Islamism as Anti-Western Resistance
The Islamic Republic was born from an anti-imperialist revolution. The 1979 overthrow of the Shah was not only a rejection of monarchy but also perceived foreign domination, chiefly by the United States and Israel. During the Pahlavi era, Iran had close cooperation with Israel, sharing intelligence and military ties.
For Ayatollah Khomeini and his followers, this alliance represented everything corrupt: secularism, imperialism, and Zionism. The new Shi'a theocracy reoriented Iran’s identity around religious opposition to perceived Western hegemony. Israel, as a Western-aligned Jewish state in a Muslim region, became an ideological enemy.
Khomeini drew upon Islamic narratives of resistance, including battles between the Prophet Muhammad and Jewish tribes, to reinforce this religiously framed hostility. The Palestinian cause was elevated as sacred, casting Israel as a permanent enemy and focal point of revolutionary resistance.
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