Iran emerges from the war weakened, yet no signs of a regime change are in sight.

The women’s wing of Pavilion 209 at Evin Prison in Tehran is where many defenders of women’s rights in Iran serve their sentences. Last Monday, Israeli warplanes bombed the prison, severely damaging that wing and other areas of the facility, according to testimonies shared with Femena, a human rights organization based in the United States that supports feminist movements in the Middle East and Asia. Israeli officials bragged about hitting a “symbol of Iranian tyranny.” What they did not mention is that the victims of the bombing, according to the cited testimonies, were paradoxically some of the Iranians imprisoned for opposing the regime that Israel claims to want to end.

The bombing of this prison—where activists were incarcerated after the 2022 protests following the death of young Jina Mahsa Amini at the hands of the police for improperly wearing her hijab—is just one of many carried out by Israel during the 12 days of war against Iran, from June 13 to June 25. More significant for the authorities in Tehran were likely other attacks: those that killed prominent scientists, destroyed or damaged their nuclear facilities, and eliminated the commanders of the Iranian armies—the regular military and the more powerful parallel force: the Revolutionary Guard—whose mass funeral was held this Saturday.

The Iranian regime has weathered these blows without succumbing, even as it faced significant challenges. Militarily—due to Israeli attacks in 2024 and the near dismantling of its regional alliance network—and economically, due to the impoverishment of its population and international sanctions against its nuclear program. As demonstrated by the protests of 2022 and earlier ones, the project of an Islamic utopia that has governed Iran since 1979 has been losing the favor of many Iranians.

Some reasons explaining the resistance of the political system founded by the charismatic Ruhollah Khomeini are obvious; others, less so. Among the former is the repression that the regime unleashes against its “greatest threat”: ordinary Iranians, as highlighted over the phone from Oslo by Iranian neuroscientist and human rights activist Mahmood Amiry-Moghadam.

Among the less obvious reasons are the ideological motivations or mere survival instincts of Iranians who either support the political system because they believe it upholds their values, or who support it because they rely on it for their livelihoods. Those who benefit from clientelistic mechanisms that offer economic advantages to the most disadvantaged classes are particularly notable among these.

The survival of this regime and the corruption highlighted by numerous studies also rely on huge privileges and great fortunes. This is the case for one of the major beneficiaries of that corruption in Iran: the Revolutionary Guard.

The continuity of the Islamic regime in Iran was also made possible in the past by its particular institutional architecture, which includes elected republican institutions like Parliament and the presidency, chosen by direct universal suffrage. Although these institutions are subject to authoritarian ones that invalidate their democratic nature—such as pre-selecting candidates for political positions—this hybrid design allowed, at least in the early decades of the current Iranian political system, for some political participation by Iranians. This served as a valve for aspirations for change.

Far removed from the times when so-called reformists—who believed the Islamic Republic could change from within—controlled Parliament and the presidency, these limited political participation mechanisms have increasingly lost weight and credibility. However, the authorities continue to try to take advantage of them. In 2024, during another difficult moment—following the death of President Ebrahim Raisi—the Islamic regime allowed a relatively moderate candidate, Masud Pezeshkian, to be elected president. Pezeshkian won the polls by stirring fear of an even greater radicalization of the regime.

Repression

Mahmood Amiry-Moghadam directs the NGO Iran Human Rights (IHR), which documents the implementation of the death penalty in Iran. This activist points to a rule in the country: “The weaker the regime, the more repression it employs.” Now, he emphasizes, when the authorities have shown themselves “unable to effectively defend” the country from foreign military aggression, around 900 people have been arrested on suspicion of spying for Israel. Six men have been executed.

The death penalty plays a central role in the use of repression as a tool of social control in Iran. “It has an impact on the entire society that goes beyond just instilling fear,” highlights the director of IHR, because “it generates a feeling known in psychology as learned helplessness, whereby people feel powerless to change their situation.” This sensation transforms into a “chronic social depression,” leading citizens to believe they “cannot do anything” to change the system. For this neuroscientist, this is one of the “keys to the survival of the Islamic Republic.

Naysan Rafati, a senior analyst for Iran at the International Crisis Group, shares the view that “in part” the survival of this regime is attributed to “the repressive capacity it has maintained and deployed against dissent.” This analyst also points to another factor: the popular base of support, the “core group of supporters who still back” the system, whether “for ideological conviction or personal benefit.”

This hard-core group of supporters may constitute, estimates Amiry-Moghadam, around “25% to 30% of the population.” He considers that among them, genuine advocates of the system are “far fewer” than those who support it out of self-interest.

Experts highlight one of those interested supports: that of the Revolutionary Guard, the parallel army tasked not with defending the country but the Islamic regime, and which serves as its main armed force for repressing protests. The current supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in office since 1989, not only prevented this body from merging with the regular army after the war with Iraq (1980-88), but has also allowed it to infiltrate and control key sectors of the Iranian economy—construction, the black market for oil, mining, banking, and telecommunications—in exchange for bolstering his leadership, which was initially questioned. In the words of Iranian historian Ali Ansari, the Revolutionary Guard has thus become an “economic empire” with arms. It also has a clear interest in ensuring the survival of the Islamic Republic.

A militia dependent on this parallel army, the Basij, is also vital for crushing any hint of change. Not only does it often play a key role in repressing protests, or women who have removed their hijabs as a sign of rejection of the regime, but it also forms part of a complex state and para-state network of educational, cultural—often indoctrination—and charitable organizations that guarantee adherence to the regime among the most disadvantaged social classes through the provision of perks.

The Basij militia is primarily a mass organization. It counts up to a million members who participate in student, teacher, lawyer, journalist, and athlete groups, or in so-called “circles of virtue” where affiliates are indoctrinated in the most reactionary Islamic values and in support of the country’s political system, often in the same mosques.

These affiliates receive preferential access to scholarships, universities, public employment, and housing, as well as a medical service and a network of discount markets. The organization has thus become “a buffer between the clerical regime and the people” and is considered another “reason for the survival” of the Islamic Republic, emphasized Iranian political scientist Saeid Golkar in an interview with this newspaper in 2022.

Without these clientelistic mechanisms, many Iranians would not be able to survive. In January 2023, the country’s Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare released a report estimating that one-third of the population was living in extreme poverty. The authorities blame this misery on international sanctions regarding the country’s nuclear program, which Israel and the United States have attempted to destroy. This wave of new poor coexists in Iran with 250,000 millionaires, according to estimates from the consulting firm Capgemini in 2020.