Investigative Journalist Lisa Daftari on Iran’s Uprising and the War Reshaping the Middle East
DAVE GORDON
The joint U.S. – Israel military campaign against Iran began not as a war of choice, but as a necessity. The attacks were a rapid and calibrated response to an onslaught of Iranian provocations over decades, that had pushed the region to the brink. Within days of precision strikes on Iranian command centers, defense analysts described what followed as a cascade of falling dominoes within the Islamic regime. Dozens of senior military and intelligence figures were eliminated, command communication fractured, and the once-formidable Revolutionary Guard showed signs of internal collapse.
The February 28th strikes came after weeks of protests that left a reported 90,000 Iranian demonstrators killed by the regime, and a total regime-led internet blackout of 90 million Iranians.
Tehran’s leadership appeared increasingly desperate, after a series of drone and missile strikes extended to eleven countries, including neighboring Muslim countries once considered off-limits.
For Washington and Jerusalem, the calculus was clear. After years of containment and deterrence, Tehran’s behavior left no diplomatic option. The ensuing strikes – swift, surgical, and devastating – signaled not escalation for its own sake, but the defense of global stability from a regime unmoored from restraint.
Award-winning investigative journalist and foreign policy expert Lisa Daftari weighs in exclusively for Community, clarifying the many layers needed to understand the conflict.
Born in New Jersey to Persian Jewish parents who met in the United States and married in Iran, Daftari brings to her journalism a deeply personal connection to the Iranian story. Even as a graduate student, she gravitated toward stories connected to Iran, producing an investigative documentary on an underground Iranian political and freedom movement that was later screened in the U.S. Congress.
Her early professional years took her into the world of Washington think tanks, where she researched Middle Eastern politics and terrorism, and produced detailed reports for the Pentagon and other government bodies. Immersed in policy debates on Iran, divestment, and regime behavior, she attended legislative hearings and compiled extensive research on Iranian youth movements and opposition networks.
Over the years, she has been a frequent guest and analyst on Fox News, as well as appearing on networks including CBS, NBC, and PBS.
As Editor-in-Chief of The Foreign Desk, a digital news platform she founded, Daftari oversees coverage of global affairs with a particular emphasis on how events abroad reverberate in American policy and domestic life. The outlet covers topics ranging from Iran’s internal unrest and nuclear ambitions to persecution of religious minorities in the Middle East and cyber threats originating from hostile regimes.
Over the course of her career, Daftari has covered some of the most significant developments in contemporary Iranian history, from the Green Movement and subsequent waves of protest to the ongoing 2025–2026 demonstrations sparked by economic collapse, corruption, and demands for political change.
This interview has been edited for brevity.
What is different about this recent wave of protests compared to earlier uprisings?
That’s a great question. One of the things I often talk about is the evolution of the protesters in Iran. So for years, we saw protests, but the Western world didn’t know what to make of them. We saw the Green Revolution (2009-2010). It was called a protest for reform because it was over a fraudulent election. Then after that, we saw the Iranians just starting to dabble with the concept of regime change. If you fast forward to the “women, life, freedom” protest (2022) [this protest movement launched after the death of a young Kurdish woman who was arrested by the morality police for not wearing her hijab properly], they began to be very clear – this is not just about women’s rights, but it’s about the entirety of the regime.
Really, all ages, all socioeconomic brackets [are involved] – and I think that’s an important part of this [current protest], that is really [happening] across the country. Iran is a diverse patchwork of different ethnicities, but right now they’re very much united in their message, and that is the message of regime change.
It’s almost the perfect storm. You have the regime at its weakest point ever, economically. The economy in Iran is in the downward spiral in terms of its proxies. They have been severely diminished by Israel the aftermath of the October 7th war.
And then, with regards to their weapons and nuclear program, we are just coming off of the 12 Day War [with Israel] in June, which severely degraded and also humiliated the regime, although they will not admit it. Then you have Bibi Netanyahu in Israel and Donald Trump in the United States, both leaders who have the moral courage to look beyond their terms in office, and look at the Middle East as a place where they can make significant change, and reset the entire region for decades to come.
I think this is going to put the Abraham Accords on steroids. What we’re seeing right now in the Middle East is a complete reset, with the Iran regime shooting indiscriminately into civilian areas, into these Arab states. We’re seeing realignment with Israel and its neighbors, and really seeing, hopefully, a new day for the Iranian people, for the region, and for global security.
How many people have taken to the streets in Iran so far, and how many people have been killed by the regime? Do we have those numbers?
It’s hard to verify. You’re not going to get real numbers from the regime, and there’s no way to really tell. But I would even say the numbers that we’re seeing are significantly higher than that [which the regime reports]. What we’re seeing quoted is 30 to 50,000 protesters killed.
There is consensus among Iranians of all 31 provinces. This is significant. Iran being twice the size of Texas. All generations are coming out onto the streets. We’re talking about millions of people, in a country of 90 million, because this is something worth sacrificing for.
