Please pay attention to the quotations below from the report of the Political Bureau of the Tudeh Party of Iran to the meeting of the Central Committee. Given the date of the report, it is clear that it was written after the twelve-day attack by Israel and the United States on our homeland and after the January (Dey) protests. If before the Israeli and American attack one could speculate about the possibility of such an assault, after this attack and the continuation of war preparations and Trump’s constant threats—bringing warships close to Iran while explicitly stating that it is for an attack on Iran—can one still speak of a “self-fabricated story of a foreign enemy”? Was the twelve-day attack by Israel and the United States a fantasy or an invented tale? Is the possibility of a U.S. military attack on Iran in the coming days and weeks merely a fabrication by the leaders of the Islamic Republic, lacking any basis in reality? Then are the dangers of a U.S. military attack—also mentioned in this very document—inserted merely to decorate the text and to silence party members and supporters of the Tudeh Party of Iran who are concerned about the leadership’s attempt to strike both sides at once and to confuse minds at a time when it is necessary to mobilize forces to confront the danger of renewed U.S. and Israeli military aggression against our country?
The Political Bureau’s report states:
“The protests of Dey 1404, which began with the strike of Tehran’s bazaar merchants and quickly spread to 180 other cities across the country, contrary to the claims of the Supreme Leader and other government officials, were not the result of a foreign conspiracy to overthrow the Islamic Republic. This uprising was the expression of the anger and protest of millions of desperate Iranians who had nothing to lose but poverty, deprivation, and injustice.”
The report continues:
“The massacre of innocent people who took to the streets with empty hands plunged society into shock and anger. The cries of protest at the funerals of their children testified to the anger and outrage of the victims’ families, not to a foreign conspiracy. By cutting off the internet and both domestic and international communications, the regime once again advanced its self-fabricated narrative of the ‘foreign enemy.’ Despite all these claims, the principal responsibility for the killings lies with a regime that, by order of the Supreme Leader, opened fire on the people. Those responsible for this unprecedented brutality are the ones who consider any crime permissible in order to preserve their shaky rule.”
“Furthermore, based on various reports and verified videos obtained from inside the country, at the same time as the people’s protest movement in Iran, the regime’s security apparatus also sent infiltrators and its own hired agents into the ranks of the demonstrators, chanting slogans in support of the restoration of the monarchy, in an effort to portray the popular protests as a project dependent on foreign forces and to create the necessary pretext for its severe and bloody repression. This meaningful simultaneity once again reveals the reactionary nature of the monarchist project and its anti-people consequences.” (Quotation from the Political Bureau’s report)
According to all reports so far concerning the events of the two days of 17 and 18 Dey, the killings that occurred during the demonstrations took place on the days when Trump incited the people of Iran to attack government centers, and Reza Pahlavi aligned himself with Trump’s call. Trump promised the protesting people: “Attack—help is on the way.” According to all reports, it was from this moment that the peaceful demonstrations of the people—demonstrations in which broad social strata had participated and which could have evolved, become more demand-oriented, and achieved at least a modest level of organization and cohesion—were transformed, through Trump’s mobilization via internet-based social networks, into “blind riots.” This led to the deaths of large numbers of young people and teenagers who, without experience in organized struggle, entered into a harsh confrontation with the regime’s repressive forces. The thousands of deaths within the span of two days indicate the intensity and breadth of the protests.
The lack of clarity in the Tudeh Party of Iran’s anti-imperialist positions has a history of several decades. But now this policy has been put to a real test in the face of the United States’ constant threats against our homeland. In the Party’s positions, there appear to be “two countries”: in one of them, the everyday and familiar struggles are taking place; in the other, the country is under the threat of military attack and various other imperialist interventions—yet these two countries have no connection to one another.
“The Tudeh Party of Iran believes that the social-political struggle currently underway in Iran has a class character. On one side of this battle stand millions of workers, laborers, and impoverished people driven to desperation; on the other side stands the ruling capitalist government, which through its anti-national and anti-people policies has brought the country to its present catastrophic condition.”
The leadership of the Tudeh Party of Iran must be asked: does the military aggression of Israel and the United States, and the danger of renewed and repeated military attacks, have nothing to do with the class struggle of the workers? A concrete analysis of the concrete situation tells us that the working class and the broad masses—and beyond that, the Iranian nation as a whole—see their present and future lives as a nation placed under the threat of intervention by the U.S. government, Israel, and other imperialist powers. It is precisely under these concrete conditions that the working class must participate in struggle and organize itself. Under the current war conditions, the anti-imperialist struggle takes precedence over all other forms of working-class struggle. One must never forget that, as Marx and Lenin said, every class struggle is first and foremost a political struggle. In the present conditions, this political struggle is a struggle against the war situation.
A popular front in Iran must be formed on the basis of these war conditions on the one hand, and on the other hand through clear demarcation from the ruling reaction; these two demarcations are inseparable. For example, Mustafa Hijri, Secretary-General of the Kurdistan Democratic Party, recently described U.S. intervention as correct and justified in an interview. In the list proposed by the Tudeh Party of Iran for the formation of a united front, the Kurdistan Democratic Party was also included. Does this list still retain its validity? At best, the Tudeh Party leadership’s understanding of the struggles of the working class and the masses is abstract and detached, devoid of consideration of the “war conditions,” and therefore irresponsible.
24 February 2026
Paris