1999 ARREST OF IRANIAN JEWS
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Freedom of religion in IranThe constitution of Iran states that the country is an Islamic republic; it specifies Twelver Ja’afari Shia Islam as the official state religion. In 2023, the country was scored zero out of 4 for religious freedom by American non-profit, Freedom House. In the same year, it was ranked as the 8th most difficult place in the world to be a Christian by Christian evangelistic organization, Open Doors.
Iranian JewsIranian Jews, (Persian: یهودیان ایرانی, romanized: Yahudiyān-e Irāni; Hebrew: יהודי איראן, romanized: Yehudei Iran) also Persian Jews (Persian: یهودیان پارسی, romanized: Yahudiyān-e Pārsi Hebrew: יהודים פרסים, romanized: Yehudei Parsim) or Parsim, constitute one of the oldest communities of the Jewish diaspora. Dating back to the biblical era, they originate from the Jews who relocated to Iran (historically known as Persia) during the time of the Achaemenid Empire. Books of the Hebrew Bible (i.e., Esther, Isaiah, Daniel, Ezra, and Nehemiah) bring together an extensive narrative shedding light on contemporary Jewish life experiences in ancient Iran; there has been a continuous Jewish presence in Iran since at least the time of Cyrus the Great, who led Achaemenid army's conquest of the Neo-Babylonian Empire and subsequently freed the Judahites from the Babylonian captivity. After 1979, Jewish emigration from Iran increased dramatically in light of the country's Islamic Revolution and fall of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the last Shah of Iran. Today, the vast majority of Iranian Jews reside in Israel and the United States.
Iran–Israel relationsIran and Israel have had no formal diplomatic relations since 1979, and modern relations are hostile. The Iran–Israel relationship was cordial for most of the Cold War, but worsened following the Iranian revolution in 1979 and has been openly hostile since the end of the Gulf War in 1991. Iran's current government does not recognize Israel's legitimacy as a state and has called for its destruction; it views Palestine as the sole legitimate government of the historic Palestinian territories. Israel considers Iran a threat to the Middle East's stability and has targeted Iranian assets in assassinations and airstrikes. In 1947, Iran was among 13 countries that voted against the United Nations Partition Plan for the British Mandate of Palestine. Two years later, Iran also voted against Israel's admission to the United Nations. However, Iran was the second Muslim-majority country to recognize Israel as a sovereign state after Turkey. After the 1953 coup d'état, which reinstalled the pro-Western leader Mohammad Reza Pahlavi as the Shah of Iran, relations between the two countries significantly improved. After the Iranian revolution—in which Pahlavi was ousted and Iran's secular monarchy was replaced by an anti-Western Islamic republic—Iran severed diplomatic and commercial ties with Israel, although relations continued covertly during the Iran–Iraq War (1980–1988). Since 1985, Iran and Israel have been engaged in a proxy conflict that has greatly affected the geopolitics of the Middle East. The turn from cold peace to open hostility began in the early 1990s, shortly after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the defeat of Iraq in the Gulf War. Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin's government adopted a more aggressive posture on Iran, and Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad made inflammatory statements against Israel. Other factors contributing to the escalation of tensions include the Iranian nuclear program, Iran's funding of Islamist groups such as Hezbollah, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Hamas, and the Houthis, and Iran's involvement in attacks such as the 1992 Buenos Aires Israeli embassy bombing and the 1994 AMIA bombing, as well as Israeli threats of military action. Iranian and Israeli organizations have been involved in direct military confrontations, such as in the 2006 Lebanon War. Iran and Israel have provided support for opposing factions in the Syrian and Yemeni civil wars and conducted cyberattacks and sabotage against each other's infrastructure, including attacks on nuclear facilities and oil tankers. Iran's proxy conflict with Saudi Arabia has led to an informal alliance between Israel and Arab states. In 2024, amid increasing regional tensions stemming from the Gaza war, Iran–Israel tensions escalated to a period of direct conflict; both carried out missile strikes on the other and Israel assassinated targets in Iran and Syria.
