Research Briefing

Iran’s clerical regime is waging a sophisticated campaign to reshape its influence across the Muslim world – including in Britain – by weaponising the Palestinian cause as a Trojan horse. Tehran seeks to don the mantle of Islamic leadership in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), outflanking Sunni rivals (notably Saudi Arabia) by casting support for Palestine and fierce anti-Zionism as the ultimate litmus test of Islamic legitimacy. This research brief examines how the Islamic Republic exploits transnational Sunni Islamist currents – particularly the South Asian Deobandi movement – to galvanize Muslim opinion against Israel and the West, thereby pressuring Sunni governments into ideological submission. It explores historical and ideological intersections between Deobandism and Iran’s 1979 revolutionary thought, Tehran’s covert partnerships with Deobandi networks in Pakistan, India, Bangladesh and even the UK, and uses the recent example of Pakistan’s Grand Mufti calling for jihad on Israel to illustrate Iran’s strategy of framing neutrality as betrayal of the Ummah (global Muslim community). The brief highlights the geopolitical threat this poses to Saudi Arabia’s custodianship of Mecca and Medina, arguing that Iran’s aim is to present itself as the rightful leader of the Islamic world by recasting the Palestinian struggle as a moral yardstick for Muslim rulers.