Right through the protests that ripped thru Iran in January, one one that received consideration was once Reza Pahlavi. Pahlavi, who lives in Los Angeles, is the son of the past due shah of Iran, who ruthlessly dominated the rustic prior to being deposed right through the Iranian Revolution in 1979.
Pahlavi emerged right through the new upheaval as a distinguished political dissident in exile who inspired and impressed Iranians to reveal. It remained unclear, then again, what stage of standard enhance he commanded inside of Iran, to not point out whether or not he was once, in reality, devoted to democracy because the descendant of a monarch.
Whilst some Iranians perceived Pahlavi as an opposition chief, others thought to be him an opportunistic determine with monarchical designs and a combined monitor file.
Crown prince to political dissident
Born in Tehran in 1960, Reza Pahlavi was once the eldest son of the shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, and his spouse, Queen Farah Diba, making him the crown prince.
From 1941 to 1979, the shah dominated Iran with an iron fist. With investment and coaching from France, the USA and Israel, he established and deployed a secret police power, the SAVAK, that subjected political warring parties to surveillance, imprisonment, torture and execution.
As standard discontent in opposition to the shah grew in 1974-75, Amnesty World estimated there have been between 25,000 and 100,000 political prisoners in Iran.
Despite the fact that the shah mentioned right through the 1979 revolution that he would reasonably flee the rustic than fireplace on protesters, his safety forces killed roughly 500 to three,000 Iranians – even though the ones figures are not up to the ones killed in the newest Iran protests.
In 1980, the shah admitted to errors, together with acknowledging that his regime had tortured Iranians.
CBS Night Information anchor Walter Cronkite reviews on Jan. 16, 1979, {that a} “tearful” Shah and his circle of relatives had left Iran “on a vacation from which he may never return.”
The shah and his circle of relatives fled Iran in 1979, and the Islamic Republic therefore was once established. After the shah died in 1980, Reza Pahlavi declared himself the following shah and began his political activism in opposition to the Islamic Republic from in a foreign country.
Extra not too long ago, he tried to arrange and unify a divided opposition composed of ethnic and non secular teams, leftists, rightists, centrists, republicans and, in fact, monarchists. Within the procedure, Pahlavi additionally aspired to boost his public profile.
From 2013 to 2017, he served as co-founder and spokesperson of the Iran Nationwide Council, an umbrella group of opposition teams, headquartered in Paris. It reportedly suffered defections from some teams, which stifled its talent to perform a lot. In February 2019, Pahlavi helped identify the Phoenix Mission of Iran, a suppose tank in Washington, D.C., devoted to regime trade and a transition plan in Iran.
Right through the 2022-23 Girl, Existence, Freedom protests, sparked by means of the dying of the younger Iranian lady Mahsa Amini whilst within the custody of the morality police, Pahlavi referred to as for rallies in opposition to the Iranian authorities in the USA, Canada and different nations. Main opposition figures spoke at those rallies, and hundreds of folks participated.
That very same yr, some high-profile activists and celebrities, together with some his father had imprisoned, recommended Pahlavi as a pace-setter or determine who may unite the opposition.
Presence and politics
In April 2023, Pahlavi made his first authentic discuss with to Israel, the place he was once hosted by means of Intelligence Minister Gila Gamliel and met with High Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The discuss with was once condemned by means of Iranians, from regime supporters to anti-government activists, who had been antagonistic to monarchy and unsympathetic to Israel.
After Pahlavi’s participation within the February 2025 Munich safety convention was once nixed, he and his supporters collected within the town that month and in the summertime to unify the political opposition and plan a post-regime transition. For Pahlavi, the conferences could have been merely a face-saving measure after the protection convention snub.
As a political dissident, Pahlavi regularly referred to as for a well-liked rebellion, regime trade and a mundane and democratic state. On the similar time, he didn’t rule out the go back of the monarchy, albeit a constitutional one, in response to a countrywide referendum and constituent meeting.
In an try to appease different opposition teams and a few anti-monarchy Iranian voters, Pahlavi sometimes insisted he was once “not a political leader” and was once “not personally seeking political office” in Iran if the regime fell.
At the overseas coverage entrance – and following in his father’s footsteps – Pahlavi has advocated for Iran to align itself with the USA and Israel.
