IRAN'S EXHAUSTING CHARADE

THE ISLAMIC REPUBLIC'S ALready lengthy catalog of fears has ballooned of late: alongside the possibility of being overthrown by its own citizens, it is haunted by the prospect of a full accounting of the massacres it has carried out; by the tenuous loyalty of its army, and its empty coffers; and by the shadow of Israeli spies and Islamic State militants.

- Azadeh Moaveni

What terrifies Iran's theocrats the most, the fear that eclipses all their other fears, is the ability of the people at large to clearly see the essential realities of the present regime.

While Iranians have heroically demanded a great many things in recent weeks―change, new rulers, democratic freedoms-they are fundamentally insisting on dismantling the meticulously curated edifice of deceit and falsehoods sustaining the state as it has been constructed since 1979. For the first time ever, by explicitly chanting the name of a specific, alternative leader in the streets, Iranians have emphasized the true problem: the biggest, the most unsustainable lie of all, they are collectively saying, is the system itself.

The founding myth of the Islamic Republic rested on a contract of rule that promised the people agency and accountability. Instead, in reality, it empowered an unelected, ever shrinking clique answerable to no one but itself. For years, deception remained essential to its survival.

Now, soaring food insecurity and hunger have exposed the system for what it truly is: a theoretical fabulism and a real-life con. The profound significance of the recent protests lies in their creation of a vast public space where tens of thousands repudiated the lie in unison. The veil was shredded, the illusion was shattered. Nothing will ever be the same. That is why the regime has killed ruthlessly, and killed as it has never killed before.