Among the slogans chanted by protesters across Iran in the last two weeks, many have been calling for the return of the country’s monarchy.
“This is the last battle. Pahlavi will return,” demonstrators were seen shouting in video reviewed by CNN. “Javid Shah (long live the king)!” they cried. “Reza Shah, God bless your soul!”
The man they were referencing, Reza Pahlavi, is the exiled son of Iran’s last shah, the Persian word for king.
Based in the US, he has sought to position himself as a de facto leader, declaring support for the protests and issuing direct calls for coordinated nationwide action.
Pahlavi’s father Mohammad Reza Pahlavi was ousted during Iran’s 1979 revolution. Pahlavi was aged 16 at the time.
In the years since, support for the deposed monarchy became taboo in Iran. Analysts say that it is unclear what might be driving the renewed excitement for the royal family in Iran.
Arash Azizi, an academic and author of the book “What Iranians Want,” told CNN that, while Pahlavi “has turned himself into a frontrunner in Iranian opposition politics,” he is also a “divisive figure and not a unifying one.”
The rallying around Pahlavi is the surest sign, analysts say, that Iran’s Islamic Republic appears to have hit a dead-end.
“Iranians aren’t opting for (Pahlavi) because he is present in the community but because they are despondent,” said Vali Nasr, an Iran expert and professor at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies.
Watch more about Pahlavi below and read about him in our full profile here.
Who is Reza Pahlavi, the son of Iran’s ousted Shah?
Nearly 50 years after Iran’s revolution, the son of the ousted Shah of Iran is drawing renewed attention as protests spread. CNN’s Jomana Karadsheh explains the significance.
Who is Reza Pahlavi, the son of Iran’s ousted Shah?
02:32