Closing Pasargadae exposes Khamenei's fake patriotism

What he says

An English translation of the talk, which is in Persian. It was made with AI from YouTube's automatic captions and may contain errors; the Persian transcript is authoritative. Click a timestamp to jump to that part of the video.

0:01 Hello. It is Wednesday, 7 Aban 1404, October 29, 2025. Every year the seventh of Aban, which is regarded as the birthday of Cyrus the Great, the founder of Iran, sees gatherings at Pasargadae or Persepolis, or at least attempts by people to gather at these places and pay their respects to someone who, in a way, can be considered the father of the country of Iran. But every year the regime also shows that it fears this gathering: it closes the roads or cuts the internet, the police stand guard, and so on.

0:58 In any case, this year it did the same thing. It blocked the roads leading to Pasargadae, and even those leading to Persepolis, and did not allow people to gather and pay their respects to someone who, quite apart from his tolerance, his conquests and his being a model of a good ruler, should rightly be considered the founder of Iran and the father of the Iranian nation and country. But why does the regime have this fear? In fact, several reasons can be given. The first reason is that the regime fundamentally fears any gathering, any gathering that it has not authorized, that is not organized by the government, and that people want to hold on their own.

1:58 The regime fears these gatherings whether they are spontaneous, whether they are on the occasion of Cyrus the Great's birthday, or even whether they are for dancing, celebration, sports and group activity in which people practice being together and push back against what the regime wants to do, namely to isolate people, make them hopeless and keep them frightened. That is also why, in the Constitution of the Islamic Republic, where it comes to freedom of assembly, more restrictions have been imposed than on any other article. These are restrictions that ultimately

2:54 can be used as a pretext to stop any gathering. More importantly, the state must actually grant permission for a gathering, whereas people coming together is their right, one of their natural and human rights, which no government has the right to take away. This is precisely the fundamental difference between the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and Articles 19 to 42 of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic, which outwardly resemble the thirty articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights but inwardly differ in essence. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights assumes that every human being, every creature who walks on two feet and is considered human,

3:55 has natural rights, such as freedom of belief, freedom of expression, freedom of assembly and so on, which no one has the right to take away from them, whether the state, the government or anyone else. The only limit to these rights and freedoms that people, that humankind, possess is where they infringe on the freedom and rights of others. But in Articles 19 to 42 of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic, all matters such as freedom of expression, freedom of assembly, I don't know, the prohibition of inquisition into beliefs, and so on, are qualified with an "unless" and an "if" and made conditional on the permission of the regime, the permission of the state, "unless it is detrimental to the foundations of Islam," and so forth, and again the authority to determine that is the regime. In any case,

4:56 the first point is that the regime in fact regards itself as the owner of rights that are natural. Natural rights have been discussed from John Locke until now, and this natural right of human beings was recognized in the American Declaration of Independence, in the Declaration of the Rights of Man of the French Revolution, and finally in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. But in the Islamic Republic these rights are not rights in the true sense at all; rather, they are verbiage contingent on permits from a regime that does not even derive its power from the people.

5:47 But another reason the regime is fundamentally afraid is that historical experience shows that when ideological regimes, for example communism or Islamic ideologism, reach a dead end and their theory fails in practice, people, in order to hold their society together and replace the idea that once created unity among them, usually turn to patriotism. Love of homeland, love of their country and sacrifice for their country take the place of those ideologies. This is a patriotism that today, among Iranians,

6:43 can also be seen, and it rests on democracy, the pursuit of freedom, secularism, human rights, comprehensive development and joining the global family, within the framework of an integrated Iran, a single country called Iran. It is precisely here that we must be vigilant, so that this alternative theory does not lose its momentum among the people. We must be careful that it does not slide into extremism, which, as it happens, the regime would not mind steering it toward: extreme nationalism, which ultimately turns into fascism. That is because in

7:35 that case its appeal diminishes. That is, when love of homeland and respect for the human rights and citizenship rights of all citizens turn into hostility toward this religion, that belief, this person, that individual, this movement, that idea, then it becomes something ugly that serves as a tool of division, which is something the regime tries to spread. In any case, the second reason the regime fears the gathering at Pasargadae is that by honoring Cyrus the Great, the founder of Iran, people are in fact expressing their love for their homeland, the country in which their roots go back thousands of years. This is a very fitting alternative to the Islamic ideologism

8:33 that is the theory of this regime. Moreover, these actions by the regime, which fears this gathering in honor of Iran and Iranians, expose Khamenei's fake love of Iran. During the 12-day war he told the regime's eulogist to sing a lament for Iran, and afterward the regime kept chanting "Iran" out of its own fear, and then they instructed all the singers and concerts to sing about Iran, and, I don't know, to put up a statue of Arash the Archer, and so on. These actions expose all of that and show that they have no real belief in love of Iran and patriotism, and instead want to use it as a tool.

9:32 Meanwhile, the internal fights over the most important seat of power, namely the country's leadership, are still continuing. They show that with Khamenei fading from view, which began at the time of the 12-day war (he isn't coming out of his hole, and he is not present in the country), the serious question has arisen: if he dies or is killed, what will become of this seat? A group of people who oppose siding with the West or resolving problems with the Western world have issued a call for a gathering tomorrow in Valiasr Square in Tehran, specifically against Mr. Zarif and Mr. Rouhani.

10:30 Some of those who are active in the Majlis and here and there are worried that, for example, Rouhani might want to become the next Leader, so this fight is over the seat; or they may want to champion Mojtaba. Another factor, which in my opinion is more important, is that they have realized that Russia's policy, too, is no longer to pursue installing another Supreme Leader after Khamenei, because they understand that this cannot continue in Iran. Therefore they want to implement the Putin model and, from within the system, from the network of these same thieves and mafias, whether Ghalibaf, Shamkhani or people we don't know, by creating insecurity after

11:23 Khamenei, to raise someone up and have him take control of affairs. That is why they are attacking those who may be inclined toward relations with the West, as well as the general public, who are basically opposed to these kinds of fights with the world. These are people who, one can say, are in fact pro-Russians and supporters of Russia who mostly want to put themselves forward and flash their headlights at the Russians, wink at them, signaling that "we can be that very Putin." People like Mr. Ghalibaf and others in fact want to tailor this cloak to fit themselves. On the other hand, with the closure of Ayandeh Bank, the scandal of Mr. Ali Ansari has been exposed. He

12:18 was considered one of the backers and associates of Mojtaba Khamenei, and Mojtaba had given him support so that he could defraud the entire Iranian nation in this way. The question has been raised whether Mojtaba Khamenei is staging a purge of his circle in order to say that these corrupt people are no longer around him, or whether this, too, is part of Mojtaba Khamenei's own scandal coming out, and Russia's project, which wants to get rid of the Guardianship of the Jurist, is what is really driving events. In any case, whichever of these it is, this too is one of the factors why, at present, these gangs of plunder and

13:11 power are pulling the seat out from under one another and the fights have intensified. Reuters has reported that the discount on Iranian light crude sold to China has reached $8 per barrel below market price, whereas until recently it was $3 to $6 at most. It seems, more than anything, that these small Chinese refineries, known as teapot refineries, which buy smuggled Iranian oil, are fishing in the troubled waters of the sanctions and the reimposition of UN sanctions, and by demanding bigger discounts they are filling their own pockets. On the other hand, the United States, by seizing 1.8

14:10 billion dollars in cryptocurrency, most of which belonged to the IRGC, though ordinary people were also among the holders, has moved its sanctions into a broader phase. Hoping for the victory of Iran and Iranians.