Until a new president is elected in Iran late next month, there will be much talk about the country and the Middle East. Mixed types of analyses and commentaries are coming about the implications of Ebrahim Raisi’s departure on the internal situation in Iran, Iranian-Russian relations, the Middle East and the role of Iran’s arms in Israel’s war on Gaza.
There is almost a consensus among those who follow the affairs of Iran and the region that Raisi did not leave a significant vacuum, as he was a faithful implementer of the approach of the Supreme Leader and the Revolutionary Guard.
The Iranian authorities, as it seems, are in a hurry to close the curtain on a major stage. They have decided the date for electing a new president before the end of the constitutional term. The widespread popular protests against the clerical regime are still present. Crowds of Iranian women protesting against the authority of the moral police, along with the image of the Kurdish girl Mahsa Amini, have been haunting the regime since 2022. The first thing Khamenei said after announcing Raisi’s death was to call on Iranians not to worry about the possibility of imbalances in the work of the authority.
On May 22, RIA Novosti quoted a Russian expert as saying that the Iranian leadership is doing everything in its power to prevent the situation in the country from getting out of its control, which could lead to escalation of tension in the Middle East as a whole. Political science professor Alexander Gusev believed that the sudden killing of the Iranian president, and the imminent military coup in Türkiye announced by the Turkish president, are two developments which could have serious consequences for the Middle East. The professor considered that Türkiye is the gateway to the Middle East, and “the Middle East is the Islamic Republic of Iran.” Without explaining what the professor meant by reducing the Middle East to the mullahs’ republic, the professor said that he saw the two developments as linked with each other which according to Gusev, may lead to another escalation in these two countries.
The professor believed that Iran is “a very dangerous country,” and the situation in the Middle East is very explosive. “One matchstick is enough for everything to explode.” But it is unlikely that Iran will allow this, as the leadership and the patron are doing everything they can to stabilize the internal political situation in the country. He described the situation in Syria as difficult, and very difficult in Iraq. He also talked about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, which is prolonged, according to him, because it is supported by the United States. He said that Palestinians are being killed in Gaza, as are Israelis and hostages. Any conflict, especially this conflict, should narrow down its ambit. But the Americans are not seeking that. Rather, they are working to expand it and provide new resources for it, forcing the combatants to continue fighting. This is at the time when “we are witnessing the same situation in Ukraine.”
Orientalist Ruslan Suleymanov was quoted by media as saying that Ibrahim Raisi was considered a potential successor to the leader, Ali Khamenei, who is 85 years old and has been complaining of ill health for some time. Therefore, Suleymanov believes that the killing of Raisi made Khamenei address the Iranians with a call not to worry about possible imbalances in the work of the authority.
Suleymanov believes that talk about the beginning of a transformation in the Iranian political system is extremely exaggerated.
[by Bassam Mekdad in Almodon]
Compiled and translated by Faizul Haque