Just hours before a ceasefire took effect Tuesday between the US and Iran’s clerical regime to pause fighting for two weeks, the regime urged young children and adults to surround Iranian energy facilities as human shields in response to President Trump’s threat to wipe out its energy infrastructure.
The thinking behind the Iranian regime’s willingness to use children and civilians as cannon fodder, observers say, is that a U.S. airstrike that kills children or civilians will dramatically turn U.S. public opinion against the war and create a rally-around-the-regime effect in Tehran.
And with high-level peace talks between the US and Iran set to begin in Pakistan, Tehran can be seen as the godfather of propaganda when it comes to manipulating much of the world’s media – even more skilled than its terror disciples in Gaza and Lebanon. Yemen and beyond.
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A billboard with a portrait of the late Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed in US-Israeli attacks, looms over an empty square in Tehran, Iran, on Thursday, March 5, 2026. (Vahid Salemi/AP Photo)
“Godfather of Propaganda”
She pointed to Tehran’s record of positioning civilian infrastructure – hospitals, mosques, schools and now power plants – as military shields. They did it in Lebanon through Hezbollah. They did it in Gaza through Hamas. And they are now doing it on their own territory, with their own people, under duress. Iranians who refuse to participate will face consequences.”
Daftari, editor-in-chief of the Foreign Desk, added: “The Iranian regime has never hesitated to use its own people as shields. The difference is that now they do it in front of cameras, in real time, and know exactly which images will make prime-time news around the world. This is propaganda. And the two-week ceasefire only gave them more time to manipulate the West and continue their narrative warfare.”
Members of security forces watch over the crowd during a funeral procession for IRGC Navy Chief Alireza Tangsiri, along with other senior Navy commanders and their families who were killed in US-Israeli attacks in Tehran, Iran in late March, on April 1, 2026. (Majid Saeedi/Getty Images)
Capitalizing on a tragedy
Right at the start of ‘Operation Epic Fury’, the world’s media was full of stories from Iran about an airstrike that reportedly hit an Iranian girls’ school in the city of Minab on February 28. The regime said the airstrike killed 175 people at the Shajarah Tayyebeh primary school, most of whom were children. The school was located on the same street as the buildings used by the IRGC. An investigation was launched by the Pentagon in March to investigate allegations that a US missile had hit the school.
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“There is no confirmation on the number of people from anyone other than regime sources,” she said. ‘Some people from the area said there were 65 boys. Sixty-five guys? What are 65 boys doing at a girls’ school at half past eleven on a Saturday morning?’
Both the Democratic and Republican US administrations have classified the Iranian regime as a major state sponsor of terrorism.
Iranian worshipers raise their hands in a sign of unity with Iran’s former Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei during an anti-Israel rally to condemn Israel’s attacks on Iran, in central Tehran, Iran, on June 20, 2025. (Morteza Nikoubazl/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
Fooling the media
Speaking on “Jesse Watters Primetime,” Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa. Thursday, that U.S. media was “basically…carrying water for Iran.”
He said: “Like Hezbollah and Hamas, Iran is using civilians as human shields for propaganda purposes. It does not care about the safety and fate of its own people. It wants to portray the country as fearless and willing to sacrifice itself for victory. And if civilians are killed, so much the better for the regime’s political objectives… Iran wants to undermine US domestic support for the war by portraying the country as America doing Israel’s bidding, and using AI-generated disinformation to depicting enormous destruction and casualties at American bases in the Middle East.”
The regime faced a crisis of legitimacy after millions of Iranians took to the streets in January demanding the dissolution of the Islamic Republic.
Both the IRGC and Basij – the regime’s paramilitary street forces – played a key role in the January massacre of 45,000 Iranian civilians protesting against the regime. President Trump said in his address to the nation that the regime has killed 45,000 people. The previous death toll was estimated at more than 35,000 people.
Iranians gather while blocking a street during a protest in Tehran, Iran on January 9, 2026. (MAHSA / Middle East Images / AFP via Getty Images)
Ruhe said: “As before the war, it also aims to delegitimize protesters and other internal opposition by portraying them as American and Israeli agents. It can be expected that all these propaganda efforts will be stepped up during the ceasefire. The United States and our partners will also be part of this intended audience.”
Using children in war
To complement its deadly propaganda mix, the regime freely uses child soldiers to achieve its goals. According to Amnesty International“Eyewitness accounts and verified audiovisual evidence show that child soldiers have been deployed at IRGC checkpoints and patrols armed with weapons, including AK47 rifles.”
Erika Guevara-Rosas, Amnesty’s senior director of Research, Advocacy, Policy and Campaigns, said in the report: “Iranian authorities are brazenly encouraging children as young as 12 to participate in an IRGC-led military campaign, putting them in grave danger and violating international law, which prohibits the recruitment and use of children in the military. Recruiting children under the age of 15 into the armed forces is a war crime.”
Iranian schoolboys wear Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) military uniforms and shout anti-American and anti-Israel slogans during a ceremony marking the 47th anniversary of the victory of Iran’s Islamic Revolution at the Shrine of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini at Behesht-e Zahra Cemetery in southern Tehran, Iran, on February 1, 2026 (Morteza Nikoubazl/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
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In late March, Rahim Nadali, a deputy of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Mohammad Rasoul Allah Corps of Greater Tehran, stated that the state was launching a recruitment campaign called “Homeland-Defending Combatants for Iran,” which is “open to volunteers” aged 12 and over. The push to recruit child soldiers took place in mosques and bases of the paramilitary organization Basij. The recruitment campaign called on young people to join ‘fighters who defend the homeland’.
