Iran’s ‘Godfather of propaganda’ tactics resurface in war with US and Israel
Just hours before the ceasefire deal went into effect on Tuesday between the U.S. and Iran’s clerical regime to pause fighting for two weeks, the regime urged young children and adults to surround Iranian energy facilities as human shields in reaction to President Trump's threat to wipe out its energy infrastructure.
The thinking behind Iran’s regime's willingness to use children and civilians as cannon fodder, according to observers, is that an American airstrike that kills children or civilians will dramatically sway U.S. public opinion against the war and create a rally-round-the-regime effect in Tehran.
And now with high-level peace talks due to start between the U.S. and Iran in Pakistan, Tehran can be seen as the godfather of propaganda when it comes to manipulating much of the world's media — even more skilled than its terror apprentice forces in Gaza and Lebanon. Yemen and beyond.
Lisa Daftari, an Iran expert, told Fox News Digital that the theocratic state’s exploitation of civilians for their war aim is part and parcel of their nearly half-century playbook against the West. "The Islamic Republic is the Godfather of propaganda. It has spent 47 years perfecting the art of saying one thing at the negotiating table and doing another in the field. The Trump administration should walk into these talks with maximum skepticism. This regime has never kept its word on its weapons, and there's no reason to believe this time is different."
She pointed to Tehran's "record of positioning civilian infrastructure — hospitals, mosques, schools and now power plants — as military shields. They did it in Lebanon through Hezbollah. They did it in Gaza through Hamas. And they are doing it now on their own soil, with their own people, under coercion. Iranians who refuse to participate face consequences."
Daftari, who is the Editor-in-Chief of the Foreign Desk, added that, "Iran's regime has never hesitated to use its own people as a shield. The difference now is they're doing it in front of cameras, in real time, knowing exactly which images will make prime-time news around the world. This is propaganda. And the two-week ceasefire just gave them more time to manipulate the West and continue on in their narrative warfare."
Right at the beginning of "Operation Epic Fury", the world's media was full of accounts from Iran of an air strike that reportedly hit an Iranian school for girls in the town of Minab Feb. 28. The air strike reportedly killed 175 people, most of whom were children, at the Shajarah Tayyebeh elementary school, according to the regime. The school was located on the same street as buildings used by the IRGC. A Pentagon investigation was launched in March to look into the allegations that a U.S. missile struck the school.
Speaking to Fox News Digital last month, Iranian-American journalist Banafsheh Zand, who has been following the reporting, pointed to the fact that the school that has been there for more than a decade and its reported affiliation with Iran’s military. She said that while the regime claims between 168 fatalities and 180 fatalities, mostly girls between the ages of 7 and 12, along with teachers and parents from the school, there has been no independent confirmation of the reported casualty figures.
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"There is no confirmation on the number of people, from anyone other than regime sources," she said. "Some people in the area said it was 65 boys. Sixty-five boys? What are 65 boys doing in a girls’ school at 10:30 on a Saturday morning?"
Both Democratic and Republican U.S. administrations have classified Iran’s regime as a leading state-sponsor of terrorism.
Speaking on ‘Jesse Watters Primetime,' on Thursday, Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., said the American media was "essentially… carrying water for Iran."
Jonathan Ruhe, a fellow at JINSA, told Fox News Digital, "The regime wants to show the Iranian people that it is not weakened despite all the deaths in its leadership and losses in its arsenals, and to claim legitimacy by showing it is winning against the eternal American and Israeli enemies."
He said, "Like Hezbollah and Hamas, Iran uses civilians as human shields for propaganda purposes. It cares nothing for the safety and fate of its own people. It wants to portray the country as undaunted and willing to sacrifice for victory. And if civilians are killed, all the better for the regime's political goals… Iran wants to undermine U.S. domestic support for the war by framing it as America doing Israel's bidding, and by using AI-generated disinformation to depict massive destruction and casualties at U.S. bases in the Middle East."
The regime suffered a crisis of legitimacy after millions of Iranians poured into the streets in January and demanded the dissolution of the Islamic Republic.
Both the IRGC and Basij — the regime’s street fighting paramilitary troops — played a key role in the mass murder of 45,000 Iranian civilians in January, who protested the regime. President Trump said in his address to the nation that the regime killed 45,000 people. The previous death toll was estimated to be over 35,000 people.
Ruhe said, "As it did before the war, it also wants to delegitimize protesters and other internal opposition by depicting them as American and Israeli agents. It can be expected to ramp up all of these propaganda efforts during the ceasefire. The United States and our partners will be part of this intended audience, too."
Adding to its deadly propaganda mix, the regime freely uses child soldiers to achieve its goals. According to Amnesty International, "Eyewitness accounts and verified audiovisual evidence show child soldiers having been deployed at IRGC checkpoints and patrols, armed with weapons, including AK47pattern rifles."
Erika Guevara-Rosas, senior director for Research, Advocacy, Policy and Campaigns, for Amnesty stated in the report that, "The Iranian authorities are shamelessly encouraging children as young as 12 to join an IRGC run military campaign, putting them in grave danger and violating international law, which prohibits the recruitment and use of children in the military. Recruiting children under 15 into the armed forces constitutes a war crime."
Jennifer Dyer, a retired commander of U.S. Naval Intelligence, told Fox News "I’d say the remnant of the regime can’t muster enough human shields to be doing it all over the place. The people are too resistant. Protests continued in the country the last couple of days, and some reporting on social media indicated a crackdown by the Basij on protesters after the so-called ceasefire was announced."
In late March, a deputy of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Mohammad Rasoul Allah Corps of Greater Tehran, Rahim Nadali, declared that the state launched a recruitment campaign called the "Homeland-Defending Combatants for Iran" that is "open to volunteers" aged 12 and older. The drive to recruit child soldiers took place in mosques and bases of the paramilitary organization Basij. The recruitment campaign sought adolescents to join "combatants defending the homeland."
Fox News Digital reached out to Iran’s U.N. Mission in New York for a comment.