On May 24, President Masoud Pezeshkian invoked a powerful symbol from Iran’s wartime past, underscoring Tehran’s steadfastness in the face of pressures from the U.S. and Israel, as noted by a counterterrorism specialist.
The Iranian president’s comments emerged during a crucial diplomatic period when President Donald Trump announced that a potential agreement with Tehran to end the conflict is “largely negotiated.” Trump emphasized that the U.S. would either secure a “great and meaningful” deal or abandon the negotiations altogether.
While Iran has shown some alignment with Washington on several issues, it has clarified that a comprehensive agreement is not yet within reach, as deliberations over the finer points continue.
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During an interview with Fox News Channel’s Martha MacCallum in New York City on September 25, 2025, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian expressed his views. (John Lamparski/Getty Images)
In a post on X commemorating the 1982 liberation of Khorramshahr from Iraqi forces, a significant event during the Iran-Iraq War, Pezeshkian declared, “Khorramshahr today represents Iran, the Persian Gulf, and the Strait of Hormuz.” He further highlighted that “resistance, self-sacrifice, and repelling aggression are deeply embedded in the culture of this nation.”
Analysts claimed Pezeshkian was deliberately invoking one of the deepest ideological touchstones of the Islamic Republic — the battle that came to symbolize national resistance, civilian sacrifice and defiance against invasion.
“This is the Iran-Iraq War reference, and the timing is the point,” said Dr. Omar Mohammed, director of the Antisemitism Research Initiative Program on Extremism at George Washington University.
May 24 marks the anniversary of the 1982 liberation of Khorramshahr, the southwestern city Saddam Hussein captured early in the war and Iranian forces retook after months of brutal urban combat.
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An Iranian flag is placed amid rubble next to a destroyed residential building near Ferdowsi Square in Tehran on March 3, 2026. (Atta Kenare/AFP)
“This is one of the Islamic Republic’s foundational mythological moments — civilian resistance, mass sacrifice, repelling an ‘aggressor army.’ Roughly what the Great Patriotic War is to Russia. The rhetorical move is the extension,” Mohammed told Fox News Digital.
“He’s mapping the 1980-82 defensive-war frame onto the current confrontation: Iran attacked by an aggressor, ordinary citizens (‘battle-untested but brave’) expected to stand and fight, with ‘resistance, sacrifice, repelling aggression’ cast as the cultural default mode.”
Some of the phrasing, Mohammed said, also evokes volunteer and Basij fighters versus a professional invading army. The analyst noted that Pezeshkian’s “Hormuz line” comment reflects a standard Iranian escalation tactic.
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Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian and President Donald Trump stand together in an official setting. (Majid Saeedi/Getty Images)
“Invoking the strait inside a wartime-mobilization frame — even rhetorically — is a deliberate signal, not throat-clearing,” he added.
“The Khorramshahr frame is the deepest register the regime has. It’s what they reach for to signal existential war, not a managed crisis.”
Mohammed explained that Pezeshkian’s X post is framing the current confrontation from the presidential account to send a “high-stakes message.”
“It’s also a tell on internal posture: Khorramshahr, in short, means ‘we are being invaded and we will not negotiate,’” he added.
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