Rovshan Mammadli
The New Arab / December 1, 2025
Efforts to weaponize Iran’s ethnic divides underline Israel’s broader ambition to weaken the Islamic Republic from within.
At the beginning of the 12-day war in June between Israel and Iran, several armed separatist Kurdish groups issued statements calling for Kurdish mobilisation against Tehran. The Kurdistan Freedom Party, for example, openly welcomed the Israeli attack and urged a nationwide uprising.
The Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan, meanwhile, called for the dismantling of the Islamic Republic. Abdullah Mohtadi – the leader of the Komala Party, who has long lobbied US officials to include Iran’s Kurds in discussions about a potential “day after” – suggested that Israel’s actions could mark a turning point in Tehran’s internal political trajectory.
A similar reaction emerged beyond Kurdish groups. The Free Balochistan Movement endorsed the Israeli assault and encouraged the Baloch population to use the moment of instability to advance their separatist aspirations.
Tehran has long accused these factions of cooperating with Israeli intelligence and has carried out strikes against their positions in Iraq and Pakistan – framing them as instruments of external destabilisation.
However, in the days that followed Israel’s war, none of these organisations launched an armed insurgency, largely because the US-Israeli attacks did not generate the internal fractures they expected.
Even so, their responses remain significant, as these dynamics fit within a broader strategic pattern. Israel has long regarded the fragmentation of regional states along ethnic and sectarian lines as a means of weakening adversaries and preventing the emergence of strong, cohesive nation-states in the region.
In 2023, several Knesset members called on the Israeli Foreign Ministry to support international recognition of “South Azerbaijan,” the ethnically Azeri-populated provinces of Iran, explicitly advocating for Iran’s territorial partition – a position also echoed by many pro-Israel hawks in Washington.
During the 12-Day War, similarly, a Jerusalem Post editorial urged the Trump administration to push for a “partitioned Iran” and to extend “security guarantees” to minority regions. While such views do not constitute official Israeli policy, they reflect influential currents within Israel’s security and political establishment.
Notably, on 20 June, Israel’s Foreign Ministry issued a statement depicting Baha’is, Kurds, Baloch, and Arabs as victims of “systematic oppression” in Iran – advancing a strategic narrative designed to heighten domestic pressure on Tehran and leverage such grievances within Israel’s asymmetric campaign.
What is Israel’s end goal ?
Israeli officials have never concealed their regime-change ambitions. In fact, Israel has cultivated close ties with opposition figures such as Reza Pahlavi, the son of the deposed Shah, who is frequently promoted as a potential alternative to the Islamic Republic.
In April 2023, Pahlavi was hosted in Israel by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Isaac Herzog. Gila Gamliel – formerly Israel’s intelligence and now science minister – openly endorsed him as a vehicle for regime change, and Pahlavi himself voiced support for Israel’s June bombardment.
Netanyahu even framed the war as a pathway to Iranian “liberation,” telling Iranians in a video address, “We are also clearing the path for you to achieve your freedom.”
Yet Israel’s instrumentalization of ethnic and religious grievances as part of a multi-front warfare campaign – potentially encouraging social fragmentation and even Iran’s territorial disintegration – suggests an agenda that goes well beyond conventional regime change.
Combined with attempts to decapitate Iran’s security leadership, efforts to target the political elite, including ministers and President Masoud Pezeshkian, and Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz’s admission that they wanted to kill the Supreme Leader, alongside Tel Aviv’s history of collaborating with fringe opposition groups such as the MEK, the picture becomes clearer.
The objective appears not to be a transfer of power, but the generation of sufficient chaos and internal discord to render the Iranian state nonfunctional.
This scenario would not resemble the US intervention in Iraq, where a new government was installed, but the Libyan model: state collapse followed by the proliferation of proxy forces, during which Israel could systematically degrade Iran’s conventional and unconventional military capabilities as a regional power.
Domestic consolidation as a new war looms
Facing what it perceived as a multi-front external campaign, Tehran turned inward. A key pillar of its response has been to harness a “rally-around-the-flag” sentiment intensified by the war, which has stirred anti-Israel feeling even among segments of society otherwise deeply critical of the Islamic Republic.
One viral video, for example, shows an unveiled woman demanding Iran develop a nuclear weapon to deter Israel – an illustration of how security anxieties are cutting across ideological divides. The Supreme Leader’s first public appearance during Ashura commemorations can be read as a symbolic response to these sentiments.
After the famed eulogist Mahmoud Karimi concluded his lamentations, Ali Khamenei requested that he perform the patriotic anthem “O Iran,” a gesture aimed at bridging Islamic and national heritage in the face of external threats.
For decades, the state has foregrounded a religious-Islamic form of nationalism, mobilising the public around symbols rooted in the post-1979 political identity. Yet the war has revived interest in Iran’s pre-revolutionary – and even pre-Islamic – past.
In June, for the first time, a 16-metre bronze statue of Arash the Archer, a mythical hero, was installed in Tehran’s Vanak Square. Soon after, another monument appeared: a sculpture depicting the Roman emperor Valerian kneeling before the Sassanian king Shapur I, pointedly titled Kneel Before Iran. Such symbols reinforce narratives of historical resilience and civilisational continuity that the state now seeks to elevate alongside its religious foundations.
An emergent form of “everyday nationalism” is also taking shape beyond official symbolism. The war has sparked renewed interest in epic poetry, popular history podcasts, and public discussions about national identity across generational and political lines – indicating that the trend extends well beyond state messaging and resonates within a multiethnic society grappling with internal and external challenges.
A second pillar of Tehran’s response concerns the enforcement of hijab regulations in public spaces. Even before the war, enforcement had been uneven, particularly in major cities such as Tehran and Isfahan. But as the conflict heightened the state’s sensitivity to domestic unrest, hijab policy became a more delicate issue.
The new law passed by parliament last year, which aimed to increase penalties for unveiled women, was subsequently suspended following an order by the Supreme National Security Council. And on 30 July, the government pulled yet another bill, this one aiming to criminalise the online posting of anti-government material – reflecting a calculation that aggressive enforcement could deepen internal polarisation amid the heightened external threat.
Whether the Islamic Republic sees this moment as a temporary challenge to manage or a catalyst for redefining its social contract remains unclear. What is evident is that, with the risk of further war looming, maintaining internal cohesion has become as vital to Tehran as strengthening its military posture.
More importantly, as Iran recalibrates its domestic strategy, Israel is also studying the lessons of the conflict – ensuring that any future confrontation will be shaped by a deeper understanding of Iran’s societal and political landscape.
Rovshan Mammadli is a Baku-based journalist and independent analyst
