Analysis-Why Iran’s clerical regime still holds as protests rage |
By Samia Nakhoul
DUBAI, Jan 13 (Reuters) - Despite Iran's nationwide protests and years of external pressure, there are as yet no signs of fracture in the Islamic Republic's security elite that could bring an end to one of the world's most resilient regimes.
Adding to the stress on Iran's clerical rulers, U.S. President Donald Trump has repeatedly threatened military action over Tehran's severe crackdown on the protests, which follow an Israeli and U.S. bombing campaign last year against Iran's nuclear program and key officials.
But unless the street unrest and foreign pressure can prompt defections at the top, the regime, though weakened, will likely hold, two diplomats, two government sources in the Middle East and two analysts told Reuters.
Around 2,000 people have been killed in the protests, an Iranian official told Reuters, blaming "terrorists" for the deaths of civilians and security personnel. Human rights groups had previously tallied around 600 deaths.
Iran's layered security architecture, anchored by the Revolutionary Guards and Basij paramilitary force, which together number close to one million people, makes external coercion without internal rupture exceedingly difficult, said Vali Nasr, an Iranian-American academic and expert on regional conflicts and U.S. foreign policy.
“For this sort of thing to succeed, you have to have crowds in the streets for a much longer period of time. And you have to have a breakup of the state. Some segments of the state, and particularly the security forces, have to defect," he said.
Iran's mission to the U.N. in Geneva, the U.S.........