In the complex politics of Iran, where public unity is a strategic necessity and disagreement is a sign of internal strife, the recent negotiations with the United States have exposed a visible, if carefully managed, fracture in the ruling elite’s messaging.
Over the past few weeks, as Iranian and American officials have circled one another across the diplomatic table, a nuanced but unmistakable divergence has emerged in how Iran’s most senior figures speak about the prospect of talks and a peace deal with the US and Israel.
In an unusual display of internal friction, Iranian media outlets linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) have issued rare and unusually sharp criticism of Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi.
The immediate trigger was an announcement Araghchi made on his personal X account on 17 April declaring that “in line with the ceasefire in Lebanon, the passage for all commercial vessels through the Strait of Hormuz is declared completely open for the remaining period of ceasefire.” While framed as a step towards de-escalation, hardline factions saw this as a major strategic and communications error.
Outlets linked to the IRGC, including the Tasnim News Agency and the Fars News Agency, accused Araghchi of “completely poor judgement in communication” and publishing a “bad and incomplete tweet” that created “misleading ambiguity”.
Their argument was threefold: the announcement lacked crucial context about a conditional reopening and Iran’s armed forces’ oversight; it failed to clarify that a US naval blockade would nullify the move, giving US President Donald Trump an opportunity to “claim victory”; and such a significant strategic announcement should not have been made on social media without coordination.
Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf added to the pressure by publicly stating that if the US blockade of the Strait of Hormuz continues, it “will not remain open”, directly contradicting the implication of a simple, unconditional reopening.
But the tweet was merely the spark that ignited long-standing conservative grievances with Araghchi’s diplomatic approach. For months, hardliners have viewed his overtures with suspicion. A major point of contention is Araghchi’s insistence that the US must drop its “excessive demands” to reach a deal, position conservatives fear signals a willingness to eventually negotiate on Iran’s uranium enrichment capabilities, which they consider inviolable “red lines”.
Statements by officials like Ebrahim Azizi, head of the parliament’s National Security Committee, reflect this hardline view, describing the negotiations as a “continuation of the battlefield”, where any talk of compromise is seen as weakness. Moreover, conservatives believe Araghchi is unilaterally shaping a narrative of progress and openness that undermines their more confrontational stance.
Thus, the criticism over the Hormuz tweet was as much about who controls the national security narrative as it was about the policy itself. The question, however, is whether these differences are genuine or performative. The answer, as with so much in Iran, is both – a combination of “good cop, bad cop” role-playing and real differences in tone.
President Masoud Pezeshkian, a reformist who rode a wave of popular discontent to gain office, finds himself in an extraordinary position: he is the civilian face of the regime but not the most powerful player in the new collective leadership.
Yet, he continues to speak diplomatically, even hopefully, recently telling reporters that his administration sees “good prospects” for nuclear talks and hopes to move the country beyond its protracted “neither war nor peace” existence.
His tone is grounded in reality: Pezeshkian’s constituency consists of Iranians exhausted by the country’s economic collapse and war fatigue, and his emphasis on diplomacy is a lifeline to a population that voted for change.
Araghchi, meanwhile, occupies a different register. A career diplomat who helped negotiate the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA – the nuclear agreement with Iran), he speaks the flexible, pragmatic language of transactional statecraft, describing the talks as an opportunity to strike an “unprecedented agreement” capable of addressing mutual concerns.
Then there is Ghalibaf, a former IRGC commander who has struck a markedly different note. “Iran reserves all options in dealing with the United States, both dignity-based diplomacy and regret-inducing defence,” he declared recently.
He also laid out what he called the “remaining major disagreements” in any potential talks with Washington, emphasising that trust is lacking, a step-by-step approach is essential, and fundamental issues remain unresolved.
“We are still far from the final points,” he said.
This is not framed as a criticism of the government’s negotiating team, but it serves a clear political function: by publicly emphasising distance and distrust, Ghalibaf is subtly marking out a more cautious, hardline position without breaking ranks. He is not fighting the executive branch; he is recalibrating its message. Ghalibaf represents the voice of the IRGC’s political wing, a faction that sees negotiation as a potential trap.
The reformist camp believes engagement with the US can reduce the pressure on the country and create economic breathing room, while the hardline camp believes negotiation risks weakening Iran’s deterrent capabilities and that the United States is fundamentally untrustworthy. These are not merely differences of tone; they are competing theories of survival.
