--- description: Decades of surveillance and assassinations have left Iran without a unified opposition ready to take power— even as foreign leaders urge an uprising. title: Why There’s No Organized Opposition Inside Iran Waiting to Take Over image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3ab2b029e5a05f6c/69b84bef6b1df2d28875b4a4/GettyImages-2256273285.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  * [World](/section/world/) ## World Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close * [Iran](/tag/iran/) ## Iran Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # Why There’s No Organized Opposition Inside Iran Waiting to Take Over  by [Karl Vick](/author/karl-vick/)  ## Karl Vick Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Editor at Large Mar 16, 2026 6:26 PM CUT  A large crowd gathers during a mass funeral held for over 100 members of the security forces whom authorities said were killed during recent nationwide protests, on Jan. 14, 2026 outside Tehran University in Tehran, Iran. A large crowd gathers during a mass funeral held for over 100 members of the security forces whom authorities said were killed during recent nationwide protests, on Jan. 14, 2026 outside Tehran University in Tehran, Iran.Stringer/Getty Images  by [Karl Vick](/author/karl-vick/)  ## Karl Vick Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Editor at Large Mar 16, 2026 6:26 PM CUT President Donald Trump [has urged](https://time.com/7382186/iran-ground-troops-trump/ "undefined") the “great proud people of Iran” to “take over your government.” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu [echoed the call in Persian](https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog%5Fentry/in-ai-video-netanyahu-tells-iranians-in-persian-to-unite-and-rise-up-against-regime/ "undefined"): “Do not let this opportunity slip away.” Inside [Iran](https://time.com/tag/iran/ "undefined"), the response is more blunt: How? **Read more:** _‘_[_He Doesn’t Care About Us’: Iranian Protesters Say They Were Betrayed By Trump_](https://time.com/7347090/iran-protesters-trump-help/ "undefined") For decades, [the Islamic Republic](https://time.com/7382631/iran-israel-us-war-explainer-trump-middle-east/ "undefined") built a system designed not just to crush dissent, but to prevent it from cohering in the first place. Surveillance is pervasive, networks are infiltrated, and organizers “disappear.” “They have killed a lot of people,” says Roya Boroumand, co-founder of the Abdorrahman Boroumand Center for Human Rights in Iran, a Washington D.C. nonprofit [tallying the regime’s victims.](https://www.iranrights.org/projects/EJK/en/index.html "undefined") “They have focused their energy on preventing their opponents from getting organized.” When [the U.S.-Israeli assault](https://time.com/7382697/trump-iran-war/ "undefined") began on Feb. 28, the center’s staff was still trying to determine how many people were killed the last time Iranians attempted what Trump and Netanyahu are now urging. In early January—encouraged in part by Trump’s rhetoric—[throngs took to the streets](https://time.com/7347090/iran-protesters-trump-help/ "undefined") armed only with the belief that sheer numbers could topple the regime. If that sounds naïvely hopeful, it once worked. In 1979, millions of Iranians filled the streets as part of the Islamic Revolution, a popular uprising that culminated in the overthrow of the Pahlavi monarchy and the establishment of the Islamic Republic of Iran. But the conditions were different. The protests were mounted by organized groups and, at the same time, the national army had declared it would no [longer fire](https://time.com/7345623/iran-protests-reza-shah-pahlavi-ayatollah-1979/ "undefined") on its own people. The faction that ultimately took power—activists who put their faith in Shiite clerics—promptly established a regime committed to preventing such mobilization from ever happening again. “The state was very aware of how the Shah fell,” Boroumand explains. “They have made sure that, if they have a legitimacy problem, there is no one to fill that vacuum.” ## Intimidation at home, assassination abroad When it came to neutralizing opponents overseas, Iran was methodical. “Back in the 80s and 90s there were a lot of assassinations,” explains Mehdi Yahyanejad, an Iranian tech entrepreneur and activist living in the United States, who has frequently been the target of cyber attacks by the Iranian government. “They removed important figures outside Iran.” Shapour Bakhtiar, a former prime minister who attempted to organize opposition in exile, was [stabbed to death](https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/tehranbureau/2011/08/a-darker-horizon-the-assassination-of-shapour-bakhtiar.html "undefined") in Paris in 1991\. A regime hit squad also killed an associate of his, Aborraham Boroumand, that same year. His daughters would go on to keep a count of assassinations abroad. The current tally stands at [457](https://www.iranrights.org/projects/EJK/en/index.html "undefined") cases. That figure does not include attempts thwarted by law enforcement, which still spread fear. For example, the Hell’s Angels member who, after being hired in 2023 to kill an Iranian exile in Maryland, was arrested before he could fulfill his vow to “erase his head from his torso.” Nor does it count the three attempts to kill anti-regime activist Masih Alinejad. Boroumand [once recalled](https://time.com/7013497/donald-trump-iran-assassination-plot/ "undefined") how, after a[ hit man](https://time.com/7270415/iran-assassins-new-york-trial-conviction-guilty-verdict-masih-alinejad/ "undefined") was photographed on the porch of Alinejad’s Brooklyn home, “people were crying in like Canada, saying, ‘we are safe nowhere.’” Inside Iran, the warnings are even clearer. In “the[ chain murders](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-46356725 "undefined")” of the 1990s, dissident intellectuals were killed by axe, staged robbery, poison and slit throats. In 1996, intelligence agents attempted to send a bus of writers over a cliff; a passenger grabbed the emergency brake after the driver leapt from the vehicle. Over time, overt killings gave way to imprisonment. “They killed the writers before,” a Tehran movie theater manager [once told](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2004/07/14/iranians-get-the-last-laugh-after-clerics-ban-a-comedy/ac46d1d8-27da-467f-ae89-921ec6a1f4d6/ "undefined") me. “Now they put them in prison.” Detention itself became a tool of psychological control. In the section of Evin Prison reserved for political prisoners, interrogators pummeled human rights advocates, journalists, and union activists with questions calculated to display the state's seeming omniscience. “They knew everything— my whole life,” one of my translators explained after emerging from interrogation. The regime controls internet access and communications. And when agents arrive to make an arrest, they seize phones and computers along with the suspect. “If they just held you for a week, you would be in awe,” says Siamak Namazi, a dual Iranian-U.S. citizen who spent eight years in Evin. Ordinary Iranians got the message as well. Attend a protest, and days later a text message arrives: “Is it really worth it?” ## Closing every avenue of dissent The regime’s own paranoia is not entirely without evidence. After President George W. Bush launched a program to promote democracy in Iran, a handful of activists were invited to[ workshops](https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna11800939 "undefined") in nearby Dubai. Three left early to return to Tehran after realizing they were being taught to foment the kind of grassroots revolution that in the early 2000s toppled dictatorships in Serbia, Georgia, Ukraine and Kyrgyzstan—exactly what the regime was on the lookout for. Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, who had [studied the downfall of the Soviet Union](https://iranwire.com/en/special-features/70676/ "undefined"), undercut the building blocks of democratic civil society— from teacher’s unions to an independent press. After the stolen 2009 presidential election signaledthat the system was closed to reform, the regime expanded security forces and entrenched [the Basij militia](https://time.com/6238623/iran-basij-militia-meaning-mahsa-amini/ "undefined") across the country. “The tentacles of the police state are now reaching into the far corners of the country,” says Houchang Chehabi, professor emeritus of international relations at Boston University. “I know people from rural areas of Iran who said that, you know, in our village, we never had a presence of the government. We had a village mayor, and that was it. And now, two kilometers from the village, we have a little Basij base.” ## What opposition remains in Iran? As it now stands, the only organized opposition groups are largely the same factions that competed for power in 1979. Reza Pahlavi, [eldest son of the overthrown Shah](https://time.com/7346706/reza-pahlavi-iran-crown-prince-trump-protests/ "undefined"), has lived in exile in the U.S. for almost his entire life but retains a presence in Iranian households via satellite television. His name is sometimes chanted at protests and he has vowed to hold elections if given the opportunity. The Mojahedin-e-Khalq (MEK), founded as a Marxist movement and which lobbies abroad as the National Council of Resistance of Iran, this month[ announced](https://x.com/Maryam%5FRajavi/status/2027930280594383075 "undefined") a provisional government. But the groupremains deeply unpopular inside Iran, having sided with Iraq during the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq War. [Kurdish militias](https://www.chathamhouse.org/2026/03/kurdish-groups-iran-face-risky-dilemma-amid-unclear-us-endgame "undefined") and political groups, concentrated in western Iran, also represent a form of organized opposition. But their calls for [autonomous rule](https://time.com/3999270/american-ryan-oleary-fighting-iraq/ "undefined"), if not an independent state, unnerves Iranians and raises fears of fragmentation—especially given the presence of other ethnic minorities within Iran's borders, including Arabs and Baluchs. All the groups, including those in exile, have a long history of fighting one another as well as the regime, which fans the flames on social media via its bots and trolls. The war, however, has ignited an effort to forge a united front. The Iran Freedom Congress is [scheduled ](https://www.ifcongress.org/en "undefined")to convene in London on March 28 and 29\. Preparations began between the January massacre of protestors and the Feb. 28 start of the joint U.S.-Israeli air assault. "It was something unique in Iranian politics," says Hossein Razzagh, an Iranian journalist based in Europe, who represented the most prominent political prisoners in talks to organize the congress. "There was no leak." After demonstrating that disparate groups can work together, Razzagh says democratic activists "will welcome the help of any country, and any international institution, that would help them for a peaceful transition. But not, he says, "military intervention." 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