Rory Stewart

You raised last week Ali Laranjani, who's the National Security Advisor.

We could have talked about Mohammad Bakr Ghalibat, who's the Speaker of the Parliament.

Those were the two securocrats that people thought really were at the key of this regime, running it day to day.

Now we've had Khamenei's son, Mustafa Khamenei, take over.

Thank you.

The bottom line on these three figures is they are regimes through and through and through.

I mean, anyone who hoped that this is the beginning of a new reform and a new pragmatism, this is instead people who I think absolutely buy into Hameni's fundamental position.

And Hameni's position is the same as Xi Jinping's position.

They both looked at what happened to the Soviet Union, and they thought what happened is Gorbachev was too soft.

The biggest moment of danger for regimes

is when you reform.

Khamenei has another Iranian wrestling statement where he used to say that when your opponent is pushing you hard, what you must never do is step back because they just occupy that space and push you further back.

That's one of Putin's judo principles as well.

Very good.

Well, they will have all concluded

that they were too restrained in their response to Israel and the US last time around.

That Hezbollah, in retrospect, should have launched 100,000 missiles into Israel straight after October the 7th.

That they should have hit back at the whole Gulf

and launched all their drones after the first two strikes, that they gave the impression to Israel and the US that they were weak and they gained nothing from it.

That everybody who had said to them, listen, if we keep our heads down,