This perspectives document was discussed, amended, and adopted at the Socialist Struggle Movement (SSM) National Committee meeting of 24–25 July. Available in Arabic and Hebrew. Under the guise of false propaganda regarding regional security and even the liberation […]
Once again slim hopes have risen that the death toll in West Asia’s current wars will, at least, lessen with the announcement of a 60-day extension of the shaky truce between the US and Iran. As Gaza, and now Lebanon, has shown, a truce can lessen the numbers of dead and injured but not completely stop the killing and […]
Under pressure, Netanyahu declared that “at the moment, the fire has been halted”. But the war on Lebanon continues and the aggression against Iran has only halted for the moment First published on socialiststruggle.org on […]
The impunity with which US-Israel waged war on Iran, killed its supreme leader, preceded by the genocide in Gaza, has led to shock, disbelief and anger among the masses in the region and around the […]
The cynical attempt to manipulate the liberation aspirations of the masses in Iran in order to impose a new regime of repression, subservient to Washington’s dictates, has failed. The offensive has produced a catastrophe on […]
The devastating war launched by the Netanyahu and Trump regimes continues to increasingly devastate Iran, Lebanon, the Gulf States, the world economy, and world relations. It is now also provoking turmoil in the domestic social […]
By late March 2026, the US and Israeli war against Iran had evolved into the most dangerous Middle Eastern conflict in decades. What began with the Israeli assassination of Iran’s supreme leader on 28 February […]
The conflict that has raged for over three weeks in the Gulf, and continues as we go to press, is the third US war in the region since the end of the Cold War more […]
Sean Figg discusses the latest developments in the war on Iran with Bob Labi, from the CWI’s International Secretariat. This episode focuses on the question of programme. What attitude should socialists take to towards the […]
Working class people, the world over, are paying the price of Trump’s Iranian adventure. More precisely we are paying for Netanyahu’s war, as it looks, in part at least, as though Trump’s ego was goaded […]
Trump and Netanyahu are inflaming the Middle East, shockwaves are striking the global economy. The imperialist war declared on Iran and Lebanon is a blow to the security of the masses throughout the region and […]
At the beginning of this year, the world economy seemed to develop in a promising direction, according to some analysists. The IMF revised its forecast from October 2025 upwards and cited a “resilient growth”. However, […]
The war launched by the Trump/Netanyahu axis has plunged the world into its deepest state of turmoil since the 1973 oil crisis. It is a war aimed at recalibrating the relations in the Middle East […]
The onslaught against Iran, soon followed by Israel’s renewed war in Lebanon, has witnessed another round of lying and hypocrisy from the imperialist powers. For a second time in less than a year, Netanyahu and […]
For a socialist alternative to imperialism and capitalist war! The unleashing of the dogs of war once again on Iran by the rogue regimes of Trump and Netanyahu has opened the ‘gates of hell’ for the […]
The governments of Israel and the U.S. launched military attacks on Iran last week. The Netanyahu and Trump regimes, including Republican and Democratic Party leaderships, have blood on their hands, killing innocent civilians in another […]
Once again peoples in the Middle East face the horrors of another war with its human casualties and physical destruction. Already there are reports of 85 people, mainly school students, being killed in a […]
Iran started the year with a mass uprising as its long-standing economic crisis collided with popular anger. While the scale of repression has intensified, the decisive question is whether resistance can develop the structures and […]
Amid the unrest following the recent mass protests in Iran, that were marked by brutal violence, a weeks’ long internet blackout, and ongoing arrest of those who spoke up, sections of the population have refused to […]
Bob Labi and Sean Figg, from the Committee for a Workers International’s International Secretariat, discuss the protest movement that has rocked the Iranian regime over the past month, the attitude of the regional ruling classes […]
Once again Iran has seen a brave mass movement against hardship, oppression and a rotten elite. Thousands have been killed. The turn of the year saw a new upsurge of resistance against the impact of […]
Mass protests are spreading across Iran; in a show of widespread anger against the regime of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and President Pezeshkan, both of whom now have answers to give to these growing mass […]