Iranian protesters cling {a photograph} of Reza Pahlavi right through a Loose Iran rally in London on Jan. 18, 2026.
Dinendra Haria/SOPA Photographs/LightRocket by means of Getty Photographs
Unclear enhance, combined file
As Pahlavi changed into extra politically energetic in a foreign country, questions surfaced about his viability as an opposition chief in Iran.
Discounting a 2023 ballot carried out by means of a pro-Pahlavi institute indicating he was once broadly standard in Iran, it remained tough to decide his enhance in Iranian society.
In a 2022 ballot carried out by means of an impartial, nonprofit analysis basis with 158,000 respondents in Iran, Pahlavi gained the absolute best share – 32.8% – amongst 34 applicants indexed to serve on a transitional cohesion council, must the regime cave in.
On the similar time, Pahlavi it appears lacked a significant monarchist motion and a powerful reference to native opposition leaders and activists in Iran. He purportedly had little, if any, enhance amongst reformist or liberal teams within the nation.
The loss of readability regarding enhance for Pahlavi in Iran defined the hesitation of U.S. officers, together with President Donald Trump, to have interaction with him. That didn’t deter Pahlavi from making an attempt to steer them to desert diplomatic talks and negotiations with the Islamic Republic over its nuclear program.
Regardless of the debates outdoor Iran about Pahlavi’s enhance throughout the nation, pro-monarchy slogans an increasing number of seemed in Iranian social media postings and anti-government protests, together with the ones in 2017-18, 2019-20, and 2022-23.
Right through the 2019-20 protests, the protection forces arrested individuals of monarchist teams across the nation and said their emerging reputation and skill to infiltrate the federal government. Some reformist intellectuals instructed that monarchist slogans had been simply a way for Iranian early life and different voters to channel their anger and frustration on the government reasonably than expressions of true enhance for Pahlavi.
The slogans additionally strengthened the regime’s efforts to delegitimize the protests by means of portraying them as a plot by means of exterior and interior enemies, together with the monarchists, to destabilize the rustic.
Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi of Iran inspects a ‘guard of honour’ composed of younger boys in uniform in Tehran, Iran, on Sept. 19, 1963.
Keystone Hulton Archive/Getty Photographs.
All over the 12-day conflict in June 2025 between Iran and Israel, which claimed the lives of one,190 Iranian civilians and injured and displaced hundreds extra, Pahlavi publicly lamented the destruction of Iran’s army infrastructure that his father had to start with constructed and the cost its folks paid for a conflict he blamed on Preferrred Chief Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the regime.
On the similar time, he was once criticized by means of distinguished political prisoners and different Iranian activists and voters for betraying his nation by means of supporting the Israeli moves and failing to sentence them.
After the conflict, Israeli investigative reporters exposed a power operation carried out and funded by means of Israeli private and non-private entities to advertise – amongst Persian-speaking audiences on social media – Pahlavi as a possible chief in a post-Islamic Republic Iran. The disinformation marketing campaign created cynicism and controversy regarding Pahlavi’s true reputation throughout the nation and his tacit reference to Israel prior to and right through the conflict.
Newest protests and long term potentialities
Hundreds of protesters became out within the streets at the ones occasions, with some chanting anti-government slogans and others pro-monarchy ones.
His function within the protests was once diminished after the regime bring to a halt the web and telecommunications between the folks of Iran and the outdoor global, in addition to amongst activists throughout the nation.
Whilst some folks praised Pahlavi for uplifting protesters, others requested whether or not he was once chargeable for sending them to detention and conceivable dying, as some believed Trump was once for in a similar fashion encouraging the protesters.
For the final 15 years, Pahlavi has intensified his efforts to unify the political opposition and achieve larger publicity, culminating in him rising as a central determine in the newest protests.
But there stay questions on whether or not he’s viable as an opposition chief or is just an opportunist.
His message a few democratic long term for Iran has been in large part constant. Then again, his father’s repressive and imperial legacy, mixed along with his personal royal pedigree and American and Israeli proximity, save you him from discovering prefer with Iranians who oppose monarchy and prioritize sovereignty.
Now, the chance of Iranians around the nation rallying round Pahlavi stays as a lot of an open query as whether or not they’ll achieve growing the stipulations for his go back by means of toppling the regime.
