On media freedom and regime change in Iran

However, none of that qualifies the State TV of Iran as a military target. Yet the silence of Western capitals and media rights groups betray a selective bias.   Most of those good Samaritans heaped condemnations when we attacked the Voice of Tiger, the clandestine Tiger media network during the height of the war

In grim video footage, a female anchor was live on air, passionately espousing, when  debris filled the studio with thunder in the background as the Israeli military attacked Iran’s State-run Television network. 

The attack was yet another instance in a war that had tested International Law and its practical limits.

Journalists are protected as civilians under the International Humanitarian Law (IHL) in international and non-international armed conflict. Similarly, facilities journalists operate from, such as television and radio stations and newspaper houses -- and at times,  hotels - are considered civilian objects and should not be attacked by belligerent parties. Deliberate attacks against journalists and media institutions constitute war crimes for which individuals are criminally responsible.

Journalists and media institutions could lose the protected civilian status if they become direct participants in hostilities, such as gathering battlefield military intelligence and transferring it to belligerent parties,which could provide a military advantage.However, media should not lose protected status simply because reporting news that may have an innate bias to one party or engage in propaganda. For instance, destroying a TV station could not be justified on the basis of its reporting being disliked by a belligerent party or that  destroying it would deliver a blow to the morale of the other. 

Surely, Iranian state TV is not the arcade of free expression. It is the mouthpiece of a tyrannical clerical regime that had locked up women simply for refusing to cover their hair. Its chief is directly appointed by the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Its prominence is a product of a suffocating media environment which leaves no room for pluralism of voices.

However, none of that qualifies the State TV of Iran as a military target. Yet the silence of Western capitals and media rights groups betray a selective bias.   Most of those good Samaritans heaped condemnations when we attacked the Voice of Tiger, the clandestine Tiger media network during the height of the war. In Iran’s case, the few voices of condemnation have come from the Committee to Protect Journalists and, intriguingly, China’s JournalistAssociation.

The Iran-Israel war also raises the oft-asked question about the selective application of International Law.

Israel’s pre-emptive attacks- targeting Tehran’s nuclear facilities, nuclear scientists and key military leaders, including chiefs of Iran’s Revolutionary  Armed Corps (IRGC) and Iranian Armed Forces - have shattered the convention and delivered a cracking blow to the international law.

Under the UN Charter,   Member States shall refrain from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any State.

While Article 51 of the UN Charter guarantees the right of UN Member States to individual or collective self-defence, such right may only be exercised if an armed attack occurs against a UN Member  State and could only warrant proportionate measures necessary to respond to the armed attack.

Equally disturbing is the danger of attacks on nuclear facilities resulting in a radioactive fallout.

Most countries that had been vocal during the clash around the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant in the Ukraine war are conspicuously tight-lipped over the potential environmental disaster in Iran.

Many Western states, including those who were scathing about Israel’s conduct in Gaza -- had defended the Israeli attack on Iran on the basis of Israel’s right to self-defence.  

The notion of ‘anticipatory’ self-defence is built on the repeated proclamations by Iran’s clerical and military leadership for the destruction of Israel, Iran’s noncompliance with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and Israeli concerns that Iran is perilously close to acquiring a nuclear bomb.

Neo realism in politics

Except as a rhetorical argument, there is an almost universal consensus that Iran should not get the nukes. In the first place, Iran is not a normal state.Neo-realism, the dominant school of thought in international politics, considers states as black boxes or like units, only different in size (power). But for all practical purposes, they are not, and their internal systems decide how they behave at home and beyond. Iran is governed by a messianic clerical junta whose rational calculations are warped by religious edicts and medieval rage. No coherent analysis could explain Iran’s dramatic slide and pillage under clerical rule since Ayatollah Khomeini ousted the Pahlavi dynasty and established the Islamic Republic of Iran. Women in Iran, hitherto the most cosmopolitan Muslim country, were herded into black chador. Shah’s abuses and excesses appeared as if child’s play in the face of religiously justified violence. Iran established itself as the foremost malignant actor in the Middle East, sowing chaos and cultivating militant groups from Hezbollah in Lebanon to Hamas, Houthis in Yemen, and Shia militias in Iraq.

Interestingly, under Reza Shah Pahlavi, Iran was the second Arab country to establish diplomatic relations with Israel. It was said that Iran’s bilateral ties with Israel were one reason for Khomeini’s wrath that fueled the Islamic revolution. It is unlikely any normal state would seek the destruction of another to the extreme of its own peril, as Iran’s clerical regime guided the nation to its ruin.A continuation of Pahlavi could have made Iran one of the richest countries in the world, with real personal liberties hitherto absent in the modernising Gulf states. Instead, Mullahs in Iran oversaw its incremental decay and international isolation.

But, it is unlikely that an Israeli attack would destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities for good unless the United States - which has bunker buster bombs that penetrate deeper underground bunkers and B2 bombers to deliver them- join the fight. Even then, with  500 kg of enriched uranium in its hand, Iran would be in a position to enrich them to  weapon-grade and build a bomb secretly. Attacks that stopped  midway would only galvanise the clerical regime to race to a bomb, considering that it would offer the best deterrent against aggression - and also to potentially nuclear blackmail its enemies.

Centre of gravity

The Centre of gravity in this war that aims to prevent Iran from getting a bomb -- is not its nuclear facilities or the nuclear scientists but the clerical regime. However, Donald Trump had reportedly vetoed an Israeli plan to take out the Supreme Leader over fears it would further inflame Iran. A headless Iran may plunge into infighting among its major players: reformists, hardliners, IRGC, armed forces and revived separatist forces of Kurds and other minorities. However, further degrading of military capabilities would rob the initiative from hardliners, at the same time emboldening Iranians who have long yearned for freedom- only to be brutally crushed by the regime -- to take to the streets and topple the regime.

There is no foolproof solution to prevent Iran from acquiringa nuclear bomb. However, the worst of all options would be leaving an enraged regime of Mullahs licking its wounds, with partially destroyed nuclear facilities and a stash of enriched uranium. 

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