Like Iran

Exiled Iranian Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi, son of the US-backed former shah, has called on Iranians to sing together against the country’s leadership at 8 pm local time (noon Eastern) on Thursday and Friday. Whether a significant number of people respond to its call could determine whether it is fatal, 12 day protests fade away as previous rounds of unrest have, or become a major challenge to the government and spark a possible broader crackdown.

“My dear compatriots, over the past week I have closely followed your demonstrations, particularly those taking place today in the bazaars of Tehran,” Pahlavi said in a video posted Tuesday on social media.

“Although the regime ongoing violent repressionthey are resisting, and it is inspiring,” Pahlavi said. “They have certainly noticed and seen that larger crowds have repeatedly driven regime forces to flee and even increased defections to the people’s side. Therefore, it is essential to keep these demonstrations disciplined and as large as possible. This Thursday and Friday, January 8 and 9, starting precisely at 8 pm, wherever you are, whether in the streets or even from your own homes, I call on you to start singing exactly at this time. Based on your response, I will announce the next calls to action.”

Some Iranian analysts and insiders believe it could be a turning point.

“It seems like his call for people to come out en masse today and tomorrow could be a turning point,” Mona Yacoubian, director and senior advisor of the Middle East Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank, told News themezone on Thursday. “This is a regime that is not afraid to use lethal force. But the question is, to what extent, if they are overwhelmed, if the protests become overwhelmingly large and if there are elements in the security forces, the police, etc., at the local level, who are suffering the effects of this economic crisis and who decide not to shoot people – these are the types of questions that I think we need to keep an eye on.”

Another veteran regime watcher inside the country, referring to Pahlavi’s call, said in written comments to News themezone on Thursday that “the moment we are all waiting for is 8:00 pm this afternoon… If there is broad participation, impossible to ignore, it could be a turning point.”

“If the singing at 8 o’clock is really loud, deafening, chorus-like and eye-catching [ie impossible for authorities to ignore]”So starting Friday, it will be assumed that the protests are a real force and will gain momentum, and then we will head into the unknown,” they said.

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Yacoubian said the current protests in Iran were different from the last large-scale demonstrations that spread across the country, over the 2022 death in police custody of a young woman accused of violating strict dress rules, because they focus on economic issues.

“In 2022, the regime could respond more directly to the protesters’ demands simply by addressing their complaints about women’s headscarves and so on,” Yacoubian said. “There was a lot of violence. A lot of people were killed. But you’ve actually seen a very significant relaxation of those kinds of social restrictions in Iran.”

Despite that relaxation of some rules governing people’s daily behavior, the intense economic problems in sanctions-ravaged Iran were enough to spark the current wave of unrest that, despite a series of measures aimed at appeasing protesters, has continued to spread across the country.

Yacoubian said the Iranian government had no meaningful way to calm current protesters’ concerns about Iran’s economy.

“In the case of these economically driven protests, there’s really nothing (the regime) can do to address the concerns and the kind of factors that are driving public discontent, because it’s driven by an economy that has completely failed and is collapsing,” Yacoubian said.

Another potential factor is Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s possible interest in continuing to attack Iran’s ballistic missile program at a time of perceived weakness in the Tehran regime.

“That’s a completely different dynamic that has nothing to do with these protests, but actually, frankly, even if there had been no protests and you asked me, I would say, look, I think it’s very possible that we could see a second round of conflict between Israel and Iran,” Yacoubian said.

Iran’s leaders “certainly have, I’m sure, a very clear understanding of all the pressure points, both internal and external, and that might be why they’re so off base, if they’re actually reading, probably well, the situation and they don’t really seem to have a good plan for how to handle the unrest.”