After preliminary jubilation, some Iranian Individuals worry a quagmire

Software program engineer Arin Saghatelian shed no tears when he heard that the supreme chief of his fatherland had been killed by American bombs.

“I don’t assume you’re going to seek out many individuals in assist of that dictatorship or the mullahs which might be in energy proper now,” stated Saghatelian, who lives in La Crescenta and fled Iran along with his household when he was 10. “I feel the world is a greater place immediately.”

However the fleeting aid that Saghatelian, 45, felt final week as an exile from Iran shortly turned to the dread he feels as an American citizen and taxpayer: What if his adopted nation will get sucked into one other lengthy, lethal and costly battle just like the struggle in Iraq?

After the preliminary jubilation in “Tehrangeles” and different native Iranian American communities, with 1000’s taking to the streets to have a good time the demise of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the tone of some conversations this week grew extra sober.

As Iranian Individuals like Saghatelian watch the speedy escalation of the struggle that started with U.S. and Israeli bombs falling on Iran, some worry that their native nation, and maybe the entire Center East, may descend into chaos.

In Iraq, after a U.S. invasion toppled dictator Saddam Hussein in 2003, sectarian leaders stepped into the vacuum. The long-simmering rivalry between Sunni and Shiite Muslims erupted right into a civil struggle that killed tens of 1000’s of civilians.

Roozbeh Farahanipour, a former Iranian dissident who now lives in Los Angeles, worries {that a} destabilized Iran, with its complicated cultural heritage and patchwork of ethnic and non secular teams, may devolve right into a far worse mess than post-invasion Iraq.

“It’s extra sophisticated ethnically, civically and traditionally,” so a protracted struggle there “just isn’t going to be like Iraq — it’s going to be 10 occasions worse,” he stated.

Of the 600,000 or so Iranians dwelling within the U.S., about half are in California, in keeping with the Iranian Diaspora Dashboard produced by UCLA’s Heart of Close to Japanese Research. By far the most important surge in immigration adopted the 1979 Islamic Revolution that despatched the U.S.-backed shah into exile and swept non secular hard-liners into energy.

Spiritual minorities, together with Christians and Jews, make up a bigger share of the expatriate neighborhood within the U.S. than they do in Iran — they’ve extra cause to depart — however Islam remains to be the dominant faith amongst Iranians right here, stated Kevan Harris, an affiliate professor of sociology who teaches programs on Iran and Center East politics on the UCLA Worldwide Institute.

Those that fled the revolution, and the hard-line Islamic rule that adopted, usually think about themselves exiles from their residence nation. However the stream of migrants has remained so regular that half of the Iranian-born individuals within the U.S. arrived after 1994, Harris stated.

The politics of youthful Iranian immigrants, who come to the U.S. for every kind of causes, and eat the complete vary of content material out there on-line, are extra various than these of their older compatriots.

Professional-Palestine protesters maintain a rally in entrance of campus police at UCLA on March 11, 2025.

(Juliana Yamada / Los Angeles Instances)

For instance, the UCLA college students protesting Israel’s struggle in Gaza final yr arrange their encampment not removed from Harris’ workplace window. He acknowledged some Iranian American college students contained in the makeshift compound, whereas others lined up exterior with counterprotesters.

“There are sufficient Iranians within the U.S. now, particularly in L.A., that one can find them on each aspect of most conflicts,” Harris stated.

Saghatelian, the software program engineer, fled after years of struggle that started with Iraq’s invasion of Iran in 1980 and took the lives of practically 1,000,000 individuals. His dad and mom wished to make it possible for he and his older brother would by no means get sucked into such slaughter.

As a child, Saghatelian was compelled to flee his Tehran neighborhood throughout Iraqi bombardments.

“So I had actual, private curiosity in seeing Saddam fall,” he stated.

However he additionally remembers the nightmare that adopted. All of the army and civilian deaths, all the fee to U.S. taxpayers.

“As an American citizen, I fear about that occuring once more,” he stated.

And he worries that his American-born pals, who’ve loved comparatively peaceable lives, don’t notice how shortly issues can slide into disaster.

As Christian Armenians, his household had it fairly good below the shah of Iran, Saghatelian stated, and didn’t undergo that a lot within the fast aftermath of the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

“Because the non secular mullahs got here to energy, they nonetheless revered the Armenian neighborhood. We acquired to maintain our church buildings,” Saghatelian stated. “However yearly, there was increasingly more strain. You’re virtually like a second-class citizen.”