Iran has been rocked by a new series of nationwide protests which have now entered a second week. Demonstrations began on 29 December as market traders and small business owners in Tehran closed down their […]
Socialistworld.net has received the following urgent solidary appeal from worker activists in Iran. We ask our readers to urgently raise the case of Sharifeh Mohammadi at union branches and other labour movement meetings. Socialistworld.net Dear […]
The ceasefire in the Israel–Iran war has brought after twelve days an end, for now, to the aerial bombing offensive that killed hundreds of Iranian civilians, as well as to the counter-offensive in which missile […]
The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) reported that at least four journalists and media workers have been killed in Iran since the start of the Israeli offensive Guest article by Ariel Gottlieb, member of the […]
Trump’s decision to join in the Israeli state’s bombing war on Iran – fundamentally in the pursuit of regional dominance by US imperialism alongside Israeli capitalism and other Western imperialisms – clearly marks a new turning […]
Truck drivers in Iran have been on strike since 22 May. Beginning in the southern port city of Bandar Abbas, the strike has spread to more than 150 cities in the days since. According to […]
Coming up to the 46th anniversary of its establishment, Iran’s theocratic regime is facing several crises, internally and externally. In this article, we will try to analyse how these crises are related and thus affecting […]
From Socialism Today, magazine of the Socialist Party (CWI England & Wales). What Iranians Want: Women, Life, Freedom is described as the first major book on the 2022-23 uprising in Iran. Protests were sparked in […]
Against a background of growing protests August saw Iran gripped by a nurses strike that swept against the country. These strikes started after public protests by nurses and medical staff began on August 5 following […]
Following the death of the former president of the Islamic Republic of Iran in a helicopter crash on May 19th, this year, the second round of voting to choose his successor took place in early […]
Iran’s retaliatory attack on Israel ushers in a new, more dangerous, stage in the widening of the Gaza conflict towards a full regional war in the Middle East, something which would have global implications. In […]
Last December a video of 70-year-old Sadegh Bana Motejaded from the city of Rasht singing and dancing in the fish market where he worked caught the imagination of tens of thousands of Iranians. Soon people […]
A year ago, Jina (Mahsa) Amini, then a 22-year-old Kurdish woman, died in the custody of the then recently re-activated so-called “morality police”. Her murder triggered a revolutionary process, initially led by brave youth and […]
Shortly before the Iranian New Year, on March 23rd, the Iranian Ministry of Labour decided to increase the minimum wage by 27%. Sounds large, but with this decision, the government broke its own law. According […]
Early March saw demonstrations across Iran in protest at the apparent chemical attacks against female students that have taken place since last November. This seems to be an organised attempt to intimidate young women who […]
The current mass movement in Iran by women and the working class is taking place against the regime that came to power in the revolution of 1979. What lessons are there for today’s revolutionaries from […]
The revolutionary youth movement in Iran has been going on for well over two months. In these 11 weeks, more than 18,000 people have been arrested and more than 400 murdered by the regime. Now […]
For a 48-hour general strike, as the next step towards overthrowing the regime! 26 October saw the end of the 40-day mourning period after Jina (Mahsa) Amini’s death with protests taking place in 30 Iranian […]
Events are moving rapidly in Iran. Despite massive repression, with over 200 killed, and thousands of demonstrators, and now strikers, arrested, increasingly revolutionary protests continue to grip practically the whole of Iran. These have lasted […]
Mahsa Amini’s death has plunged Iran into turmoil. Protests and clashes have taken place in at least 85 cities and towns. Protests, often led by young women, immediately began after Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old woman […]
Iran has not been at rest since the beginning of 2022. Amongst the protesters were teachers who, under the leadership of the Coordinating Council of Iranian Teachers’ Trade Associations, led a campaign of protests and […]
The war in Ukraine and the further twist it has given to the sharpening of international relations is, amongst other things, now seemingly blocking a conclusion to the nuclear talks in Vienna. These discussions concern […]
