Iran-Israel conflict leaves Iranian Americans feeling helpless, hopeless

USA Today

4 hours ago

Iranian Americans with loved ones in Iran fear reignited war and say conflict could endanger those living in the US.
The texts began coming late one night from somewhere outside Tehran, shaking Shaghayegh Cyrous from her sleep. For more than two weeks, the Los Angeles-based artist had tried in vain to reach her parents, retired designers who live near the capital city of Iran, the country she left 14 years ago.
Israeli bombs had been hitting oil depots, military installations and nuclear facilities. The U.S. had just launched its own attack and worries were rising about a full-blown Middle East war.
Cyrous frantically made a video call. Her parents kept saying they were OK, but the Internet signal was so weak, she could barely see them.
'It's very terrifying,' said Cyrous, 38, who left for America in 2011 and declined to provide her parents' names, fearing for their safety. 'We're just trying to send prayers for peace. Sometimes, I feel both helpless and hopeless.... I don't want them to be in danger.'
As the conflict between Israel and Iran rests on a fragile ceasefire, Cyrous and other Iranian Americans expressed dismay at American involvement and fear for loved ones still in Iran, saying a resurgence in violence could ripple around the world.
'Iranian Americans are worried, obviously, about their loved ones,' said Neda Bolourchi, executive director of the Public Affairs Alliance of Iranian Americans.
Bolourchi said the national advocacy organization, based in Washington, D.C., has lobbied Congress to help Iranian Americans stay in touch with family and friends in Iran during times of crisis.
Reza Rajebi, an Iranian-born novelist and physician who now lives in Houston, said he worries daily about loved ones still living in his homeland.
'Like many in the diaspora, I live in two worlds,' said Rajebi, who came to the U.S. in 2005 and writes under the pen name Diako Hazhir. 'One is here in the U.S, where I work, making a living and care for my family. The other is in my mind, always carrying the weight of anxiety for those I love and all the people in Iran who have no escape.'
Those claiming to protect the oppressed have turned into oppressors
The situation, Rajebi said, represents a 'national tragedy' with roots in the 1979 revolution that vaulted Iran's theocratic regime to power.
'The leadership has made it clear that they would rather see the country burn than surrender their grip on power,' he said. 'Step by step, cell by cell, soul by soul, the holy men who once claimed to protect the oppressed transformed into oppressors.'
Trump this week told reporters he was not seeking regime change in Iran and scolded both sides for violating the ceasefire.
Lana Silk, the Iranian-born CEO of Transform Iran, an international Christian humanitarian organization with offices in Glendale, California, said among the broad emotions unleashed by the U.S. airstrikes were feelings of relief from those who resent the longstanding regime.
'These past days have felt surreal,' Silk said. 'What once seemed like a distant hope now feels within reach …. While any form of military engagement brings with it the heavy burden of civilian suffering, many Iranians are acknowledging that the strikes have delivered the most significant blow to the Islamic Republic in over four decades.'
Silk said the Iranian regime 'does not negotiate in good faith' and employs diplomacy as a deceitful stalling tactic designed to preserve the Islamic theocracy. 'As war unfolds and daily life is disrupted by severe shortages of essential resources, many Iranians are facing displacement and growing fear,' she said. 'In the midst of this suffering, there is a desperate cry not only for freedom but for a swift end to the violence – even if that means welcoming further international intervention.'
Firuzeh Mahmoudi, of Berkeley, California, agreed.
"It is well established that the Islamic Republic of Iran does not mind killing civilians indiscriminately," Mahmoudi said. "We saw this during the Women, Life, Freedom movement and again in Iran's attacks on Israel."
'Historical precedents don't show anything favorable'
War is not the means through which many Iranians want to achieve freedom after decades of undemocratic regimes that have combined religion and authoritarian control, said Nahid Siamdoust, a former journalist who grew up in Iran and is now a professor of media and Middle Eastern studies at the University of Texas, Austin.
'It's a very depressing moment for Iranians right now,' said Siamdoust, who left Iran at age 10 with her family. 'They are not happy with the Islamic Republic, and they do not want war and destruction, but the historical precedents don't show anything favorable.'
More than a third of the nearly 400,000 Iranian immigrants in the United States live in the Los Angeles area, and more than half overall are in California, according to the Migration Policy Institute, a non-partisan think tank based in Washington, D.C.
A national poll conducted last year by the Public Affairs Alliance of Iranian Americans said Iranian Americans were nearly divided on the 2024 presidential election. About 45% of Iranian Americans voted for Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee, and 41% percent for Trump, the GOP nominee.
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Until last weekend, Trump had pursued negotiations to end Iran's nuclear enrichment program but began warning of annihilation after Israel's June 13 attacks on the country's nuclear and military operations killed multiple military leaders and nuclear scientists.
Siamdoust said she is "saddened for my people," believing America's involvement further complicates matters.
"It does not appear to be the case of a one-and-done," Siamdoust said. "Trump said he would keep the U.S. out of these 'forever wars,' and the U.S. has just engulfed itself in yet another war in the Middle East that will cost Iranians dearly."
Fear that Iranian Americans could become targets
Persis Karim, an Iranian American and professor of comparative and world literature at San Francisco State University, said that as much as her family dislikes the regime, they've already lived through a war between Iran and Iraq in the 1980s that killed more than a million people combined. They don't want another one.
'They know what war looks like,' Karim said. 'It's messy, it's ugly, and it does not resolve a situation.'
While Karim, 63, doesn't believe Iran is innocent, "I think the negotiating table is the only wise choice,' she said.
However, she fears Iranians in the U.S. will be vilified "just like Latinos are vilified, just like Arabs were vilified and like we were vilified after 9/11."
That concern is shared by Bolourchi, of the Public Affairs Alliance of Iranian Americans, which had worked with the U.S. Justice Department's civil rights division to help fight discrimination and hate crimes against Iranian Americans. She worries the Trump administration's elimination of that unit earlier this year may put the community at risk of increased targeting should the conflict escalate.
'Iranian Americans constitute the fabric of our American society,' she said, and risk 'getting caught up in a resurgence of post-9/11 Islamophobia and hate, even though Jews, Christians and Baha'is make up who we are.'
A 'good omen' or 'more perilous than ever'?
Despite the dire situation in Iran, Mahmoudi said, many Iranians remain cautiously hopeful about the potential for change.
"It is heartwarming to see how unified Iranians (in Iran) are becoming, helping each other wherever they can," said Mahmoudi, founder and president of United for Iran, a non-governmental organization working to improve civil liberties in Iran. "Doctors are offering free medical support, strangers are opening their homes and assisting the elderly, and restaurant owners are providing free food. It's a good omen of what the future could bring."
Siamdoust said she feels for those back home just struggling to live normal lives.
'The country has among the best-educated young people in the Middle East," she said. "They don't deserve the tightrope they have been put on and … the devastation that is yet to come. They've worked so hard to bring about changes to their political and social circumstances.'
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Jamal Abdi, president of the National Iranian American Council, urged restraint and expressed concern for people living in the region who will suffer the consequences should tensions reignite.
'Our hearts are with everyone in Iran who has been impacted by this horrific war already and could soon be put at risk by the consequences of this outrageous choice to broaden the war,' he said in a statement. '… The way ahead seems more perilous than ever.'