Necessity of "Down to the oppressor, whether Shah or Supreme Leader. We want neither Shah nor cleric, only the formation of councils"

Abbas Goya- February 22, 2026

If we consider the main cause of the uprising of workers in Iran to lie in chronic poverty, widespread job insecurity, the absence of any prospect for a dignified life for youth, repression of freedoms, structural inequality, and gender apartheid, then it can be said that what is visible between the Islamic Republic of Iran and monarchist currents—beyond their rhetoric of love and hate—is a kind of strategic and class overlap.

Monarchism is not merely a pressure group; it is a political project with a specific agenda. If, in their gatherings, there is no sign of a demand for the release of political prisoners, no promise—even a token one—of public welfare, nor any defense of equal rights, no promises of freedom, or the elimination of oppression, this absence is not accidental. Such demands have no place in their project.

They have one clear objective and nothing more: the almost intact transfer of the Islamic Republic’s state apparatus—especially with all its instruments of repression—to Reza Pahlavi by the U.S. and Israel. The aim is to advance the very mission that the current Islamic government has currently failed to fully accomplish: containing and suppressing protesting labor forces, and repressing demands for freedom and equality.

What monarchists display, both in cyberspace and in the streets, recalls the symbolic and authoritarian mobilizations experienced in European history: consciously aggressive, extremely right-wing mobilizations aimed at gaining legitimacy from above. The goal is to earn a “badge of merit” for inheriting the existing order, not to break from it.

From this perspective, what is unfolding in opposition to the Islamic Republic is not a “regime-change movement,” but a class war. On one side we face a configuration that constitutes a form of class unity. The Islamic Republic plus an opposition faction, part of which has rallied around Reza Pahlavi, along with their international supporters in Washington and Jerusalem compose the ruling class. In this reading, the current Iran–U.S. confrontation is less a diplomatic and military dispute between hostile states than a form of intra-class maneuvering to preserve and expand class interests. Whatever the outcome of their internal struggle, workers are the loser one.

On the other side of this class struggle stand workers and a broader spectrum of the oppressed. Friends and foes are not determined on the basis of opposing the Islamic Republic within a fictional "regime-change movement”. They are determined by opposing the ruling class which includes the Islamic Republic, according to material and class interests.

It is within this context that the assessment of field observations has led the Workers’ Organizing Action Committee to the following conclusion:

“In our view, we must, with whatever means we have, expand the twin slogans against both clerical and monarchical despotism—even if such intervention is from the position of a minority (even a single person) among a crowd that predominantly chants ‘Long live the Shah.’ Our own field experience in confronting pro-Pahlavi slogans and even debating some pro-Pahlavi leaders showed that, contrary to initial expectations, many of them are not political in the precise sense of the word; they merely chant these slogans in an emotional state and retreat in the face of criticism and objection. The refrain of many of them during the days of protest was that they were chanting in favor of Pahlavi ‘out of necessity.’ Therefore, one should not be intimidated by the atmosphere or mistakenly assume that we are facing an army of diehard Pahlavi loyalists in the streets.”

Chanting slogans such as the following has become an urgent necessity. “Down to the oppressor, whether Shah or Supreme Leader. We want neither Shah nor cleric, only the formation of councils", both inside and outside of Iran, particularly in the ongoing student gatherings.