To understand the depth of these views, one need only look at Iran’s newspapers. Reformist papers like Ham-Mihan and Shargh have struck an optimistic, almost technocratic tone, describing the talks with the US as progressing and hinting at a shift towards direct negotiations.
Ham-Mihan is managed by Gholamhossein Karbaschi, a former mayor of Tehran and a reformist politician who is close to former president Mohammad Khatami and his faction. However, this influential newspaper is facing financial difficulties and operational challenges.
Shargh is arguably Iran’s most prominent reformist daily newspaper. It is known for its centrist and pro-reform political stance and is often viewed as a counterweight to conservative papers like Kayhan.
On the other hand, hardline outlets like Kayhan and Farhikhtegan see the talks with the US as a trap, warning that Washington is lulling Tehran into complacency through negotiations while the US military prepares for a new round of aggression.
Farhikhtegan, a prominent daily closely associated with the Islamic Azad University (IAU), is often described as representing the views of senior regime figure Ali Akbar Velayati, who was the political and security adviser to the late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Velayati serves as the head of the IAU board of trustees. The newspaper is generally described as having a conservative or hardline stance. It often aligns with the views of the Paydari (Principlist) Front and has criticised diplomatic normalisation, warning against making any concessions to the United States.
Kayhan, widely regarded as a mouthpiece for the supreme leader’s ideological camp, has warned that the United States is inherently deceitful – “after shaking hands, count your fingers,” as one editorial recently put it – and says that Iran’s true strength lies in missiles, regional influence, and nuclear leverage, not in concessions.
Alongside Kayhan, the IRGC-linked Javan and the ultraconservative Vatan-e Emrooz have all run content sceptical of the talks with Washington.
Javan, part of a “media trifecta” along with the Fars and Tasnim News Agencies, is used by the IRGC to shape public opinion and disseminate official narratives. It promotes strict adherence to revolutionary ideals and frequently warns against Western influence, particularly from the US and Israel. The daily has taken hardline stances on the negotiations and has also advocated leveraging Iran’s military presence in the Gulf to command fees for passage through the Strait of Hormuz.
Vatan-e Emrooz is another daily widely considered to be a hardline outlet. It belongs to the Principlist camp and historically supported the administration of former president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
These divergences are not random; they reflect genuine differences in worldview between reformists seeking economic breathing room and hardliners prioritising strategic autonomy. Yet this pluralism is also permitted, even encouraged, by a regime that understands the value of controlled dissent.
Still, these are not the open factional battles that characterised the Ahmadinejad or Rouhani eras (of former president Hassan Rouhani). They are something more subtle, and perhaps more telling: a deliberate choreography in which each actor plays a prescribed role, yet the accumulated dissonance reveals genuine strategic tension at the system’s core.
The conventional wisdom in Western capitals has long held that Iran’s foreign policy is the product of a single, coherent will emanating from the office of the supreme leader. That was never entirely accurate, but it is demonstrably false today. The assassination of Khamenei and the decapitation of more than 50 senior security and military commanders have left Iran operating under an improvised, collective leadership structure that would have been unthinkable a year ago.
The new Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei, is reportedly badly injured, with his condition and whereabouts unclear. A small council composed of senior IRGC officials, the speaker of parliament, the head of the executive branch, army commanders, and former advisers to the late supreme leader now exercises effective control over core decision-making.
With Mojtaba Khamenei’s condition uncertain, power has devolved to a collective leadership that includes Pezeshkian, Ghalibaf, IRGC Commander Ahmad Vahidi, Judiciary Chief Gholam-Hossein Mohseni Ejei, and Mohammad Bagher Zolghadr, the new secretary general of Iran’s National Security Council.
This is not the tidy hierarchy of the Khamenei era; it is a messy arrangement. Sources have described a “tight network of trusted individuals”, with the IRGC effectively assuming control over key state functions and erecting a security cordon around the wounded supreme leader.
In this environment, figures like Velayati, Saeed Jalili, the former head of nuclear negotiations, and Mohsen Rezaei, the former commander of the IRGC, retain influence not through formal office but through networks of loyalty and expertise. They are the shadowy figures whose opinions still matter, even if they no longer command the levers of power.
The ideological foundations of the regime and its opposition to external domination remain intact, but beneath that shared canopy, disagreements over tone, tactics, timing, and trust have emerged into plain sight.
* A version of this article appears in print in the 23 April, 2026 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly.
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