WANA (Aug 05) – A member of Iran’s Expediency Discernment Council said: The United States and Israel had planned with full confidence to topple the Islamic Republic within a short period of time. But this assumption resembled the daydreams of Saddam Hussein and the Mujahedin-e Khalq, and in the end, it turned into a major defeat for the architects of this plan.

 

Mohammad-Hossein Safar Harandi, speaking on Iranian television’s Special News Talk program under the title “The 12-Day Sacred Defense: The Battle of Wills, from the Battlefield to Diplomacy”, was asked who emerged victorious from the 12-day war between the U.S. and the Israeli regime against the Islamic Republic of Iran. He responded:

 

“Sometimes the Israelis and Americans pretend to have differences and speak as if on each other’s behalf. It is a very naïve assumption to think there is any real gap between them. Of course, there may be divisions within Israeli circles themselves, but to consider these two entities as separate from one another is, in my view, sheer naïveté — though some do it deliberately and insist on pushing this narrative.”

 

He continued: “According to the scenario the U.S. and Israel had prepared and openly declared, they had two or three clear objectives. Perhaps their most prominent goal was to ensure that the Islamic Republic would cease to exist — in other words, regime change.”

 

He argued: “Based on findings from our own intelligence services and newly obtained signals, those 12 days cannot truly be called a war. It was nothing but a regime-change operation. They even recruited and employed military elements in its service, giving it various appearances. Naturally, they gathered whatever tools were necessary for such an operation — one in which they had immense confidence.”

 

The council member added: “The U.S. and Israel were certain that, with the measures they had prepared, the downfall of the Islamic Republic — and in such a short time frame — was inevitable. This was similar to the delusions of Saddam Hussein, who thought he could capture Tehran in six days, or the corrupt and treacherous Mujahedin, who believed that, under the conditions at the end of the Iran-Iraq war, Iranian society was ripe for an uprising. If we look at the events through this lens, this turned into a crushing defeat for its planners — the kind of failure where one says, ‘What we expected versus what actually happened.’”

 

He further noted: “In truth, their main reliance was on the Iranian people becoming the foot soldiers of their operation — people who indeed had grievances, shortages, and economic hardships, much of it caused by sanctions imposed from the other side. They believed sanctions would be crippling and would drive Iranians to desperation. Their logic was: the people must become desperate so they revolt. They assumed once people reached the breaking point, they would turn against local authorities. But the exact opposite happened. When this plot revealed its true face, the people, instead of clashing with their leaders and the system that governs them, went after the root cause of the crisis.”

People attend the funeral procession of Iranian military commanders, nuclear scientists and others killed in Israeli strikes, in Tehran, Iran, June 28, 2025. Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency)