This year began auspiciously for Iran when, on January 1, it joined Brics, a grouping of alternative power centres to the West. It was yet another feather in its diplomatic cap following re-establishment of ties with Saudi Arabia and its membership of the Shanghai Co-operation Organisation last year.
Having tackled the protests of 2022-2023, the government seemed to be finding its balance again. Few, then, would have expected just how stormy a year awaited it. But as it turned out, 2024 became a year when the untenability of the policies of its government and those of its supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, became more evident than ever.
Regionally, Tehran had to witness the unprecedented battering of its so-called Axis of Resistance, a coalition of anti-western and anti-Israel militias that have been at the core of its foreign policy for years. With Israel continuing its assault on Gaza, Axis member Hamas has lost much of its capabilities. Earlier Israel killed its leader, Ismail Haniyeh, in Tehran and his successor, Yahya Sinwar, in Gaza. It also assassinated Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah alongside many of the group’s commanders in Lebanon.
This weakening of the Axis was an important factor in the overthrow of Bashar Al Assad’s government following a decade-long civil war in Syria. This also meant Iran losing its main state ally in the region.
Supporting the Axis was a strategy that had, until this year, allowed Tehran to take the fight to Israel without having to engage in direct military confrontations with it. This “Khamenei Doctrine” failed when, for the first time, Iran and Israel exchanged direct blows in April and then October.
In what has been a stormy year, Iran launched attacks on territories belonging to two nuclear powers – Israel and Pakistan – as well as inside Iraq and Syria. Mr Khamenei’s claim of keeping war away from the country has since seemed implausible. And as the year comes to an end, both the Axis of Resistance and the Khamenei Doctrine lie in ruins.
Iran has also found itself ever more diplomatically isolated from the West.
In June, Canada joined the US in listing the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terrorist organisation. In response to the execution of an Iranian-German political prisoner, Berlin closed three Iranian consulates in October. Earlier in the year, it shut down a landmark Iran-backed mosque in Hamburg that had been active since the 1950s. Germany also joined France and the US in imposing new sanctions on Tehran for its support for Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Domestically, Mr Khamenei and others in the establishment appeared to have realised that continued repression would not bode well for their government. In February, only 40 per cent voted in parliamentary elections, the lowest in the Islamic Republic’s history.
A helicopter crash in May changed that to a degree, when it led to the death of Iran’s hardline president (and Khamenei loyalist), Ebrahim Raisi. This sudden demise gave Tehran an opportunity to bring the reformist and centrist factions in from the cold. After two rounds of presidential elections (which featured, once more, the lowest presidential election turnouts in Iran), the public elected Masoud Pezeshkian, the first reformist head of government in nearly two decades.
Dr Pezeshkian ran on a more modest programme than had his reformist predecessors, such as Mohammad Khatami, who had been president from 1997-2005 and had promised to democratise the country. In contrast, the new president has promised little more than good governance and limited reforms in areas such as internet freedom and the mandatory hijab for women.
Dr Pezeshkian’s administration is filled with veterans who had previously been involved in negotiations with the US. He has pledged to return to engagement with western powers, with the purpose of easing the country’s diplomatic isolation and providing economic relief to its people.
Having experienced a rough start to his presidency, Dr Pezeshkian has his work cut out for him.
The hardliner-dominated parliament recently passed a draconian hijab bill that runs counter to his pledge. On Tuesday, the Cyberspace High Council, most of whose members are not accountable to Dr Pezeshkian, finally accepted lifting of restrictions on WhatsApp and Google Play, yet this is just a drop in the bucket. Meanwhile, Iran is facing energy shortages and power cuts with little precedence in its modern history.
However, as tough as 2024 has been for Iran, the most important challenge to Dr Pezeshkian – and his country more broadly – begins in the new year with the inauguration of US president-elect Donald Trump.
Mr Trump has pledged to double down on his “maximum pressure” policy against Iran. According to recent reports, many in the Israeli establishment seek to resume attacks on Iranian territory. It remains unclear whether Mr Trump would give such attacks his go-ahead, but he certainly could use the threat to add more pressure on Tehran.
Yet as menacing as Mr Trump’s second term appears to be, the next four years could also provide Tehran with an opportunity. The president-elect has repeatedly stated his preference for a deal with Iran, which could materialise if Tehran shows flexibility. There are already media reports in Japan that Iran’s leadership might ask Tokyo to meditate between Tehran and Washington.
If the Iranian government wants a deal with Mr Trump, it will need to cut its losses and acknowledge the fact that its quixotic promise to “destroy Israel” has delivered little but isolation and misery for its people. It would have to recognise its setbacks and accept a deal commensurate to the balance of power in the region. It would also need to counter its own domestic hardliners who rail against both a deal with the West and any concessions to popular demands in the country.
Yet the stakes are high enough to motivate many within Iran’s establishment to pursue a more conciliatory path. And so, while the new year could prove challenging for the country, it might also end up being one of historic change and reform.
