Burhanettin Duran, Daily Sabah
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Excerpt:Feb. 26 Iran held elections for the Assembly of Experts, which elects the supreme leader, and for parliament. The fact that millions of Iranians went to the polls for the first time since the nuclear deal raised the election's profile.
According to media reports, moderate reformists affiliated with President Hassan Rouhani and former President Hashemi Rafsanjani won a majority in both houses, which the international community, no doubt, will welcome. ...
To be perfectly honest, Iran's public diplomacy team deserves some credit. Whenever Iran holds elections, they persuade the West that the country is at a critical junction. The fact that Iran has a semi-democratic government under Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei's political and ideological control often goes unnoticed. ...
Athough the lifting of sanctions might trigger economic growth, which the government could use to partially liberalize domestic politics, Iranian foreign policy will remain immune to change. The country abandoned anti-Western rhetoric after the Arab Spring revolutions and opted to strengthen its cooperation with the West while aggressively expanding Iran's influence over the Middle East. ...
The Syrian civil war provided the perfect opportunity for Iran's leaders to test their instruments of hard and soft power. By suggesting that Iranian citizens fighting the Syrian opposition were clashing with infidels, Khamenei tapped into Iran's radical ideology and religious doctrine to legitimize regional competition. At this point, the world is so preoccupied with radical Sunni jihadists embodied by DAESH that many people are willing to turn a blind eye to the Iranian leadership's pragmatism with a radical twist. Moving forward, Iran will seek to work more closely with the United States, the European Union and Russia by tapping into fears of Sunni radicalism. ...
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