Khamenei is dead — and Iranians dare to hope for freedom again after decades of tyranny

"Khamenei is dead?" That was the archetypal condemnation astatine the apical of each connection I received arsenic Operation Epic Fury unfolded. The question people astatine the extremity baffled me; Israel had already announced that it had verified the assemblage successful the rubble of the rocket onslaught to beryllium that of Ayatollah Khamenei.

Even much confusing was that the question persisted adjacent arsenic mainstream quality sites splashed the words "Khamenei is dead" crossed their screens.

Then it dawned connected maine that this was nary longer a question. It was disbelief, compounded by a uncommon operation of mourning and celebration. It was a look into the surreal satellite successful which Iranians had travel to live, arsenic if thing that happened successful Iran was similar sleepwalking into idiosyncratic else’s nightmare.

And past determination was a flood of messages filled with exclamation marks and fireworks emojis. The temper shifted from disbelief to jubilation. Iranians were dancing successful the streets, honking their car horns and chanting "Freedom! FREEDOM!"

They had not envisioned this infinitesimal arriving truthful early, lone a fewer hours into Operation Epic Fury, and truthful precisely targeted that each the buildings surrounding Khamenei’s compound remained standing.

The longest-running dictator of the modern era, who had managed a façade of invincibility for himself and disposability for his opponents, was dead. His epoch of denying Iranians a consciousness of normalcy — of beingness lived without one’s ain choices — had travel to an end.

FORMER TOPGUN PILOT DECLARES IRAN MILITARY 'OVER WITH' AMID US AIR SUPERIORITY, BUT WARNS OF ANOTHER DANGER

The Islamic Revolution of 1979 had abruptly upended normalcy, veiling women, banning bars and movie theaters, separating genders and gradually transforming nationalist spaces into glorified cemeteries, with pictures of Iran-Iraq War (1980–88) "martyrs" looming large.

For those of america with fond puerility memories of parks with flowerbeds and fountains, and men selling toys and balloons from pushcarts, thing looked similar the Iran we knew. The Iran we loved changed slowly, and past quickly, from a modern, forward-looking state to a country retired of an Islamic "Mad Max."

Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei addresses to the nationalist connected the juncture of the 47th day of the Iranian Revolution according to Iranian authorities tv successful Tehran, Iran connected February 9, 2026. (Iranian Leader Press Office/Anadolu/Getty Images)

But arsenic caller uprisings person shown, Iranians are resilient and creative. "They are similar wheat successful a field," Rolof Benny, a celebrated lensman touring Iran to seizure its beauty, told my parents. "They crook their heads with the coming tempest and basal close backmost up."

MORNING GLORY: WHY TRUMP MUST FINISH WHAT HE STARTED WITH IRAN’S REGIME

Life was not arsenic seamless arsenic Benny had observed. But helium was close that Iran is unique. Longing for normalcy, Iranians began to softly rebel, naming their babe boys Shahan — a Persian-origin sanction meaning kings — alternatively of the regime-sanctioned Mohammad. They created movies that won awards successful planetary competitions.

Careful not to rise the ire of the regime’s morality council, they embedded their choler successful plotlines depicting the regime’s tyranny done stories of divorcement and the dissolution of families, the anguish of a rebellious child, oregon a begetter dying of Alzheimer’s who forgets the unbearable contiguous and lives successful the past.

Normalcy was besides the telephone successful the opus "Baraye" ("For the Sake Of") by Shervin Hajipour. Popularized during the 2022 Woman, Life, Freedom movement, Hajipour sang of towering trees lining Tehran’s famed Pahlavi Avenue, barking dogs and idle days spent drowning successful one’s beloved’s eyes. Hajipour won a Grammy successful 2023 successful the Best Song for Social Change category.

DOUG SCHOEN: AS A DEMOCRAT, I BACK TRUMP'S IRAN STRIKE — MY PARTY IS WRONG

It is astir excessively casual — and possibly excessively aboriginal — to reason that the mullahs were the authors of their ain demise.

But for a authorities anchored successful the teachings of the Quran, the authorities was blatantly immoral and unspeakably ruthless, butchering Iranians successful the streets oregon successful the isolation of situation wards. Many who were detained were ne'er seen again. Many who were released were ghosts of their erstwhile selves.

Perhaps the bigger discourtesy to arrogant Iranians was the clerics’ claims to nationalism, arsenic they often wove Iran’s beloved poesy into their hateful sermons. Nationalism is Iran’s astir enduring ideology, and Iranians ridicule immoderate pretense by the clerics with gusto.

CLICK HERE FOR MORE FOX NEWS OPINION

"They don’t correspond maine oregon my people," I would often perceive successful interviews with Iranians. "There is thing Persian astir the Ayatollahs." In the aftermath of the 12-day war, they insisted they would not rally astir the emblem "because this is not our flag."

Just arsenic the Islamic regime’s emblem replaced the past Lion and Sun, the regularisation of the clerics was a conception from the start. In fact, it had nary precedent successful Islamic history. "We did not make a gyration to interest astir the terms of tomatoes," Khomeini would angrily retort to those who came to buss his robe and inquire mundane questions astir moving the country. "Islam is the answer. It has everything."

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP

Ironically, Iranians’ rejection of Khomeini’s Islam has brought 2 past peoples together. My sources successful Iran talk of a increasing enslaved betwixt Iranian Jews and crowds of protesters. "Ma hameh ba ham hasteem" ("We are each successful this together") is present chanted portion Israeli flags question alongside the Lion and Sun emblem crossed Europe and the U.S. In this, past has travel afloat ellipse from Cyrus the Great to the present.

A instrumentality to normalcy whitethorn not beryllium acold behind.

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM NAZEE MOINIAN 

Related Article