The tragic deaths of Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian and others onboard the helicopter have opened a pandora's box of conspiracy theories as to how it happened and what could happen next.
A Daily News editorial reads: “Will Iran change? The death of President Ebrahim Raisi and the terror regime continues” and The Jewish Chronicle opinion piece headlined, “Raisi set the Middle East aflame but his death will not put out the fire.” For a starting point, these headlines provide food for thought and increase one’s drive for further investigation.
Afterward, I carefully read, watched and listened to a series of newspaper editorials, reports, comment pieces, television talk shows and radio programs. It appears the Western media, polity and public are divided on President Raisi’s death: accident or sabotage?
Most media debates and discussions surrounding Raisi’s death reflect Western media and polities' agenda-setting theories. Evidence shows most media outlets in America, the United Kingdom, Europe and Israel have attached significant importance to the event to “shape political reality” and to “set the agenda of the campaign.” This reintroduced the decades-old narrative of Iran as the “Axis of Evil” and that Iranians are celebrating the death of the Iranian president because he was a “hardliner,” “bad boy” and “disliked” person.
Once again, many Western politicians and sections of the media are openly endorsing the regime change approach. In an ongoing confrontation between Iran and the West, such signals could possibly escalate the already tense situation in the Middle East.
Remember, Raisi had cemented Iran-Russia ties, and further strengthened Iran-China, Türkiye and Pakistan mutual relations. Russian President Vladimir Putin remembered him as “a true friend,” while India, Pakistan and Türkiye observed a day of mourning.
At the height of ongoing tension in the Middle East, after all, it is the best time to look at regime change approaches and how they could turn out to be dangerous escalation.
Though regime change is largely seen as an unpopular move, it is still considered a useful weapon in the Western and American armory. Books, films, documentaries, papers and speeches are testament to the American governments that have employed this technique to curb all those who challenge hegemonic designs, from the Middle East to North America and beyond.
For example, I recommend these in-depth documentaries: “The War on Democracy,” “Overthrow: 100 years of U.S. meddling and regime change, from Iran to Nicaragua to Hawaii to Cuba,” “How Iraq’s ‘Regime Change’ was Masterminded by the US” (2002) and “American-backed coups mapped.”
What one can make out of it is that the regime change scheme is not a fiction but a distasteful reality. Anyone who challenges Western powers' hegemonic designs is a “bad guy” who must be silenced.
Evidently, sections of the American print and broadcast media, politicians and public bodies have long been talking about regime change tactics. Although a few discredit the approach, the majority endorse it.
Recall the American media campaign centered on Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez, think of Iraq's Saddam Hussain and “How the media mythologized a monster-honorable mention” and BBC editor Mark Mardell wrote on the Libyan President Moammar Gadhafi’s death: “Gaddafi’s death will be a relief to President Obama and his administration. That’s on the fairly simple grounds that he backed NATO action, called for him to go, and now he’s gone.”
The emerging underlying themes reflect the West’s wishful tactics as it pushes views like, “the supreme leader’s son may be the beneficiary” and “a president’s death gives Iran’s regime a choice”; “Iran’s hardline Paydari Front eyes a political vacuum after Raisi’s death” and “The death of Iran’s president will spark a high-stakes power struggle. Aimed at a regional war, a fight at home between the clerics and military looms.”
So, will there be a civil war in Iran? Why are sections of the Western media and polity pushing such a negative discourse? Now that Raisi is gone, American and Western media are preparing for the grounds for the next phase of regime change.
Apart from the media, think tanks are supporting and promoting the agenda quite openly. Look at the headlines: The National Interest, “Like it or not, regime change is coming to Iran”; Atlantic Council, “The United States needs a new policy it involves regime change, but not the traditional kind” and JINSA, “Joe Biden should make Iran regime collapse strategic priority.”
America has already “ousted” Iran’s democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadeq and many Iranian scientists, engineers, military commanders and politicians have been assassinated in several covert operations in and outside Iran.
The questions that arise are: How far can a regime change approach go, and what are the consequences for the West and the rest? Can the West afford a regime change in China and Russia?
Currently, the Western media is airing images of a handful of Iranians, mostly residing in the West, rejoicing Raisi’s death and blaming Raisi for the “blood on his hands”; however, this campaign has utterly failed to remind the public about former President George Bush and U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair's deadly roles in the illegal Iraq War, launched on the pretext of “weapons of mass destruction.”
The same goes for the Israeli ongoing assault on Gaza as many Jewish professors, journalists and activists openly argue that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has “blood on his hands” over attacks on “anti-PM protesters” to slaughter children in Rafah and Gaza.
If humanity is ever able to flourish and live in peace and harmony, war felons should be brought to justice. Next time, anyone who recommends a regime change would do better to campaign for a change in mentality and that should start in the U.S., so we all live in peace.
