The recent escalation in tensions between the United States and Iran has renewed concerns about Tehran’s potential use of terrorism as an instrument of statecraft. In this article, Ebrahim Roshandel examines how the Islamic Republic employs two complementary dimensions of terrorism—ideologically driven religious terrorism and geographically targeted terrorism—to advance its strategic objectives. The article argues that the regime’s systematic use of ideological indoctrination, public persuasion, and asymmetric warfare provides the foundation for state-sponsored terrorism, while recent rhetoric from Iranian officials suggests an increasing willingness to extend terrorist threats beyond the Middle East, including against targets in the United States. By analyzing the regime’s ideological framework, operational methods, and evolving threat posture, the article offers important insights into Iran’s terrorism strategy and its implications for homeland security and counterterrorism policy.
In this article, it is appropriate to develop a deeper understanding of the conduct of the Islamic Republic in its use of terrorism in two distinct forms.
- Ideologically-BasedReligious Terrorism
Although the nature of terrorism is not confined to its ideological dimension, the purpose of this section is to examine the behavioral characteristics of the Islamic Republic and the manner in which, through a process of threat amplification by means of ideological terrorism, it seeks to organize forces within its own structure to promote state-sponsored terrorism in opposition to viewpoints that do not conform to its extremist positions.
This radical and extremist pattern of conduct, from recruitment to operational activity, is not confined to a particular territory. Rather, its defining boundaries are set by its ideological aspirations and its pursuit of domination through the propagation of political Islam. Consequently, the scope and geographical reach of terrorist objectives, as conceived within the ideological framework of political Islam, are fundamentally transnational. The Islamic Republic has therefore aligned its entire conduct with this framework for generating threats through the systematic management of terrorism.
- The Method of Ideological Assimilation and Public Persuasion
The harmonization of beliefs with the ideological framework of political Islam to mobilize terrorist forces, together with the systematic use of public persuasion, constitutes a permanent instrument within the Islamic Republic’s political system.
Since the Iranian regime relies on public persuasion to mobilize ideologically committed individuals and possesses the organizational capacity to recruit and deploy such forces, the use of persuasion to legitimize terrorist activities has become one of the regime’s principal instrumental policies.
What is particularly significant in this regard is that there is generally a period of time between the regime’s policy of criminalizing and demonizing its opponents and its eventual decision to eliminate them. This interval facilitates the gradual process of public persuasion, thereby enabling the regime’s terrorist actions to acquire a measure of public justification before they are carried out.
- Geographically-BasedTerrorism
Within this methodological framework, the pursuit of national interests is the central axis of policymaking. Accordingly, a defined geographical area is designated for the operational activities of the regime’s terrorist forces.
The Islamic Republic’s management of public opinion has repeatedly demonstrated that, when it must secure public acceptance for advancing its ideological objectives, it ultimately resorts to the preservation of national sovereignty and the imperative of defending national interests as justification for assassinating or eliminating its opponents, whether they are Iranian citizens or foreign nationals.
In light of the foregoing discussion regarding the Islamic Republic of Iran’s capability to employ both dimensions of terrorism—ideological and territorial—the following question naturally arises:
Given the unprecedented escalation of military confrontation between the Islamic Republic and the United States, which began on February 28, 2026, following the death of Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, does the Islamic Republic have the capability to regenerate terrorist threats on a more advanced scale and to extend them into the territory of the United States itself?
In addressing this question, it is first necessary to conduct a realistic assessment of the Islamic Republic’s capacity to revive modern terrorist threats, as well as the potential scope and geographic reach of such threats. Such an assessment enables us, at a minimum, to understand the regime’s operational capabilities and its capacity to carry out terrorist operations.
The first and perhaps most important consideration is that, given the regime’s extensive experience in managing asymmetric warfare, its substantial human resources, and the considerable investments made over many years by its destabilizing institutions in developing instruments of coercion and intimidation, it is only natural that the regime would once again resort to methods and instruments that have previously produced results it considers effective.
Because of military attacks against Iran by the United States and Israel, the territory of the United States has now become part of the regime’s designated target environment. It should be recognized that, despite its inability to conduct conventional military attacks against the United States comparable to those directed against Iran, the Islamic Republic is likely to seek retaliation through terrorist means.
It is therefore reasonable to conclude that, in the course of escalating threats directed even at American citizens, the regime may gradually move beyond an exclusively ideological model of terrorism and increasingly adopt forms of territorially based—or urban—terrorism.
