Britain has become well acquainted with the more overt threat posed by the Islamic Republic of Iran. The regime has plotted against dissidents, journalists and Jewish targets here in the UK, and yet successive governments spent years debating how to deal with Tehran’s IRGC before the Starmer government finally designated the group. The reluctance to act decisively against so clear a danger ought to prompt a wider reassessment of how this country understands the threat from Tehran.
The stories reported by the JC underscore why. Cambridge University is investigating allegations concerning the doctoral thesis of Shirin Saeidi, an Iranian academic who has expressed support for the Islamic Republic, and the 2022 book published by Cambridge University Press based on the same research. Several former Iranian political prisoners cited in her work say that interviews attributed to them either never took place or were inaccurately represented, including in ways that “whitewash” the regime. Dr Saeidi has not responded to the JC’s request for comment and has previously argued that she is being targeted because of her research and political views.
Cambridge is right to have appointed an independent investigator, but the affair should also prompt institutional self-examination across British higher education. Where researchers have publicly expressed sympathies with authoritarian regimes, or have relationships with institutions associated with them, universities and academic publishers should be especially rigorous in examining methodology, sourcing and potential conflicts of interest.
Still more disturbing are the accounts given to the JC by British-Iranian dual nationals who say Iranian intelligence officers used detained relatives in Iran to pressure them into attending particular anti-Israel demonstrations in Britain. According to their testimony, they were told to publish photographs of themselves participating in these demonstrations on social-media, in the hope that compliance might assist relatives held by the regime.
These allegations demand investigation by the British authorities as they would amount to an especially sinister form of foreign interference: a dictatorship effectively using family members as hostages to manipulate political activity on British streets.
There is no suggestion that the British organisations whose demonstrations were named by those giving evidence to the JC knew of, still less participated in, such coercion. That distinction matters, but so does the regime’s interest in these protests. The persistent and extreme character of these anti-Israel marches has helped fuel antisemitism and political polarisation in Britain. Evidently, the regime sees value in their capacity to deepen sectarianism, hostility and division within British society. That demands attention not simply as a matter of public order, but of national security.
Aspects of this weekend’s Arbaeen procession in London provides another reminder of the problem. The display of Iranian regime symbols and images of the Islamic Republic’s leaders in central London warrants particular concern against the wider pattern of regime-linked activity in this country.
Britain has been far too complacent about Islamist extremism, both home-grown and foreign and that threat becomes more serious still when backed by the resources of a hostile state. The Islamic Republic possesses an intelligence apparatus, diplomatic representation, state media, religious and cultural institutions, money and networks extending deep into this country. Britain should therefore examine Iranian influence not merely through the prism of counter-terrorism but as a question of national resilience.
That means ensuring universities investigate credible allegations without fear or favour, Iranian dissidents can report threats without placing relatives at greater risk, and organisations, institutions and individuals with close connections to Tehran face oversight proportionate to the threat posed by the regime.
Britain has already been too slow to confront the terror threat from Tehran; it must now be quicker to recognise and counter the less visible ways the regime seeks to exploit and divide this country.
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