Wiesenthal Center says Iran has run a 30-year influence campaign — Jerusalem Post
The Simon Wiesenthal Center published a report stating that Iran has been conducting an influence campaign in Western countries for 30 years. According to the document’s authors, Tehran uses antisemitism and anti-Israel rhetoric to undermine trust in U.S. institutions and social cohesion. This was reported by the Jerusalem Post.
The report, “The War for Western Minds: Iran’s 30-Year Campaign to Divide the West,” claims that the Islamic Republic uses nationalist, religious and anti-imperialist narratives in its ideological “soft war” against the West. The document’s authors believe that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps adapts such messages for different audiences, including by portraying Iran as a force opposing Western hegemony.
Spread of conspiracy theories
According to the Simon Wiesenthal Center’s assessment, Iran contributed to the spread of claims about alleged Jewish control over U.S. foreign policy. The report notes that once such narratives take hold, they can subsequently be disseminated by other participants in the information environment without Tehran’s direct involvement.
The authors also mentioned that the Hezbollah-linked Lebanese TV channel al-Manar spread the false claim after the September 11 attacks that 4,000 Jewish employees did not come to the World Trade Center because they had been warned. The report separately examines Press TV, a channel created by Iran in 2007, which, according to the compilers, targeted its programming at an international audience.
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Media and cyberattacks
The Center stated that by 2026, Iranian influence operations had, in its assessment, encompassed websites impersonating U.S. media outlets, fictitious online personas and campaigns simulating public support. The report’s authors also claim that such networks use news agency materials and copied articles to appear credible.
The document cites data from Microsoft’s Threat Analysis Center: during the 2024 U.S. presidential campaign, a group linked to the IRGC sent targeted phishing emails to a senior campaign official through a compromised account of a former adviser and attempted to breach the accounts of county authorities in key states. Over the past year, the Simon Wiesenthal Center identified more than 340 influencers, media outlets, organizations and affiliated structures that, in its view, form an interconnected network for disseminating such messages.
Among the measures proposed by the report’s authors are mandatory disclosure by platforms of information about coordinated threats, labeling of AI-generated content, and a review by the U.S. Congress of Section 230 provisions of the Communications Decency Act.
