<figure id="attachment_3293994" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-3293994" style="width: 1600px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" class="size-full wp-image-3293994" src="https://media.freemalaysiatoday.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/caf7956b-reza-pahlavi.jpg" alt="Reza Pahlavi" width="1600" height="1000" /><figcaption id="caption-attachment-3293994" class="wp-caption-text">US-based Reza Pahlavi, exiled since 1979, has positioned himself as the leader for a democratic transition to a secular Iran. (EPA Images pic)</figcaption></figure>
WASHINGTON: The exiled son of Iran&#8217;s last shah urged Iranians Sunday to stage nightly street protests to help overthrow the government as the United States and Israel maintained massive air strikes on the country&#8217;s military and leadership.
US-based Reza Pahlavi said the death of Iran&#8217;s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, on the first day of the war Saturday means the current regime is now &#8220;drawing its final breaths.&#8221;
Pahlavi, who has not returned to Iran since before the 1979 Islamic revolution that ousted the monarchy, is billing himself as the man to lead a democratic transition to a secular Iran, as the theocratic regime fights to survive.
&#8220;I ask you, while maintaining your security, to demonstrate your satisfaction with and support for the crushing of the Islamic Republic through nightly chants, and to shout your demands for Iran&#8217;s future,&#8221; Pahlavi, 65, wrote on X on the second day of the US and Israeli attacks.
&#8220;My strength comes from your strength and your support,&#8221; he wrote.
Pahlavi urged the &#8220;remaining officials of this republic of terror&#8221; to hand over power without bloodshed.
And he reached out to Iranians outside the country, asking them to intensify their support for overthrowing the government.
&#8220;Force the world to hear the Iranian people’s support for this humanitarian intervention and our demand for the complete fall of the regime,&#8221; Pahlavi wrote.
The war quickly decapitated Iran&#8217;s theocratic government by killing supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and other senior leaders.
The Iranian opposition remains divided and Pahlavi has faced criticism for his support for Israel, making a highly publicised visit in 2023 that fractured an attempt to unify opposition camps.
He has never distanced himself either from his father&#8217;s autocratic rule.

MatchPoint Times

Son of Iran’s last shah urges people to ‘shout’ down government

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