Almost immediately after last month’s Iranian presidential election, a national strike began in the country’s strategically important oil, gas and petrochemical sector and is still continuing. Organised from below through unofficial bodies, this strike has […]
Ebrahim Raisi’s election as president, openly described in Iran as ‘engineered’, revealed the regime’s weak popular support. The mechanics of his ‘victory’ were those of rulers fearful of the population. Facing a rising tide of […]
Recent days have seen more strikes and protests by workers in Iran, more signs of the general revival of the workers’ movement there since 2017. The May Day statement (below) issued by 15 Iranian workers, […]
Iran’s semi-official Fars News Agency reported on 8 May that the country’s largest sugarcane factory, Haft Tappeh, has been re-nationalised. The factory was privatised in 2015. Since then, the workers have been fighting for its […]
On 30 October, four representatives of the Haft Tappeh Workers’ Union were arrested by the Iranian regime’s security forces and imprisoned in the Shush detention centre. The arrested workers are Ebrahim Abasi Monjezi, Yousef Bahmani, […]
Since the beginning of August, Iran has seen more and more workers from different sectors follow the example of the Haft Tappeh sugar cane workers who went on strike on 14 June. These workers started […]
With a strike involving thousands of Haft Tappeh sugarcane refinery workers about to enter its third month, other significant strikes began in Iran at the start of August. Some were in the oil industry where […]
Small steps back by the regime is combined with continued repression Events are beginning to speed up in Iran again as protests increase. A brief attempt to intimidate the thousands of Haft Tappeh sugar cane […]
Since 14 June, workers at the Haft Tappeh sugar cane factory, near the Iranian city of Shush in oil-rich Khuzestan Province, have again taken strike action. Led by their independent trade union, the workers carried […]
According to the Iranian regime, towards the end of May, the number of people in Iran infected with covid-19 was over 140,000, and the number of people who have died as a result of the […]
Build a socialist movement that can offer an alternative to the rich elite, poverty and capitalism! A wave of anger at what is seen as the regime’s lying and incompetence after the tragic downing of […]
Shockwaves went around the world, and outrage spread in the Middle East, as news broke of Trump’s unilateral decision to assassinate Qassem Suleimani, commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards’ Quds Force and a key Iranian […]
Iran has been shaken by a new nationwide wave of anger and protests after a sudden overnight government announcement that imposed 50% fuel price rise on the cost of fuel. This measure, accompanied by a […]
Forty years ago, a great revolution against a dictatorial monarchy was in progress in Iran. Recalling the heroic scenes of those days still inspires us; scenes of comradeship despite the shortage of goods and fuel […]
The Iranian regime has once again arrested Esmail Bakhshi, the representative of the Haft-Tapeh sugar cane agro-industry workers, and an activist Sepideh Qolian.
The Iranian regime arrested around 30 steel workers in Ahvaz, the capital of oil-rich Khuzestan Province. This happened on 36th day of a workers’ strike and walkout over unpaid wages.
The Iranian economy is in downfall, and Iranian working class is the main target of this slump. Prices of staples are increasing day by day. The regime has only delivered empty words, and its explanation […]
Week by week, the acute economic crisis in Iran is bringing new social groups in confrontation with the regime. Six months ago, the poor people, unemployed and disillusioned youth in tens of small and peripheral towns […]
The Iranian regime has started harassing and prosecuting university students because of their participation in nationwide January protests alongside workers and the poor. On 18 June, Tehran University students staged a rally against the security […]
Three months after the December-January protests that shook the country, Iran is still a smouldering fire. Despite killing dozens of protesters and the arrest of thousands, the regime has not been able to push back […]
Mass protests in December and January shook Iran’s reactionary regime to the core. Although facing severe repression, they signal a new confidence and preparedness by workers and young people to fight for their rights, in […]
On January 5th, independent trade unions in Iran issued a statement in support of the mass protests against austerity and dictatorship that began at the end of last year. The statement was issued in the […]
Significantly Iran’s nationwide demonstrations began in Mashhad – the second biggest city – where many now bankrupt financial institutions were based and whose collapse already provoked protests across the country.
