For the Iranian regime, the death of President Ebrahim Raisi in a helicopter accident on Monday was an embarrassment. Since the crash, Iran has been trying to save face by emphasising its leadership across the Middle East.
Iran needs to do this primarily when it comes to its archenemy, Israel. Since the deadly 7th October Hamas attacks, as the war between Israel and the Iran-backed group has escalated, a tense standoff has developed between Iran and the Jewish state. The two exchanged symbolic attacks last month—Iran’s choice of offensive against Israel was a much publicised barrage of drones and ballistic missiles on the night of 13th April. The intention was to send a clear message about Iran’s military and technological prowess.
The helicopter accident was a reminder, however, of how far Iran trails Israel on those fronts. With US sanctions targeting Iran’s aviation sector, the country’s civilian and military aircraft are poorly maintained and lack spare parts. The American helicopter transporting the president was dated from the Vietnam war era. That this old craft ended up crushed on a mountain pierces the image of strength Iran has been trying to cultivate.
To counter its apparent weakness, the Iranian regime was quick to cast itself as a victim of US injustice. On Iranian state television, the former foreign minister, Javad Zarif, directly blamed Washington for the crash. “One of the causes of this heartbreaking incident is the United States, which by sanctioning the sale of the aviation industry to Iran caused the martyrdom of the president and his companions,” he said. “The US’s crime will be recorded in the minds of the Iranian people and history.”
To project strength, Iran needs to show it has diplomatic weight across the region. In its favour is an almost unanimous stance in the Arab world regarding relations with Tehran. No Arab state wants tensions to escalate. They have their own domestic concerns, including socioeconomic transformation programmes in countries like Saudi Arabia and the UAE, and the maintenance of stability across the Gulf. Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt, and even Bahrain—known for its deep distrust of Iran—sent representatives to Raisi’s funeral. This is a reminder that his death is unlikely to alter the balance of suspicion between Iran and its Arab neighbours.
What matters most to Iran, however, is its self-styled position as the leader of the so-called “axis of resistance” in the Middle East. Raisi was not a major player in Iranian foreign affairs because it is the country’s Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, not its president, who sets this policy. As such, Raisi’s death will not shift the direction of Iran’s military interventions across the region. Neither will it affect its support for proxies like Hezbollah, the Houthis, Shia groups in Iraq and Hamas. Still, Iran used Raisi’s funeral to reemphasise its “resistance” credentials.
Here the role of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, who is based in Qatar, is worth noting. On Wednesday, at Raisi’s funeral in the city of Mashhad, Haniyeh gave a speech in which he described these Iran-backed groups as part of a united resistance against Israel. Haniyeh praised Iran for centring the Palestinian issue, and described “resistance” in Palestine, aka Hamas’s actions, as the frontline of the wider Iran-led axis. Haniyeh described Hamas’s 7th October attack—which the group called “Al-Aqsa Flood”—as a gamechanger conducted across “all resistance fronts” in the region. This was a reference to the involvement of Hamas allies Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Houthis in Yemen in militant activity against Israel.
Citing the various leaders of these groups at the funeral (among whom was Hezbollah’s second-in-command Naim Qassem), Haniyeh stressed that the end goal for them all is the liberation of Palestine. To further press the message, the day after the funeral Iranian state media reported that senior commanders from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corp (IRGC)—the most powerful branch of Iran’s armed forces, which is designated as a terror group by countries including the US—convened a meeting with all the leaders of these groups on the sidelines of the funeral.
Haniyeh’s speech echoes the one he gave at the funeral of IRGC senior commander Qasem Soleimani, who the US assassinated in January 2020. On that occasion, the Hamas leader described Soleimani as the “martyr of Jerusalem” and said that Palestinians will follow Soleimani’s path “to confront the Zionist project and the US influence”.
Haniyeh’s framing gives Iran, not the Palestinians, ownership of the Palestinian issue. And in choosing Haniyeh both times to deliver this message, at funerals for two of the country’s most senior officials, Iran is reminding its proxies in the Middle East that Tehran sets their agenda. The message is also directed at Israel and the US. It’s a reminder that, ultimately, any deal with Hamas is a deal with Iran.
