While two wars on Iran by the United States and Israel have exposed serious vulnerabilities in Iran’s intelligence and security institutions, Iran is using the threat to crack down on dissent, analysts have said.
Saeid Golkar, an associate professor in political science at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, said the genuine espionage threats faced by Iran were illustrated by the killing of high-level figures, including former Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, on the first day of the latest assault by Israel and the US on February ۲۸.
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“At the same time, the regime has historically used real or, most of the time, perceived security threats to justify political repression and expand its coercive apparatus,” Golkar told Al Jazeera.
“The current crackdown appears to reflect both legitimate counterintelligence concerns and the regime’s broader efforts to suppress dissent and intimidate society.”
Spy threat
Former Israeli spy chief David Barnea recently said that in the weeks before Israel launched its ۱۲-day war on Iran in June ۲۰۲۵, he had approved the entry into the country of dozens of agents with clear intelligence or sabotage assignments.
“I can’t say that they are here with us. But they are there in Tehran, living their lives,” he told a conference in Israel on October ۲۲.
According to Barnea, who was the director of Mossad for five years until June ۲۰۲۶, Israeli intelligence tried to maximise the number of Iranian citizens arrested by local authorities in order to shield its genuine agents inside Iran.
Just hours after launching the war and killing senior commanders and nuclear scientists, they deliberately released footage of agents inside Iran with a Mossad logo, leading to the arrests of thousands of people with no links to the Israeli intelligence service.
Barnea claimed the strategy worked, and almost all of their assets remained unidentified. Eight months into a second war launched by Israel and the US against Iran, with the stated aim of overthrowing the Islamic republic, Iran’s paranoia remains.
Iranian authorities have significantly accelerated judicial punishments for cases linked to national security since the ۲۰۲۵ war. That has entailed mass arrests, expedited prosecutions, lengthy imprisonment, asset confiscations and executions.
The people targeted include alleged spies but also protesters, journalists, lawyers and minorities. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have documented cases involving coerced confessions, the denial of effective defence and national security charges applied to dissenters.
“The espionage threat facing Iran is very real. The two US-Israeli wars exposed serious vulnerabilities in Iran’s intelligence and security apparatus… Tehran has legitimate concerns about foreign infiltration, sabotage, and intelligence operations inside the country, especially as the threat of another military escalation remains high,” Negar Mortazavi, a senior fellow with the Center for International Policy, said.
“But there is a fundamental distinction between espionage and dissent,” she added. “Espionage involves covertly gathering sensitive intelligence or assisting foreign intelligence operations. Criticising the government, reporting on its failures, engaging with foreign media, or challenging official narratives does not, in itself, constitute espionage. The Iranian authorities have increasingly blurred this distinction, treating political opposition and independent reporting as extensions of foreign intelligence activity.”
‘Hybrid war’
Iranian authorities argue that foreign intelligence operations are aimed not only at overthrowing the government but also fragmenting the country.
Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence said in May that “enemies” were combining espionage, sabotage, hostile media, exploitation of economic crises and fuelling ethnic and sectarian tensions as part of a “hybrid war”.
Judiciary chief Gholam-Hossein Mohseni-Ejei has repeatedly invoked wartime conditions and domestic laws to argue for urgent security measures, and accelerated the punishment of alleged collaborators as a means of protecting the country.
Judiciary spokesman Ali Kazemi said earlier in October that there were active cases involving at least ۱,۸۹۵ people, including ۹۴ media workers, accused of cooperation with Israel or other hostile states. Police had announced at least ۲۱,۰۰۰ arrests following the June ۲۰۲۵ war, while at least ۵۰,۰۰۰ people were detained in connection with the nationwide protests in January ۲۰۲۶. Thousands of civilians were killed in the crackdown against antigovernment protests across Iran, according to US-based rights organisation HRANA.
The authorities have referred to the nationwide protests as a “coup” orchestrated entirely by Israeli and US intelligence agencies. The Iranian government also claims that Mossad and other intelligence agents killed protesters. But an independent United Nations fact-finding mission said the authorities committed crimes against humanity during their most violent crackdown since the revolution.
Executions linked with security charges have also increased following the wars and protests. At least ۱۹ people were hanged in espionage-related cases between June and December ۲۰۲۵, according to the UN.
Iran Human Rights, an Oslo-based nonprofit group, said it recorded ۱۶ espionage defendants executed between January and September ۲۰۲۶, alongside ۳۳ protesters and ۱۳ prisoners affiliated with banned groups. The group had tracked at least ۶۰۴ executions by early October.
Amnesty International reported at least ۳۴ executions this year linked to the January nationwide protests by October ۱۳, including five between September ۳۰ and October ۵.
‘Securitising every aspect of life’
Iranian authorities have warned the public about Mossad and other intelligence agencies running cyber-operations to expand their influence in Iran, accusing them of recruiting people through social media and online offers.
Sending images or information to networks deemed to be hostile to the Iranian government – including BBC Persian – could result in sentences of ۱۰ to ۱۵ years in prison and heavy fines. Combined with other offences, it could lead to potential charges of “corruption on Earth”, which carry the death penalty.
The authorities also regard the Starlink satellite internet service as a “tool of war” used for espionage, information gathering and even operating drones by “enemy” agents inside Iran. Tens of thousands of Starlink terminals have been smuggled into the country despite severe punishments for distributing and using the service. Iranian authorities have tried to confiscate or jam them.
For several days during the ۱۲-day war, ۲۰ days during the January protests and ۸۸ days at the start of the current war, Iran imposed a near-total internet shutdown on ۹۰ million Iranians. The official reasons ranged from protecting national assets against cyberattacks to disrupting hostile drones. The global internet remains severely filtered in Iran, and authorities have warned it could be disrupted again in case of military escalation.
University of Tennessee at Chattanooga’s Golkar said that by blurring the line between espionage and political opposition, authorities increasingly treat protesters, journalists and ordinary citizens as potential threats to national security.
“Ultimately, the Islamic republic increasingly treats regime security and national security as interchangeable concepts. While counterespionage is a legitimate state function, it has also become a tool to protect the ruling establishment and expand the influence of security institutions,” he said.
“In brief, and over time, the Islamic republic has transformed into a security-dominated regime that increasingly securitises nearly every aspect of political and social life, including peaceful civic activism, treating even nonviolent expressions of dissent as potential threats to regime survival”.
