Tehran launched fresh missiles strikes against Tel Aviv and other Israeli cities as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed further strikes on Iran in a military operation that has targeted the nuclear and military facilities of his country’s arch enemy.
Shortly after midnight on June 14, Israel said its military had intercepted a new round of Iranian surface-to-surface missiles in Tel Aviv, Haifa, and Jerusalem on the second consecutive day of Iranian air strikes that followed a damaging Israeli air assault on sites linked to Tehran’s nuclear program.
Can you give some examples? I think I keep up with world news and am genuinely at a loss for what you’re talking about
The Iranian theocracy over the past few years has been feeling real pressure because of how badly Israel has exposed them. Consider what Israel has done to them:
Haniyeh was assassinated in Tehran
Hezbollah got neutered
The Iranian embassy in Syria got bombed
They completely lost their proxies in Syria
They lost the Al Assad regime
They had their proxy groups in Palestine, Hamas and the PIJ, get bombed into oblivion
Their oil infrastructure keeps getting bombed and damaged
They had military bases inside country get attacked
Their nuclear facilities keep getting attacked and damaged
They had a bunch of their military leaders assassinated
They keep losing their top nuclear scientists
Mossad has repeatedly shown that it’s so balls deep in Iran’s affairs that they’re borderline running the country
Keep in mind this is just Israel, they’re also facing pressure from the US, UAE, KSA, and EU. The Iranian regime has shown time and time again that they won’t do anything substantial no matter what. It’s a sign that Iran hasn’t done anything because they can’t, which means they’re a paper tiger.
This is just external pressure. Internally, they’re also feeling the squeeze because the people DESPISE them:
There are massive protests in Iran every other year since the late 2000s. Here are some recent examples:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahsa_Amini_protests
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021–2022_Iranian_protests
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019–2020_Iranian_protests
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018–2019_Iranian_general_strikes_and_protests
The mullahs and their regime have completely lost their legitimacy to the people of Iran and they’re only still in power because they still have the military on their side which they use to oppress the people. The regime’s only way to stay in power is to rule through fear and violence.
On top of this, Iran also has major separatist movements like Kurdistan, Balochistan, Iranian Azerbaijan, and the Arabs in Khuzestan. These groups and regions comprises half the country, and they all want out. The theocracy has to spend an insane amount of effort keeping them down.
So between power moves by foreign powers, the separatists, and the general population, the theocrats are getting squeezed from all sides. This means that the regime is very fragile and they could get ousted from power easily if they show too much weakness.
I agree with each and every point that you’ve made above, however I disagree with your original statement that Iran is a paper tiger.
A paper tiger would have crumpled already under that level of sustained pressure. For better or worse (and I would definitely argue the latter), Iran is far tougher than we in the West tend to give them credit for.
A paper tiger doesn’t necessarily mean that a country is weak, it just means that a country is weaker than it is perceived. It’s a relative term. Iran is much stronger than my home country of Iraq, whom they have thoroughly abused. However, Iraqis in general think that Iran is actually a weak country relative to, say for example, Turkey, who has similar base stats.
The Iranian regime portrays itself as this mighty and powerful power that contend with the West, and here in the West we make Iran seem like it’s as powerful as the Soviet Union was… But in reality their strength has been greatly exaggerated by propaganda both inside and outside the country, and their actual capabilities are far less than they are on paper, hence why it’s a paper tiger.
You could make the same argument for Russia. Before the Ukraine war both Putin’s regime and the West believed that Russia’s military was world’s second most powerful and that they’re strong enough to take on the US… At least in theory. But as it turns out, Russia is way weaker than anybody expected and they keep getting pushed back by Ukraine. Russia is still strong, but they’re also a paper tiger.
I’m curious what drives a person to write this much on this topic on lemmy
Imagining asking a question and then insulting the person who put in effort answering. You’re a clown.
I recognize the reality of the world is grey, rather than black or white. Given the awful things both nations have engaged in, when someone launches into a virulent pro-Israel/anti-Iran diatribe, you can bet I have questions about their motivation
being anti-Iran is not the same as being pro-Israel.
please, brace yourself for a challenging thought - two different things can both be bad.
How is this pro Israel at all? It’s factual you dope. These things happened, are you that dumb?
Only brainless zealots view factual reality as a propaganda narrative. This is doubly true when they can’t even verbalize what their stance is, they’re just mad because their distorted and myopic worldview has been mildly challenged. It’s like the NPC meme but irl.