History of the Jews in IranThe history of the Jews in Iran dates back to late biblical times (mid-1st millennium BCE). The biblical books of Chronicles, Isaiah, Daniel, Ezra, Nehemiah, contain references to the life and experiences of Jews in Persia. In the book of Ezra, the Persian kings are credited with permitting and enabling the Jews to return to Jerusalem and rebuild their Temple; its reconstruction was carried out "according to the decree of Cyrus, and Darius, and Artaxerxes king of Persia" (Ezra 6:14). This event in Jewish history took place in the late 6th century BCE, by which time there was a well-established and influential Jewish community in Persia. Persian Jews have lived in the territories of today's Iran for over 2,700 years, since the first Jewish diaspora when the Assyrian king Shalmaneser V conquered the (Northern) Kingdom of Israel (722 BCE) and took some of the Israelites into captivity at Khuzestan. In 586 BCE, the Neo-Babylonian Empire expelled large populations of Jews from Judea to the Babylonian captivity. Jews who migrated to ancient Persia mostly lived in their own communities. The Persian Jewish communities include the ancient (and until the mid-20th century still-extant) communities not only of Iran, but also the Armenian, Georgian, Iraqi, Bukharan, and the Mountain Jewish communities. Some of the communities were isolated from other Jewish communities, to the extent that their classification as "Persian Jews" is a matter of linguistic or geographical convenience rather than actual historical relationship with one another. Jews trace their heritage in Iran to the Babylonian captivity of the 6th century BCE and have retained their ethnic, linguistic, and religious identity. However, a Library of Congress country study on Iran states that "Over the centuries the Jews of Iran became physically, culturally, and linguistically indistinguishable from the non-Jewish population. The overwhelming majority of Jews speak Persian as their mother language, and a tiny minority, Kurdish." In 2012, Iran's official census reported 8,756 Jewish citizens, a decline from 25,000 in 2009.
1999 arrest of Iranian JewsIn 1999, the Intelligence Ministry of Iran arrested 13 Iranian Jews, accusing them of spying for Mossad. Security agents arrested 13 Jewish residents of the Iranian cities of Shiraz and Isfahan, including five merchants, a rabbi, two university professors, three teachers in private Hebrew schools, a kosher butcher and a 16-year-old boy, accusing them of spying for Israel. After a trial in Islamic Revolutionary Court, 10 were sentenced to 4–13 years in prison. The Israeli government and many U.S. Jewish groups and Jewish federations worldwide organized a pressure campaign globally against the Government of Iran, with demonstrations in front of Iranian embassies worldwide. As a result of the pressure campaigns and secret negotiations, the prisoners were gradually freed in small groups. The last prisoners were released on February 19, 2003. First news was leaked online on March 18, but the news was ignored amid the 2003 Invasion of Iraq. All of them emigrated to Israel and live there with their families. The arrests have later been described as discriminatory in the broader view of antisemitism in Iran.
Hezbollah–Israel conflictHezbollah, a Shia Islamist political party and militant organization that was established in Lebanon in 1985, has been involved in a long-running conflict with Israel as part of the Iran–Israel proxy conflict and the Israeli–Lebanese conflict.
Israel and the nuclear program of IranThe government of Israel believes that if the Islamic Republic of Iran achieves the development of nuclear weapons, the existence of Israel will be in serious danger and this regime will be the first target of a possible nuclear attack by Iran. Benjamin Netanyahu, the prime minister of Israel, who is mentioned as one of the supporters of Israel's "preemptive strike" on Iran's nuclear facilities, has repeatedly emphasized in official speeches that "all the risks are small and insignificant compared to the risk of Iran's nuclearization." The Iranian government has repeatedly emphasized that the country's nuclear program is for peaceful purposes such as energy production and medical issues, and is not seeking to build nuclear weapons. However, since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, the goal of eliminating Israel as a Jewish state has remained a central pillar of Iran’s regional policy, and the destruction of Israel is often cited as one of several strategic motives behind Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Also, during the threats of an Israeli attack, the Iranian government emphasizes that it will give a "heavy response" to the "scenario of an Israeli attack" on Iran, and Ali Khamenei, the leader of the Iranian government and commander-in-chief, has also said that "anyone whoever in the thinks of invading the Islamic Republic of Iran, should prepare himself to receive strong slaps and steel fists from the army, IRGC and Basij."
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