Opinion: The relationship the Iranian and Jewish people should have

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As Minnesotans with shared roots in one of history’s great civilizations — Iran — we write in the wake of pivotal events reshaping the Middle East.

Ali was born in Tehran and came to the U.S. just before the 1979 Islamic Revolution. Sami’s grandparents, Iranian Jews, left Shiraz for Israel in 1949, and much of his extended family later came to Minnesota.

Our stories reflect something larger: the long, layered relationship between Iranian and Jewish civilizations — two ancient peoples whose stories have intertwined for over 2,500 years.

The Jewish holiday of Purim recalls a genocidal threat narrowly averted in ancient Persia, where Queen Esther’s courage saves the Jewish people. Just generations later, Persian King Cyrus the Great issued a decree allowing Jews to return from exile and rebuild the Second Temple in Jerusalem. That decree — found in the final words of the Hebrew Bible — closes the canon with a note of restoration and hope.

Cyrus’ legacy — rooted in pluralism and justice — has endured in Iranian memory for over two millennia. His vision is preserved in the Cyrus Cylinder, where he proclaimed religious freedom and the restoration of communities displaced by conquest, like the Jews from Judea. That legacy — not the regime’s inversion of it — should define the relationship between our peoples.

For centuries, Jews were an integral part of Persian society — contributing to its culture, economy and civic life. Before the 1979 revolution, Iran was home to more than 100,000 Jews and maintained diplomatic ties with Israel.

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Today, fewer than 10,000 Jews remain in Iran. Like other minorities in the Islamic Republic of Iran, their identity is tightly controlled. They face constant surveillance, are barred from expressing ties to Israel, and must conform to Islamic norms in public life.

The regime in Tehran, born in the chaos of 1979, is built on a revolutionary, theocratic ideology. It claims a divine mission to redeem Islam through confrontation with the West. America is the “Great Satan”; Israel, the “Little Satan,” phrases coined by Ruhollah Khomeini, the first leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran. The regime’s stated goal is Israel’s destruction — not metaphorically, but literally.

As President Donald Trump noted, Iran’s campaign of terror is not limited to targeting Israelis.

American patriots remember the cost of Iran’s brutality — from the 1979 U.S. embassy hostage crisis in Tehran, where 52 Americans were held for 444 days; to Hezbollah’s 1983 bombing of the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut that killed 241 American servicemembers; to the Iranian roadside bombs in Iraq and Afghanistan that maimed and murdered thousands, including members of the Minnesota National Guard.

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Iran’s revolutionary ideology has inflicted devastating harm across the Arab world. With funding, weapons and training from Tehran, proxies like Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis have fueled violence and instability, leaving Palestinians, Syrians, Lebanese, Yemenis and Iraqis trapped in cycles of war and repression.

Inside Iran, the regime has gutted a country rich in talent and natural resources by pouring billions into terror proxies and a rogue nuclear program. The economy is in crisis. Its air is polluted, rivers are running dry, and repression is constant — targeting women, minorities (over 40% of Iranians are not ethnic Persians), journalists and dissidents. Nearly 10% of its 90 million people have fled the country.

In recent years, brave Iranians have taken to the streets with chants like “No Gaza, No Lebanon, My life for Iran” — rejecting the regime’s obsession with exporting conflict — and “Woman, Life, Freedom,” the rallying cry of a movement demanding basic dignity and human rights. These protests reflect a simple truth: Iranians want to rebuild their country — not see it sacrificed for an ideological crusade against Israel.

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While Iran remains faithful to this crusade — a path of ruin and repression — others in the region have charted a different course: If you can’t beat Israel, recognize it is here to stay.

Egypt led the way in 1978, formally ending decades of war. Jordan followed in 1994. Then in 2020, the UAE, Bahrain and Morocco joined through the Abraham Accords — choosing partnership over isolation and conflict.

Meanwhile, by early 1979, revolutionary Iran — once a quiet regional partner of Israel — chose the path of ruin. The newly formed Islamic Republic, led by Khomeini, severed diplomatic ties and institutionalized “Death to Israel” — a relentless campaign against Israel and Jews worldwide — as a pillar of its identity and foreign policy.

Now, 46 years later, those two paths are colliding.

On Oct. 6, 2023, Saudi officials met with the Biden administration to finalize a historic agreement to normalize relations with Israel.

Just hours later, Hamas — backed by Iran — launched the Oct. 7 massacre, aiming in part to derail Saudi-Israeli normalization. The attack shattered Israelis’ illusion of deterrence and set off a cascade of suffering — for Israelis, Palestinians and Lebanese alike, as Hezbollah opened a northern front.

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Western media often depicts these 20 months of war as another brutal chapter in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

But for many Israelis, Jews and Iranians, two deeper truths surfaced.

First: The Oct. 7 massacre marked the opening salvo in an existential war — not with the people of Gaza or Iran, but with the gangs of terror that hijack their futures and export ruin across the region.

Second: When those who choose ruin over recognition vow destruction, they mean it.

These truths — revealed through blood and anguish — shifted Israel’s strategy from deterrence to prevention.

Twenty months later, Israel has largely dismantled Hamas’ terror infrastructure, sidelined Hezbollah and — after decades of failed diplomacy — struck centers of the regime’s empire of terror, targeting senior commanders, nuclear scientists and missile sites with precision.

Now, with Iran weakened and exposed, the U.S. dealt a significant blow — underscoring the global stakes and futility of Iran’s 46-year forever war against Israel, the U.S. and the liberal order.

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At this inflection point, the region — and the world — must choose between two divergent futures.

One path — chosen by Iran’s revolutionary regime, followed by Hamas and echoed by its Western apologists — leads only to repression, destruction and endless war.

The other — pursued by Abraham Accords signatories and upheld by Israel and the U.S. — offers recognition, stability and the promise of shared prosperity.

After months of regional trauma, Israel’s military gains created the opening for a decisive U.S. strike — one only America could deliver. Together, this alliance has shifted the momentum and made a new trajectory possible for the Middle East.

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This past Hanukkah, we lit candles together in Minneapolis. After the blessings, Ali said: “One day, hopefully soon, we’ll celebrate Hanukkah together in Tehran.”

Cyrus’s legacy of dignity and pluralism hasn’t vanished — it’s been buried by a regime that fears it. But the people of Iran have not forgotten. Neither have we.

As the region stands between two paths — one of ruin, one of recognition — we lit our candles with hope:

That the flame of freedom — first kindled in ancient Persia — will rise again, for Iran, and all who seek peace.

Sami Rahamim is director of communications and community affairs at the Jewish Community Relations Council of Minnesota and the Dakotas (JCRC). Ali Alizadeh is president of Hemisphere Companies, a private investment group based in Minneapolis.