Different ethnic minorities had it worse, Saghatelian stated: “In case you had been Jewish, the extra hard-line the nation acquired, the extra hazard you had been in.”

After fleeing Iran, Saghatelian’s household spent two years in refugee camps in Germany and Austria. At one level, they had been kicked out of the Austrian refugee program and have become homeless till a Catholic priest took them in and made them caretakers of a medieval church.

However like so many others fleeing Iran, his household’s plan was to discover a approach to america, which they lastly did, settling in Glendale when he was 12.

Since then, he has targeted on constructing his life right here, with no actual need to return. However he has stored an eye fixed on circumstances in his native nation through the years, and his mom stays in contact with an uncle who remains to be there.

“It’s a phenomenal nation. I might love to have the ability to go to freely as a United States citizen,” he stated.

“Regime Change in Iran” indicators and pictures of Reza Pahlavi, the exiled son of Iran’s final shah, will be seen in a lot of store home windows on Westwood Boulevard as neighborhood members and enterprise homeowners react to the U.S. and Israel bombing Iran..

(Jason Armond / Los Angeles Instances)

However he doesn’t assume the Iranian authorities will quit with out a lengthy combat, nor does he consider the Trump administration has a long-term plan.

Farahanipour, 54, additionally considers himself an exile. In the summertime of 1999, he was a 27-year-old journalist in Tehran who grew to become a recognizable determine in a pupil protest motion that known as for a free press, the top of presidency censorship and equal rights for girls. Some, together with him, publicly known as for Khamenei to resign — which was unthinkable on the time, Farahanipour stated.

In response, the regime shut down a widely known reformist newspaper, despatched safety forces into a school dormitory and beat and jailed college students who participated in public demonstrations.

On July 12, 1999, Khamenei took to the nationwide airwaves and known as the scholars “rioters” and pawns of international enemies. Removed from being discouraged, Farahanipour stated, he was in awe. Forcing Khamenei to reply was “the proudest second of my life,” he stated, smiling on the reminiscence.

However he didn’t have a lot time to bask within the glory.

“I obtained a demise sentence from the regime,” he stated, as calmly as others may say they acquired a parking ticket. Then got here three fatwas — non secular decrees — calling for his demise, he stated.

That was after years of seeing relations and acquaintances get “arrested, tortured and executed” by the federal government.

“They hated me and I hated them. It was a two-way avenue,” he stated, which left him with just one alternative: in search of asylum in america.

Roozbeh Farahanipour, proprietor of Delphi Greek restaurant in Westwood, stands for a portrait as neighborhood members and enterprise homeowners locally react to the of bombing of Iran.

(Jason Armond / Los Angeles Instances)

He has lived in Los Angeles since 2000, opening a few eating places. In 2017, he grew to become an American citizen, arriving at that momentous determination whereas strolling in a Westwood cemetery.

“This can be my closing handle,” he thought.

Nonetheless, he couldn’t look away from the information earlier this yr when a collapse of the Iranian foreign money drove individuals into the streets, sparking a brutal authorities crackdown that killed 1000’s of protesters.

When Farahanipour heard about Khamenei’s demise, he popped the cork from a champagne bottle and celebrated “the happiest second of my life.”

However like Saghatelian, he quickly started considering of Iraq.

Shortly after the collapse of Hussein’s ruling celebration, crowds looted authorities places of work and cultural websites. Heavy infrastructure injury from the U.S. bombing led to continual and fixed failure of the electrical and water programs in main cities — making them virtually unlivable, particularly within the sweltering summers.

On the peak of the sectarian struggle, components of Baghdad had been so riddled with impromptu militia checkpoints that many Iraqis began carrying two official-looking IDs — one real and the opposite a forgery with a final identify and birthplace related to the opposite sect.

Selecting which to current, particularly in closely contested neighborhoods, was like tossing a coin together with your life within the stability.

“We don’t have a superb monitor report,” Faranhipour stated. “What number of American lives did we waste in Afghanistan? How a lot cash did we waste over there simply to interchange the Taliban with the Taliban?”

He’s praying america received’t get slowed down once more.

“Hopefully the president and his workforce know what they’re doing,” he stated. “They need to declare victory and withdraw.”