Iran's 'paper tiger' leadership will fall, predicts Nobel peace laureate Ebadi
LONDON, June 25 (Reuters) - Iranian Nobel Peace Prize laureate Shirin Ebadi said on Wednesday Iran's war with Israel had revealed the weakness of its "paper tiger" leadership, predicting that Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei would be toppled in a peaceful revolution.
She spoke a day after a shaky ceasefire brokered by U.S. President Donald Trump took hold between Iran and Israel, ending a short but intense air war in which Israeli strikes seemingly targeted Iran's senior leadership at will.
"The people of Iran and the world saw that and realised what a paper tiger this administration is," Ebadi told Reuters in an interview in London, where she has lived in self-imposed exile since 2009.
Ebadi, a lawyer who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2003 for her work defending human rights, has been a staunch critic of the Shi'ite Muslim clerical establishment that has ruled Iran since 1979.
Security officials said Khamenei, 86, went into hiding during the conflict, which wiped out the top echelon of Iran's military leadership and killed its leading nuclear scientists.
"The people will not trust a leader who hides during times of war," Ebadi said. She said previous protests, such as those around the death of Iranian-Kurdish woman Mahsa Amini in 2022, had shown mass public support for change.
"I predict the people will succeed this time around and this regime will be gone."
There have been no signs of significant street protests against the Islamic Republic, with relief dominating the first response of many Iranians to the ceasefire.
While Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, a relative moderate, has said the atmosphere of national solidarity during Israel's attacks would spur domestic reform, hardline security organs have also moved swiftly to demonstrate their control with mass arrests, executions and military deployments, officials and activists have said.
"The regime is trying to compensate for its defeat by arresting the people," Ebadi said. "Because it fears that now that it has been defeated in this war, the people will find more courage and take to the streets."
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Daily Mail
18 minutes ago
- Daily Mail
Haitian migrants face mass deportation from America after dramatic update
Haitian migrants risk deportation from America after the Trump Administration terminated their temporary legal protections. On Friday, the Department of Homeland Security that it is terminating legal protections for hundreds of thousands of Haitians, setting them up for potential deportation. DHS said that conditions in Haiti have improved and Haitians no longer meet the conditions for the temporary legal protections. 'This decision restores integrity in our immigration system and ensures that Temporary Protective Status is actually temporary,' a DHS spokesperson said. 'The environmental situation in Haiti has improved enough that it is safe for Haitian citizens to return home.' The Department of State, however, has not changed its travel advisory and still recommends Americans 'do not travel to Haiti due to kidnapping, crime, civil unrest, and limited health care.' 'The decision today will leave returning Haitian citizens at very high risk of persecution, danger, homelessness. People have nowhere to go,' Pastor Dieufort Fleurissaint, of Boston, told The Boston Globe. 'You have a humanitarian collapse... The only hope we have is God. God and to call upon our friends and allies, elected officials, to advocate on our behalf, so these families can be protected and find a way to enact permanent solutions.' He told the outlet that migrants have been calling him left and right since the news dropped as they are now unsure what their and their children's futures look like and their employment. Massachusetts Representative Ayanna Pressley condemned DHS, writing on Bluesky: 'We should NOT be deporting anyone to a nation still dealing with a grave humanitarian crisis like Haiti.' Heather Yountz, senior immigration staff attorney at the Massachusetts Law Reform Institute, said the Trump Administration was revoking Haitian's protect 'simply to fulfill the harmful mass deportation he promised,' she told The Boston Globe. Haitian migrants who are in the US under a temporary protection status (TPS) will have to leave by September 2. The program ends on August 3, but it doesn't go into effect for a month. DHS advised TPS holders to return to Haiti using a mobile application called CBP Home. The majority of Haitian migrants live in Massachusetts and Florida. Gang violence has displaced 1.3million people across Haiti as the local government and international community struggle to contain an spiraling crisis, according to a recent report from the International Organization for Migration. The report warned of a 24 percent increase in displaced people since December, with gunmen having chased 11 percent of Haiti's nearly 12million inhabitants from their home. 'Deporting people back to these conditions is a death sentence for many, stripping them of their fundamental right to safety and dignity' Tessa Pettit, a Haitian-American who is executive director of the Florida Immigrant Coalition, told AP. Frantz Desir, 36, has been in the US since 2022 on asylum, but he says he is concerned by the Trump administration's decision to terminate their protections. 'You see your friends who used to go to work every day, and suddenly - without being sick or fired - they just can't go anymore. It hits you. Even if it hasn't happened to you yet, you start to worry: "What if it's me next?"' he told AP. Desir says his asylum court date was set for this year, but the judge rescheduled it for 2028. Desir lives in Springfield, Ohio, with his wife and two children, and he works in a car parts manufacturing plant. The US has also banned all flights to Port-au-Prince, the nation's capital, until September.
