Many Iranians were optimistic and even supportive of Israel when it first began conducting targeted strikes against the Iranian regime's nuclear facilities, scientists and senior military commanders, not least from the Islamic Revolutionary Guards last Friday. This was hardly surprising: the same military commanders and Revolutionary Guards have, over the past four decades, been responsible for murdering thousands of Iranians civilians each time they've taken to the streets against the regime.
But as the war now expands across Iran's cities and residential areas, the regime's propaganda machine is going into overdrive in an attempt to convince the population that Israel is indiscriminately targeting Iranian civilians, not the regime. While this is unlikely to result in the population rallying around the regime, as more explosions are heard across residential areas, it could see an about-face in public opinion, against Israel.
If left unaddressed, Israel risks losing the hearts and minds of Iran's population – a population that, until now, is perhaps the most pro-Israel in the region. The current goal of the Islamic Republic's regime is to evoke fear and panic among the Iranian population to make them believe that they are in fact Israel's targets.
