“He asked if one of us was willing to do a dance challenge to their new song. I said I would, and we still have the video, so it’s funny to see us interacting when we’d just met, without a clue of what was going to happen,” she smiled.
Neither of them imagined that the brief interaction would lead to a relationship that would bridge not only distance, but deep political and cultural divides.
“I asked her for the first date, but I wasn’t looking for a long-term relationship,” Armia said. “I never fell in love before and was a playboy until I met Yasmin.”
From the outset, their dynamic was anything but conventional but, today, as we talk on Zoom, it is obvious the bond runs deep.
“Our first date we were talking and I was very clear to girls that I don’t fall in love, and that girls fall in love with me,” he said.
Yasmin’s response was immediate. “I just laughed in his face. First off, I said, who said I’m going to be falling in love with you, and if anything, you’ll fall in love with me.”
Within weeks, their relationship intensified. “After two weeks she fell in love with me, and it took me three,” Armia said, sheepishly.
“Now we are two and a half years together, and we will get married next year.”
But what might have been a straightforward love story quickly became more complicated. Yasmin, whose father is Israeli with family roots in Iraq, admitted her first reaction upon learning Armia was Iranian was shaped by the realities of the region.
“I thought, ‘Oh my gosh, I just met the enemy.’ I didn’t know what to expect, it was the first Iranian I’d met,” she said, giggling.
“So when he asked me out, I didn’t know if I should do it… I called my mum and told her about it, because I thought it was funny, and she told me not to share my Israeli side. So that’s what I was planning on doing.”
That plan quickly dissolved.
“He asked me about my background, and I was just honest… I think I told him that I’d moved to Israel from Amsterdam and he just said, OK, cool.”
For Armia, the moment carried a different meaning. “When Yasmin said she was Israeli, I thought it was very interesting, thinking we would be like a symbol of love and that you don’t have to hate each other,” he said.
Their relationship accelerated rapidly but just as love blossomed, the world shifted.
“A week after our first date… October 7 happened and I was at his house when I found out,” Yasmin said. “Calling my family frantically in Israel… my dad in particular… I didn’t tell him that he was Iranian.”
Her family’s initial reaction was cautious when they were told Armia was Iranian. “Her father did a full background check on me, and I understand that,” Armia said. “I’m all over social media so it wasn’t hard.”
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Over time, attitudes softened. “It took a few months and they warmed up to it and realised Armia is just a normal person,” Yasmin said, relishing the story. “My father said that if I love him, he will love him like a son.”
For Armia, whose own life has been shaped by political repression in Iran, the relationship carried added emotional weight.
He left Iran at 18. “I ran away overnight because the book I wrote in Iran was too controversial… I had to leave with just $500 in my pocket,” he said. “I miss the places I grew up and want to show them to Yasmin.”
Seeing the war unfold is “a mixture of worry and hope that the regime will end”, he said. His music speaks longingly about his homeland, to which, under the current regime, he cannot return.
Watching the conflict from afar, the images are deeply meaningful. “I saw the police station they took me to many times to get hit,” he said.
“I got taken to the cell there a lot… for talking to a girl, for the clothes I wore. I was just 14 or 15 when I was first captured and hit over the head with a Kalashnikov before they bundled me into a police van,” he said. “I remember thinking I hated them.”
Their story, which the couple share on Instagram at @ArmiaandYasmin, has drawn both criticism and support.
“As a Persian, what was shocking was that even a lot of Israelis shared hateful comments when we went public,” he said. “I think what we are doing is beautiful,” he added.
For both, the relationship represents something larger than themselves. “That’s the power of love,” Armia said.