Daily Mail
18 minutes ago
- Daily Mail
Boy, 6, battling cancer is seized by ICE outside Texas courthouse
A Honduran mother has sued ICE and the Trump administration after she and her cancer-stricken six-year-old son were arrested by agents outside a Los Angeles immigration court. The woman, who is not named in court documents, said they violated her family's rights by detaining them at a Texas facility, despite their lawful efforts to seek asylum in the U.S. In a scathing petition filed in San Antonio federal court, her lawyers argue that the arrest was unconstitutional and traumatic, especially for her young son who has undergone chemotherapy for acute lymphoblastic leukemia. The young boy urinated on himself and remained in wet clothes 'for hours' during the traumatic arrest, according to the documents. 'They're asylum seekers fleeing from violence, who had an appointment at the border, were paroled into the country and the government made an assessment that they didn't have to be detained,' said attorney Kate Gibson Kumar of the Texas Civil Rights Project. 'There should be some sort of protection for this family, which is doing everything right.' The lawsuit claims the mother and her kids were taken into custody without warning on May 29, immediately after a judge granted dismissal of their asylum case at the government's request. The woman had objected, telling the court, 'We wish to continue [with our cases],' according to legal filings. The family - already facing death threats in Honduras - had been living in California with relatives while attending court hearings, going to church, and enrolling the children in local public schools. But shortly after leaving the courtroom, all three were arrested in the hallway by ICE agents and taken to a nearby facility, where they were allegedly held for hours. Her son, who was due for a medical check-up on June 5, missed the appointment due to the arrest. According to court documents, all three 'cried in fear' during the ordeal. They were later flown to San Antonio and transferred to the South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley, Texas - where they remain in detention. Kumar slammed the move as cruel and unnecessary. 'So often, you'll hear all the rhetoric in this country that immigrants should be doing it 'the right way,' and it's ironic in this case because we're in a situation where this family did it 'the right way' and they're being punished for it,' she told the Los Angeles Times. Kumar added that the government never gave the mother a chance to contest the detention before a neutral judge - violating her Fourth and Fifth Amendment rights. Federal officials pushed back, saying the case is unfolding lawfully. 'This family had chosen to appeal their case - which had already been thrown out by an immigration judge - and will remain in ICE custody until it is resolved,' said DHS assistant secretary for public affairs Tricia McLaughlin. As for the boy's cancer, McLaughlin noted that 'the minor child in question has not undergone chemotherapy in over a year, and has been seen regularly by medical personnel since arriving at the Dilley facility.' She also insisted that 'ICE ALWAYS prioritizes the health, safety, and well-being of all detainees in its care.' 'The implication that ICE would deny a child the medical care they need is flatly FALSE, and it is an insult to the men and women of federal law enforcement,' she said. But according to the lawsuit, the family was left in limbo - with the children crying each night and praying 'for God to take them out of the detention center.' The mother says her son went days without proper monitoring for his cancer. Her legal team is now asking a judge to block their deportation and to release them from detention, warning that returning to Honduras would place the family in grave danger.
The Sun
23 minutes ago
- The Sun
IDF ‘assassinates Hamas mastermind of October 7' who founded terror group's military wing in targeted Israeli airstrike
ISRAEL says it has killed one of the last masterminds behind the bloody October 7 attacks. Senior Hamas commander Hakham Muhammad Issa Al-Issa was "eliminated" in a targeted airstrike on Gaza City, according to the IDF. 1 The Israel Defense Forces said Al-Issa — described as a founding member of Hamas' military wing — was 'eliminated' in an operation on the Sabra neighbourhood. 'Issa led Hamas' force build-up, training, and planned the October 7 massacre,' the IDF posted on X. As Head of Combat Support, he advanced aerial & naval attacks against Israelis. 'The IDF & [Israel Security Agency] will continue to locate and eliminate all terrorists involved in the October 7 massacre.' According to Palestinian reports, Al-Issa was killed along with his wife and grandson, though this has not been independently confirmed. The IDF later said it had verified his death, according to The Jerusalem Post. Al-Issa is widely believed to have played a pivotal role in orchestrating the October 7 assault on southern Israel that triggered the current war, with terrorists slaughtering kidnapping dozens of innocent people. The military described him as a 'central knowledge figure' and a high-value target who was instrumental in building Hamas' training and weapons programmes. The IDF said in a statement: 'In the past, Issa led Hamas' force-buildup efforts in the Gaza Strip, was one of the founders of its military wing, served as Head of the Training Headquarters, and was a member of Hamas' General Security Council. 'Additionally, Issa played a significant role in the planning and execution of the brutal October 7 massacre.'