Sudden largescale nationwide protests have shaken Iran. Sections of the masses have shown utter defiance of the regime. Youth, facing unemployment estimated to be between 25% and 40%, have particularly been to the fore. The […]
On Saturday 11 November Mahmoud Salehi, a jailed and seriously ill Iranian trade unionist, was moved back to Saqqez prison from the Khomeini Hospital in Saqqez, despite the pleas of his family. Mahmoud Salehi, 55, […]
On 19 and 20 September, Arak, an Iranian industrial city 170 miles from the capital, Tehran, was the scene of a strike, pickets and clashes between workers from two major factories in the city, Azarab […]
Iran’s presidential election on 19 May saw, as we predicted, Hassan Rouhani was re-elected with 22 million votes, according to the regime’s figures. His conservative rival won around 16 million, while more than 17 million […]
Crisis continues; infighting escalates
Teachers fighting poverty wages and leaders’ imprisonment
Iranian workers need solidarity
Statement by Jafar Azimzadeh, a leader of the Free Union of Iranian Workers, and Esmail Abdi, a leader of the Iranian Teachers Trade Association
In aftermath of disastrous Iraq occupation, Obama administration balancing between region’s forces
Increasing demands for a living wage
International action needed to overturn latest conviction and to immediately release Behnam
Protest against Iranian government’s brutal sentences!
Support jailed labour activist’s demands against critical dentention conditions
Demand the release of the arrested workers!
Khamenie and Rouhani are riding a tiger
Iran’s June 14 presidential election takes place against the background of deep divisions in society and the regime.
Tehran’s bus drivers’ union leader sentenced to 6 years in prison
Western powers step up sanctions and military threats against Tehran
11 February: From the revolution of the oppressed 1979 to the new wave of resistance 2010
Listen here to a discussion on events in Iran 1979, which took place at the November 2009 ’Socialism 2009’ event, held by the Socialist Party (CWI England and Wales).
“The people have woken up”
Deepening divisions in ruling regime
Now available in Farsi.
Splits in the ruling Islamist-capitalist class
Working class must decisively enter struggle
New phase of struggle opens up
Potentially catastrophic consequences of bombing attack
The number reported being held has now increased to 43.
Repression against workers, students and women activists increases
Growing opposition against Ahmadinejad’s regime
Alarm bells have been ringing, left and right. John Pilger, the radical journalist, wrote an article, Iran: The War Begins (New Statesman, 3 February), warning that a US air attack on Iran was imminent.
US imperialism threatens
Washington hawks aim to remove Iranian regime
Some released, new arrests, hundreds detained
More protests planned
Appeal for international solidarity
Crisis shows imperialist powers’ hypocrisy
This is an urgent call for international solidarity.
The newly elected president of Iran, the religious conservative and former revolutionary guard Mahmoud Ahmadinejad who was elected on the 24 June tried to play down fears of Iranian workers during the election campaign that […]
Hardliner’s victory stuns Western leaders
The rich defeated but Ahmadinejad is no alternative
Stop the execution of Ismail Mohammadi – urgent protest needed
Neither conservatives or “reform wing” of elite win support of youth and workers
Armed forces in Iran opened fire on a peaceful demonstration of copper foundry workers and their families on 23 January, killing fifteen and injuring 300.
Armed forces in Iran opened fire on a peaceful demonstration of copper foundry workers and their families on 23 January, killing fifteen and injuring 300.
IN THE repressive environment of Iran’s Islamic Republic, the working class is suffering from high levels of capitalist exploitation.
THE LAST four weeks have witnessed mass protests in Iran as thousands have taken to the streets in opposition to the government of Mohammed Khatami.
"THE CLERICAL regime is nearing its end. Vigilantes commit crimes, the leader supports them," chanted defiant student protesters at Tehran university, Iran.
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