Six months into U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran, Iranian Americans remain divided over what comes next
Six months after the United States and Israel launched their military campaign against Iran, the physical, financial and emotional toll of the war is still rippling far beyond the battlefield. For the large Iranian community in the United States, the conflict has sharpened old fault lines and created new ones, leaving families, friends and activists split over how the war began — and whether it has accomplished anything at all.
The Iranian diaspora is not a monolith. It includes those who fled after the 1979 revolution, the children of that exile, and more recent arrivals who left amid crackdowns and protest movements, including the 2022 woman-led uprising. Those different departures help explain why reactions to U.S.-Israeli strikes have ranged from open celebration to deep alarm.
For some Iranian Americans, especially anti-regime activists, the military intervention was long overdue — a potential opening to end the Islamic Republic’s rule. For others, it was a dangerous escalation likely to bring more suffering to ordinary Iranians and further destabilize the Middle East. The divide is not simply political. It is rooted in competing experiences of repression, exile and visions of what Iran should become. Those divisions have also been visible in public. At a protest outside Los Angeles Stadium in Inglewood, California, on June 7, demonstrators waved U.S. and pre-revolutionary Iranian flags ahead of the start of the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
At the start of the campaign, CNN spoke with Arezo Rashidian, a longtime monarchist activist aligned with Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi, the exiled son of Iran’s last shah. She had helped organize protests in the Los Angeles area and initially welcomed military action, saying she hoped the United States and Israel would carry out “targeted attacks on bases to bring down that regime.”
Six months later, that optimism has largely faded. “We really wanted regime change … it’s been six months now, and it didn’t get to that point,” Rashidian said, describing a mood of frustration and uncertainty. Her family members and contacts inside Iran, she said, describe a renewed climate of fear in the months since the heaviest fighting subsided — people are increasingly reluctant to talk about politics or their participation in January protests, wary of surveillance and retaliation.
“Now that the war is a little bit quieter, now the secret police are starting to mobilize,” she said.
The comments come amid reports that Iranian authorities have stepped up enforcement of mandatory hijab laws, with videos showing women publicly rebuked over their clothing and businesses scrutinized for dress-code violations. Rashidian also described arrests, executions and broader security crackdowns, though CNN cannot independently verify those accounts.
Even with her disappointment, Rashidian remains supportive of tougher sanctions against Tehran, saying she hopes they will “tighten the rope” around the regime. This week, Washington threatened new measures, with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent saying they would target the intricate network Iran uses to evade existing sanctions. But the long-awaited “economic D-Day” announcement fell flat for many after the Trump administration stopped short of major new penalties, focusing instead on enforcing and expanding sanctions already in place.
Iran, meanwhile, has vowed reciprocal pain, warning of expanded strikes on regional oil producers and European countries, and even hinting at the weaponization of its nuclear program. In Minab, Iran, a school damaged by a Feb. 28 strike was photographed on Aug. 27.
For Aria Rostami, a 38-year-old Iranian American museum professional in New York who grew up in Southern California’s Iranian community, the past six months have changed how he sees his own community. He was disheartened by the enthusiasm with which some Iranian Americans embraced the strikes.
“I was really disheartened by the community when they were on the streets cheering the war,” he told CNN.
The conflict, Rostami said, exposed divisions that have made him question things he once took for granted. “There was a time where if I met somebody who was Iranian, or I'd hear people speaking Persian on the street, I had a specific feeling about it,” he said. “Now it's changed to suspicion or an uncertainty. I don't know where their politics are. I don't know what they believe.”
Before the conflict, he said, supporters of intervention often argued that “Iran is different” — a kind of Iranian exceptionalism. He never accepted that premise. “Why would you want the United States to be involved in a war or have any military action in Iran, given what we've seen in the last 20 years with Iraq, with Afghanistan, with Libya?” he asked.
Rostami acknowledges that many war supporters are now disappointed, but he argues they were sold false expectations about what military intervention could accomplish. “People are being lied to, manipulated, played for a fool,” he said. Still, he resists dismissing those who backed the war. “There's real pain there. I do think people have been taken advantage of and manipulated.”
The chasm in the diaspora is not just a matter of political debate. It has strained personal relationships, reshaped online communities and complicated the search for a common strategy as Iran’s leaders face pressure at home and abroad. The broader consequences of the conflict are still coming into focus. On the ground, Iranians face economic pressure and a resurgent security crackdown. Abroad, the diaspora is left to reconcile hopes of regime change with the reality of a war that has not delivered it. For now, the only point of agreement may be that the uncertainty is not over.
CNN’s Mostafa Salem contributed reporting.