Mousa Afshar: Postwar Institutional Fractures Put the Principle of Velayat-e Faqih Itself in Dispute

Mousa Afshar, a member of the National Council of Resistance of Iran, said the most dangerous consequence of the recent war for Iran’s ruling establishment was not merely its military losses, but the breakdown of its decision-making center and the transformation of long-standing factional disputes into an existential struggle over the very foundation of the system of absolute clerical rule.

Afshar said the regime has tried to portray its mere survival as a victory, while ignoring the fact that this survival came after the loss of the head of the ruling hierarchy and a number of senior political and military commanders, amid a devastated economy and a society in which the causes of uprising remain fully present.

He noted that repeated incidents of censorship and abrupt broadcast interruptions on state media reveal the collapse of a unified official narrative. When parts of Mojtaba Khamenei’s messages are removed, or senior officials and lawmakers are cut off while discussing negotiations and agreements, it shows that the regime’s institutions no longer share a common interpretation of the new Supreme Leader’s position.

Afshar said the statement attributed to Mojtaba Khamenei that he had “a different view in principle” has become a weapon in the factional conflict. Hardline factions have used it to accuse the government and the Supreme National Security Council of bypassing the leadership, while rival factions have cited the same message as authorization for negotiations. This contradiction demonstrates that the Supreme Leader’s word no longer settles disputes as it once did.

He added that statements issued by members of the Assembly of Experts and parliament, attempts to impose red lines on diplomacy, and public accusations of betrayal and political coup among senior officials represent open institutional defiance. The fact that the Supreme Leader’s representative inside the IRGC was forced to order commanders and personnel to accept Mojtaba’s message as final further indicates that the split has reached the regime’s most sensitive security structures.

Afshar also pointed out that Khamenei’s funeral exposed, rather than concealed, these fractures. What was intended as a display of unity became a platform for attacks against Masoud Pezeshkian and Abbas Araghchi, who were accused of compromise and betrayal.

He concluded that the current crisis is not a temporary disagreement over negotiations, but a crisis of legitimacy, leadership, and survival. The regime has lost its former center of authority without creating a credible replacement, while economic pressure, public anger, and the organized Resistance continue to grow. The regime’s survival after the war therefore does not signify stability, but entry into a more fragile phase in which the institution of absolute clerical rule itself has become an object of internal conflict.