Reviews of statements made by official circles within the Islamic Republic indicate a strong motivation to extend terrorist attacks into the territory of the United States. Some of these statements have appeared intermittently in Iranian media outlets.
The scattered yet mutually reinforcing statements emerging from official and semi-official media circles in the Islamic Republic suggest that, should the regime decide to operationalize terrorist threats on American soil:
- It has already arrived at a clearly defined hierarchy of targets. At the highest level are officials of the United States Government, foremost among them President Donald Trump. The second tier consists of senior political and security officials, while American citizens themselves constitute the third category of intended targets, primarily to generate fear and intimidation.
- Assessments based on the methods and instruments cited in the statements of those advocating terrorist attacks indicate that, in the view of the Islamic Republic’s military leadership, the operational experience accumulated by the Quds Force in planning, executing, and managing asymmetric warfare against American military forces in Iraq has been considered successful. According to this line of reasoning, those operational experiences could once again be recreated and adapted to urban operational environments.
Advocacy for terrorist methods within the United States has appeared with increasing frequency—albeit in cautious language—in statements by proponents of confrontation with the United States in Iranian state media and in public interviews conducted under the banner of the regime’s “revenge.” These themes have been repeatedly expressed, including in remarks by former Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki, broadcast on Iranian state television. These cases represent only a small portion of the broader pattern of threatening statements and rhetoric.
– 11 January 2026 – Hassan Rahimpour Azghadi: During a televised program, he stated that if the conflict continued, operations against U.S. targets, including those on U.S. soil, could be considered legitimate, and that Donald Trump “must pay the price” for his actions.
– 1 May 2026 – Hassan Rahimpour Azghadi: He stated that if the war resumed, the Islamic Republic and its allied forces should broaden the scope of their attacks and that U.S. leaders should not feel safe in their own country.
May 26, 2026 – Mostafa Khoshcheshm:
Mostafa Khoshcheshm, an analyst on the IRIB’s Ofogh TV channel, warned that the transformation of a regional war into a transregional conflict should not be interpreted as a missile-related threat. He emphasized that this would mean carrying out operations on U.S. soil.
13 June 2026 – An Iranian regime-affiliated analyst on IRIB’s Ofogh TV channel stated:
“We are not going to fight the United States on Iranian soil; rather, we must take the war to U.S. territory.”
It should also be noted that the Quds Force and the armed forces of the Islamic Republic have publicly promoted the conduct of terrorist operations inside the United States under what they describe as the Iranian Armed Forces’ “Long Arm Doctrine.”
– 26 June 2026 – Hassan Rahimpour Azghadi: He called for a bounty to be placed on Donald Trump and spoke of the need to activate supporters of the Islamic Republic in the United States to take action against U.S. officials.
– Early July 2026 – Manouchehr Mottaki: Iran’s former foreign minister stated during a televised program that the Iranian people “have the right” to target Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu as qisas (retribution), and claimed that he was personally pursuing the matter and laying the groundwork for such action. He also claimed that he was personally working to facilitate such action.
– 4 July 2026 – Ali Ozmaei: The commander of the IRGC Navy stated that “revenge” against the United States was near and emphasized that the Islamic Republic’s response to U.S. attacks would continue.
Indeed, the deliberate emphasis placed by agents of the Islamic Republic on the prospect of terrorist operations within the United States—particularly through references to the perceived effectiveness and operational experience associated with roadside bomb attacks employed by the Quds Force under the command of General Qassem Soleimani against American forces in Iraq—increases the possibility that certain terrorist tactics may be adapted to the context of urban terrorism. Such adaptations could include the placement of explosive devices in public locations or along heavily traveled highways through individuals recruited from members of Latin American drug cartels. During recent weeks, public promotion of such terrorist threats against the United States by representatives of the Islamic Republic has exceeded ten separate instances.
The Islamic Republic’s use of terrorism extends beyond traditional proxy warfare, combining ideological mobilization with geographically targeted operations to advance its strategic objectives. As tensions with the United States have intensified, official rhetoric has increasingly endorsed terrorist retaliation against U.S. interests and, potentially, the homeland itself. While it remains uncertain whether these threats will translate into operational attacks, they warrant close attention from policymakers and security professionals. Understanding how Iran integrates ideology, public persuasion, and asymmetric warfare into its broader security strategy is essential for anticipating emerging threats and strengthening preventive counterterrorism measures.
