By Joseph Puder, JNS
Under the pretext of “national security,” the regime’s authorities began a sweeping campaign of arresting civilians accused of belonging to the underground.
The success of the Israeli operations in Iran during the 12-day war is evidenced by the massive damage the Israeli and American air forces inflicted on Iran’s nuclear installations.
Furthermore, the Israeli Air Force and its commandos eliminated Iran’s top nuclear scientists and military personnel, and destroyed more than 50% of Iran’s ballistic missiles and a similar percentage of its launchers. Military facilities used by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps were also destroyed, as well as Iran’s air defenses. Israel’s operation exposed Iran’s weakness to the quiet cheers from moderate Arab Gulf states.
The Iranian regime’s pride and confidence were shaken by last month’s events, and its sense of “honor” was injured. As a result, the Islamic Regime has sought to avenge its humiliation by turning against its minorities, especially the Kurds, whom they accuse of collaborating with the Israelis.
Under the pretext of “national security,” the Islamic Regime’s authorities began a sweeping campaign of arresting Kurdish civilians accused of belonging to the underground, which cooperated with Israeli Mossad agents and assisted them in penetrating deep into Iranian territory during the war.
According to the European Peace Foundation, Tehran executed at least six Kurdish people and imprisoned another 700 throughout the Kurdish areas. KC Hum Sappan, the president of the foundation, issued a harsh condemnation on June 27 over the regime’s arrests and executions.
Jews were also apprehended by the Iranian regime’s intelligence services. The 10,000 to 15,000 Jews in Iran, however, are less threatening to the regime than the approximately 10 million to 15 million Kurds in the Islamic Republic of Iran.
In an appeal to the international community, the East Kurdistan National Center said, “Following the 12-day war between the Islamic Republic of Iran and Israel and the announcement of a ceasefire, the Iranian regime, having suffered major strategic and security failures, has turned to retaliate against the Kurdish people instead of addressing the real causes of its defeat.”
It went on to say that immediately after the ceasefire, “more than 150 individuals in the city of Kermanshah were arrested and imprisoned by Iranian security forces.” Three of those individuals—Idris Ali, Azad Shojaei and Rasoul Ahmad Mohammad—were executed “on charges of assisting in the transfer of equipment and weapons allegedly used in the assassination of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, a top figure in Iran’s nuclear program.”
These allegations are baseless and contradict earlier official statements. In December 2020, Mahmoud Alavi, then-Iran’s minister of intelligence, publicly admitted that Iran’s security services had failed to track down the perpetrators of Fakhrizadeh’s assassination.
The executions appear to be politically motivated acts of scapegoating, intended to divert attention from the regime’s military and intelligence failures. Iranian Kurds are gravely concerned that the Islamic Republic, emboldened by its survival after Israeli attacks, may repeat the horrors of 1988, when, following Ayatollah Ali Khomeini’s acceptance of the ceasefire in the Iran-Iraq war, thousands of political prisoners were executed in mass killings. This time, accusations of espionage and collaboration with Israel may serve as the pretext for another wave of mass executions and widespread repression, particularly targeting the Kurdish population.
Some members of Iranian-Kurdish armed groups have found refuge with the Kurdistan Regional Government in northeastern Iraq and in some Arab Gulf states. Among them, an old acquaintance, Hussein Yazdanpanah, the former leader of the Iranian Kurdish Freedom Party, which includes an armed wing. Encouraged by the chaos in Iran following the war, Yazdanpanah posted a call on X for Kurdish youth to rise up against the ayatollah’s regime.
Sherkoh Abbas, president of the Kurdistan National Assembly of Syria, spoke against the Iranian regime’s persecution of its Kurdish population and said in a telephone conversation that “Iran’s intensifying execution of Kurdish individuals, often under sweeping accusations of foreign allegiance, reveals a brutal strategy to stifle dissent and vilify an entire community.”
“These actions are typically cloaked in secrecy and marred by allegations of coerced confessions and denied legal rights. What emerges is a disturbing pattern of scapegoating, where the Kurdish identity itself becomes a political liability.” Abbas added, “As Iran’s internal legitimacy declines and external conflicts escalate, the regime turns inward. Labeling Kurds as foreign agents not only dismisses their long-standing pursuit of pluralism, but also undermines any vision of an inclusive regional future.”
The time is now ripe for the minority communities in Iran, whose numbers amount to almost half of the population, to band together and bring down the hated, fanatically theocratic regime.