The regime has responded with internet blackouts, arrests, and killings. What are you hearing from your sources inside Iran about how people are going about their daily lives?
It’s a great question. You know, the way I describe the Iranian people right now is with an “anxious optimism.” Obviously, nobody wants bombs coming over their heads. But imagine a people so desperate for change, so desperate for basic freedoms. We can’t understand this here in the West, but they are so desperate for basic freedom that they were asking for military intervention on their soil.
I think that that’s being lost in the mainstream media coverage of all this. They are trying to stay safe. A lot of people have gone out of the major cities for safety.
The Achilles heel of this regime has always been the people of Iran coming out in grassroots fashion, and rising up. They showed us in 2009 they were the first people on earth to use social media in an integrated effort, to tell the world their stories. They became citizen journalists. They were sending us videos and sending us stories, and telling us their stories without any reporters on the ground. So they [regime members] do the blackout, because they don’t want people to organize and to let one another know about where the next protest will be, or how they should organize politically.
You support the return of Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi. Why?
I support him for many reasons. From the time I was a child, my dinner table conversations revolved around this nostalgia about Iran that my parents carried with them to the United States. I was born in the United States. I was born after the revolution, but I inherited this nostalgia for a time under the Shah of Iran that my parents told me about. My mother went to university (in Iran), and she wore trendy outfits. They spoke of such a glorious time. The younger generation inherited their parents’ stories, too.
They want to go back to the glorious times of Iran. They are very cognizant of the fact that their country went backwards in the last 47 years instead of going forward.
I have had the honor of interviewing Pahlavi many times, getting to know him. I interviewed his wife. More recently, I interviewed his daughter, getting to know their family. They have become the guardians of this civilization. Pahlavi hopes to be a transitional leader – giving the Iranian people what they want, and putting them on the right course to reclaim their country and determine their future.
What signals do you look for to determine whether or how the US-Israel strikes are making a real difference?
It’s so interesting to me to watch the mainstream media and the political opponents here and around the world, whether they’re in Europe or the Middle East or in the United States, be so impatient. They’re asking: how are we going to dismantle a five decade tyranny in a week?
I think it really warrants more patience. I’m very much enthused, as I listen to briefings by the president, also by the IDF, as to what targets they’re hitting, and what their plans are. I’m enthused to hear that they are ahead of schedule. They’ve hit thousands of targets and eliminated fifty members of Iranian top-tier leadership. That’s a huge win for this war and for the Iranian people’s morale. If we don’t remove the regime now, we’ll maybe face nuclear weapons, more ballistic missiles, more proxy attacks, and an existential threat to Israel and the entire Middle East. I know the Arab countries being shot at now feel the same way.
There is no scenario in which this regime should be left with remnants [of munitions].
During a press conference on March 12, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made a striking remark. “In these days, my team and I are weaving additional alliances with countries in the region, alliances that only a few weeks ago would have seemed unimaginable.” Is there code behind that? What does that mean?
I think it’s actually very clear that he’s talking about alliances with countries that now understand this threat better, clearer, than ever before. So, just as an example, the Qataris were housing and funding Hamas, and now Iran regime missiles are falling into Qatar.
The same goes for a long list of Persian Gulf Arab states that are now on the receiving end of the fury of this tyrannical maniac regime. I think that we’re looking again at a reset of the Middle East. We’re looking at an entirely new day on the horizon for the Middle East. I think for many years, a lot of us have been saying it, but now it’s become clear on the military battlefield.
If we remove the Iran regime, we will remove the biggest obstacle for Middle East security for decades to come, if not for generations to come. I think that that’s exactly what Netanyahu was referring to. This is the tremendous impact the removal of this regime will have on global security.
There is some discussion over what happens if the United States decides to halt operations before Israel is ready to do so. What does that situation look like, and how could that be handled?
I interviewed Ambassador Dr. Yechiel (Michael) Leiter, Israel’s ambassador to the United States, and posed the same question to him. He said very emphatically that the United States and Israel have never been so closely aligned from the beginning of this war to this very moment. So I’d like to echo his sentiments.
What message do peace-loving Iranians in Iran wish to send to the West?
I receive many videos, whether people are talking straight to the camera, or they are showing me graffiti, or they are dancing and praising Bibi and Donald Trump, for this very courageous effort. They look at this as a rescue mission.
Donald Trump saw an opportunity to end a war that started 47 years ago. From the first days of this regime, they said “Death to America.” They burned American flags, and then they took American hostages, and they started targeting our assets, and targeting our service members.
In the region, Iran was the number one state sponsor of terror. They put every dollar they had either into their nuclear program, their ballistic missile program, or into their proxies. The Iranian regime tried to train people to hate Israel and hate America, but that’s not the people of Iran. We love America. We love Israel. I think that they [the Iranian people] look forward to joining the global community and being free of this regime. So, they are grateful for this rescue mission.