Iran’s top leader praises pro-Palestine student protesters in the US

The supreme leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has lavished praise on American students for protesting US-backed Israel’s war on Hamas.

Khamenei, in an open letter and social media posts, told student protesters they were standing on the “right side of history” by opposing the US and Israeli governments.

Student protesters at Yale University.Credit: AP

“Dear university students in the United States of America, this message is an expression of our empathy and solidarity with you,” the leader wrote in a letter this week. “As the page of history is turning, you are standing on the right side of it.”

Calling Israel an “apartheid Zionist regime” that is committing “genocide” in Gaza, Khamenei wrote: “You have now formed a branch of the Resistance Front and have begun an honorable struggle in the face of your government’s ruthless pressure.”

University campuses in the US such as Columbia in New York have seen sizable protests and building takeovers, as students protest the US support for Israel as it wages a deadly offensive in the Palestinian territory of Gaza.

The war began when Hamas and other militants burst into southern Israel in a surprise attack on October 7, killing some 1200 people and taking about 250 hostages.

Israel’s military offensive has killed at least 36,096 Palestinians according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between fighters and civilians in its count.

The US has come under ferocious criticism from at home and abroad for continuing to supply Israel with weapons that it is uses against Hamas in a process that has killed thousands of civilians including women and children.

Khamenei’s expression of solidarity comes amid a tangled backdrop of Iranian influence. Iran supports a network of armed proxies through the Middle East, including Hamas, in an effort to shape the region’s politics.

Iran, a strategic ally of Russia and China, has also dispatched assassins harass and to target critics within democracies.

The Iranian regime came to power in 1979 in an Islamic revolution that involved taking hostages at the American embassy. Since then, Iran has made violent opposition to the US and American interests a plank of its regime. Iran has vowed to destroy Israel.

“I too am among those who empathise with you young people, and value your perseverance,” Khamenei wrote.

While lauding protests in the US, Iran has used deadly violence to put down protests by young people, particularly women, opposed to wearing compulsory head coverings, in accordance with an ultraconservative interpretation of Shia Islam.

The death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, detained in 2022 by Iran’s so-called “morality police” who found fault with her headscarf, set off protests that were followed by a violent repression by the government.

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei speaks in meeting a group of families of the Revolutionary Guard members in Tehran, Iran. Credit: AP

More than 300 people, including 40 children, were killed in protests in Iran following Amini’s death in custody.

In a separate move, Iran on Thursday started registration of candidates for an early election next month following the death of President Ebrahim Raisi in a helicopter crash, Iranian Interior Minister Ahmad Vahidi told state TV.

He was once seen as a possible successor to Khamenei – the ageing ultimate decision-maker – now Raisi’s sudden death has triggered a race among hardliners to influence the selection of Iran’s next leader.

After the five-day registration period, the Guardian Council, which oversees elections and legislation, will vet the candidates running for the presidency.

“The vetting process will be seven days and then qualified candidates will have almost two weeks for the election campaign,” Vahidi told state TV. The council will publish the list of qualified candidates on June 11.

Moderate politicians have accused the 12-member hardline council of disqualifying rivals to hardline candidates, who are expected to dominate the upcoming presidential race.

with Reuters

Get a note directly from our foreign correspondents on what’s making headlines around the world. Sign up for the weekly What in the World newsletter here.