Iranian Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi does not believe that it is necessary for the US to extract Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and put him on trial for his crimes, downplaying chatter that the US military may conduct such an operation, similar to the extraction of Maduro from Caracas, Venezuela.
Pahlavi's comments came during an interview with the Wall Street Journal's Tunku Varadarajan via Zoom, published on Monday.
"I think that change in Iran is ultimately in the hands of the people of Iran themselves," he affirmed.
"Many governments have reasons to hold Khamenei accountable, but I think it will be far more appropriate for this to be solely in the hands of the Iranian people, and to have world governments be supportive" of their fight to free themselves, he added.
"I don't think it’s a matter of any kind of outside intervention, either a military or a special ops kind, because I think the regime is collapsing. The regime is at its weakest."
Pahlavi also spoke about how the 2009 Green Movement protest group was "thrown under the bus" by the Obama administration. He also discussed how the protests following the murder of Mahsa Amini in 2022 were damaged as the Biden administration "allowed the Islamic regime to have access to over $200 billion of oil revenue they shouldn’t have had in the first place."
Pahlavi continued, "The regime utilized that money not to benefit the Iranian people and the economic situation, but to strengthen their proxies."
"This strengthening of proxies, in turn, led to the October 7 massacre, he continued.
"You have a very strong prime minister in Israel who is clearly on our side. I think that [US President Donald] Trump, unlike his predecessor, is definitely on a different path vis-à-vis what’s happening in Iran today. And you have Marco Rubio at the State Department. I believe he’s perhaps the first secretary of state ever since the Iranian revolution who truly gets it," Pahlavi said, praising the political echelons in both Jerusalem and Washington.
Pahlavi: Iran will form a 'Cyrus Accord' with Israel after the fall of the Islamic regime
Varadarajan asked Pahlavi if the crown prince believes Tehran would join the Abraham Accords after the fall of the Islamic regime.
"I think Tehran will elevate it to the 'Cyrus Accord' to make Iran part of that Abraham Accord group. That’s what I said two years ago when I was in Jerusalem and met with President Herzog and Prime Minister Netanyahu," he replied.
"I think there are only two countries on this planet that can claim to have a biblical relationship: Iran and Israel. This goes back 25 centuries. Cyrus the Great [c. 600-530 BCE] freed the Jewish slaves in Babylon and helped them rebuild their temple in Jerusalem," he noted.
"Today, we have serious water issues in Iran. The best experts in the field happen to be Israeli scientists. Part of the reason I went there is to discuss the matter with them and have a plan of action to immediately be able to attend to a problem that could become a major issue," he continued.
"This is not just rhetoric. Iranians believe that they will have a solid strategic partnership with Israel and with our Arab neighbors to make the Middle East get back on track. That’s part of the reason why the Abraham Accords were sabotaged by the regime in Iran," he added.