forces and acted with the direct involvement of the United States and Israel.

Foreign media, funded NGOs and Starlink

The CIA’s National Endowment for Democracy (NED) continues to fund hundreds of media programs to pump disinformation into Iran. The Mossad works with the CIA to fund Persian-language satellite television stations. British imperialism has long maintained daily Persian language services.

The role of this media beamed into Iran is to blame alleged “economic mismanagement, corruption and systemic privilege” for shortages — not the decades of economic blockade.

In an article titled, “Revealed: The CIA-backed NGOs fueling the Iran protests,” Alan MacLeod of Mintpress News stated: “The huge death tolls in Iran being splashed all over the media are sourced to an outfit in Fairfax, Virginia, called ‘Human Rights Activists in Iran’ that is overwhelmingly funded by the U.S. government. What is their methodology? Is it credible? Who cares? Just pump the big numbers out. … In the past week alone, their assertions have provided much of the basis for stories in CNN, The Wall Street Journal, NPR, ABC News, Sky News and The New York Post, among others.” (popularresistance.org, Jan. 16)

The loudest and most prominent Iranian “protest leader” quoted in the west is Masih Alinejad, a woman who was on the payroll of NED for years and who currently works for the U.S. Agency for Global Media. She lives in the U.S. Between 2015 and 2022, Masih Alinejad received $628,000 in funding from NED and related groups and a nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize. (mediareviewnet.com, Jan. 20)

Why did both the U.S. and Israeli media moguls believe they could be so public in their role? Their whole operation depended on the destabilizing impact of the more than 50,000 Starlink internet devices smuggled over months into Iran. Starlink provided free services and transmitted gory images of massive deaths and exaggerated Western media support back into Iran.

The plan was to blast that the government was collapsing, and the people were rising, which could destabilize and demoralize the population. In the past U.S.-backed “color revolutions,” using similar tactics, were successful.

By Jan. 10, when Iran, using its own technology, was able to block Starlink connections to Elon Musk’s blanket of satellites, the protests ebbed. This ability of Iran to assert its sovereignty and control its own messaging over its own country came as a shock to the U.S.

Then U.S. intervention threats moved into high gear. On Jan. 12 the White House messaged: “Effective immediately, any Country doing business with the Islamic Republic of Iran will pay a Tariff of 25% on any and all business being done with the United States of America. This Order is final and conclusive.” (x.com/WhiteHouse/status)

On Jan. 13 on Truth Social Trump roared:. “Iranian patriots, TAKE OVER YOUR INSTITUTIONS!!! Save the names of the killers and abusers. They will pay a big price. … Help is on the way.”

After the kidnapping of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and First Revolutionary Combatant Cilia Flores, Venezuela didn’t collapse. All of its institutions, military, peoples militias and mass movement stayed united.

When all attention was then focused on a U.S. strike on Iran, the same thing happened there. Iran organized massive pro-government demonstrations nationwide on Jan. 12. 

Of course, this received no coverage in western corporate media. Iran announced it would retaliate against Israel and the U.S. if it were attacked, reminding the two countries of its response to the Israeli / U.S. bombing seven months ago in June.

Iran’s hypersonic missiles

To protect its revolutionary gains, Iran has built a strong military apparatus — the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). It has developed military technology to defend the country from U.S. and Israeli military attacks.

A U.S. attack on Iran appeared inevitable, even though 70% of the U.S. population opposes military action in Iran. Trump, who campaigned promising to end the U.S. legacy of forever wars, has bombed seven countries in the past year: Yemen, Syria, Iran, Iraq, Nigeria, Somalia and Venezuela.

But on Jan. 14 Netanyahu publicly appealed to Trump to postpone any plans for a military attack. Senior officials from U.S. allies Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Oman and Egypt joined in urging no attack on Iran, warning that such a move could trigger a wider regional conflict.

Israeli and U.S. military experts have warned that Israel was less equipped to defend itself against Iran’s missile threat than it was in the 12-day round of bombing in June, when Israel, in a surprise attack, targeted the Islamic Republic’s military leadership, nuclear scientists and missile production. 

Iran has developed sophisticated missile systems — including hypersonic missiles, advanced ballistic missiles and hypersonic glide vehicles, which maneuver within the atmosphere at extreme speeds. These ballistic missiles can be manufactured relatively quickly and at scale, far outpacing the long production time and slow resupply of THAAD interceptors from the U.S.

Although Trump promised, “Help is on the way,” the U.S. was forced to pull back. Its industrial resupply was too slow, and the mobilized Iranian unity, even in the face of a new form of sneak attack, had prevailed with the people mobilized and its scientific and industrial defense intact.

However, U.S. efforts to undermine the Islamic Republic of Iran are sure to continue. The anti-imperialist movement must remain ready to act.