Over a 50-year career in academia and foreign service, Hooshang Amirahmadi has pretty much seen it all on Iran.
The Rutgers professor, 78, founded the transnational American Iranian Council, ran the Center for Iranian Research and Analysis, visited Iran during its war with Iraq to try to bring about a resolution, authored numerous books in English and Persian and even submitted bids to run for president of Iran in 2005, 2013 and 2017. (The mullahs disqualified him, presumably for his American ties and pro-democracy stances.)
Amirahmadi is also deeply ensconced in the U.S., where he’s served as director of Rutgers’ Center for Middle Eastern Studies and is one of the more prominent public figures to hold both American and Iranian passports, allowing him to travel freely between the countries. He’s appeared frequently on CNN, Fox and PBS.
Given how many impressions of Iran — or misimpressions of Iran? — have been permeating the news since the Israel-Iran War began on June 12, it seemed like the right moment to reach out to Amirahmadi, who often finds himself explaining the U.S. to Iran and vice versa. The Hollywood Reporter spoke to him a few days before the U.S. joined the war early Sunday morning by bombing Fordow and other key Iranian nuclear sites, in what President Donald Trump called a “spectacular military success.” Here are excerpts of the conversation.
So much of what we see of Iran on TV shows here is a restless populace eager to help anyone who opposes the regime. The Apple TV hit Tehran can make it seem like half the Iranian security establishment is working for the Mossad. How accurate is that representation?
Well, first you have so many Jewish people who are connected to Iran in some way. There are about 90,000 or 100,000 Jews still living in Iran. And it’s probably a lot more since there are all those who converted after the revolution so they could stay but at heart are still Jews. There are even people in the regime like this. So a lot of people in Iran, I don’t think that they’d all work for the Mossad of course, but they’re certainly open to doing things that are against the regime. So the shows are correct.
And they’re not worried about being seen as supporting the enemy.
A lot of Iranians have good feelings about Israel. The regime doesn’t. But the people don’t necessarily have an issue. In fact sometimes they’re proud of Iranians who have succeeded there — for example Shaul Mofaz [the Tehrani-born Israeli military hero and former Minister of Defense], he is someone even many Muslims are proud of. “An Iranian is a high-ranking member of a foreign government,”[they say]. These ties are stronger than you’d think.
And has that remained consistently true even through recent history?
No unfortunately not. The last 10 or 15 years it has gotten worse. When Israel started stepping up its killing of generals and nuclear scientists, I think that changed things for some Iranians. Not everyone — I’d say it’s still about 50-50. But it used to be a much higher number that were pro-Israel.
Are these attacks are upsetting even to Iranians who don’t like the regime? They don’t see the nuclear scientists as tools of that regime — of what they don’t like?
No because the nuclear scientists are not walled off like they are in some other countries. They’re professors — professors living in their communities. That’s why the killings have done so much to ruin Israel-Iranian relations.
Where do you think the current conflict will leave those relations?
Unfortunately it will increase animosity on both sides. When you have so much infrastructure destroyed on both sides — hospitals, roads, bridges, you name it — that’s going to happen. At the beginning. But. My hope is that it changes and it brings people together. Sometimes war does that. People need it so they can understand each other, can understand their common humanity. Human beings have used war that way. Why couldn’t that happen here?
Postwar Germany and the U.S. would certainly be a good example. OK, so let’s talk about American news organizations. When you watch CNN, do you think it captures how typical Iranians feel?
Iran unfortunately has been presented to Americans as a pariah state made up only of terrorists. It’s actually really a similar situation to what Iranian TV portrays vis-a-vis Israel — “they’re all terrorists.” And unfortunately it doesn’t seem to ever get better. I’ve worked on U.S.-Iran relations for more than 40 years and there’s still animus for Americans toward Iranians because of this.
It’s not necessarily all the networks’ fault, though, when it comes to showing a wider spectrum, is it? Part of the issue is getting direct news coverage from Iran, just getting reporters on the ground.
That’s obviously a challenge. Another big problem is that American universities produce very few Iran specialists. There used to be a lot, and now you have less, and those you do have tend to be American. They’re great but we really need more who aren’t just giving the American view.
We do have in the U.S. all these dissident movies from Iran. Just this past Oscar season we had The Seed of the Sacred Fig, which showed a younger generation opposed to the regime, and of course the Women, Life, Freedom protests of 2022 inspired director Mohammad Rasoulof to make the movie in the first place. Jafar Panahi, one of the most well-known dissident filmmakers in Iran, just won the Palme d’Or for his slyly political film It Wast Just An Accident. The images of dissatisfaction with the regime and interest in democracy that these films platform — how representative are they?
What people don’t remember is that Iran was the most pro-American country in the Middle East before the revolution. Why would that change? People below 50 or 60 may not remember. But people above 50 or 60 do, and they can help the younger people.
You don’t think even the older people have been influenced by the regime and its propaganda?
No, I think the Iran street is actually very pro-American. It’s the regime that isn’t. If you want to see anti-American go to the streets of Saudi Arabia, where 35% of the people live below the poverty line. Not the palace. The palace, the so-called pro-American palace, that’s just billionaires having fun. Trust me, they are not pro-American. In 10 years they’ll have the most anti-American country in the region. The average Iranian is ten times more pro-American than the average Saudi. Many Iranians, even if they’re Muslim in name, they’re secular, and they can be either socialist or capitalist, just like Americans. The Iranian economy is a capitalist economy. But we tend to see things from a political lens and a regime lens and we don’t realize that.
It’s always striking to me when talking about Iran and Israel how despite being mortal enemies they’re actually united by being outliers — two large non Arab-majority countries in the Middle East. That detail can really gets lost, especially when other Muslim countries in the region are held up as bigger American allies.
In Iran the regime is anti-American and the street is pro-American. And in Saudi it’s the reverse. But of course it’s the street that should matter more. The regime changes. The street doesn’t.
These are not nuances that necessarily come through on American television news coverage.
I mean you have Ted Cruz telling Tucker Carlson he doesn’t even know the population of Iran. I think many Americans understand these differences but our leaders on television don’t give me a lot of hope.
Given that a war doesn’t tend to make for the most humanizing effects, what’s going to ensure the most accurate American perceptions of the Iranian people in your view?
We need to see ordinary Iranians on television, not just the regime in the news. Someone needs to make a show [in Hollywood] where the main characters are Iranians in Iran. That’s what will make for a deeper understanding.