While Iranian Kurds agree that the Islamic Republic of Iran regime has to go, they remain divided on a united Kurdish policy. Disunity among the Kurdish leadership is a cycle ordinary Kurds desperately seek to break, yet most Kurdish leaders deepen it.
Some Kurds see the current war as an opportunity, while others understand the vulnerability of the Kurds to Iranian regime brutality.
Some Kurds see the current war as an opportunity, while others understand the vulnerability of the Kurds to Iranian regime brutality. Many Kurds remember the trauma of the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq War; others are cynical because Israel never translated its rhetorical support for Kurds into action beyond limited assistance to Mullah Mustafa Barzani in 1960s. Kurds follow Washington closely and recognize regime change is not yet on the White House agenda. Many Iranian Kurds, as well as their armed opposition groups, remain skeptical of diaspora opposition figures like Reza Pahlavi, the late shah’s son. When the future is unpredictable, pushing change becomes difficult.
For Kurds, however, the most pertinent issue is disunity. Absent unity, many Kurds fear another Kurdish civil war in Iranian Kurdistan akin to what Iraqi Kurds suffered between 1994 and 1997, when Masoud Barzani’s Kurdistan Democratic Party and Jalal Talabani’s Patriotic Union of Kurdistan turned their guns on each other and their fellow citizens.
When President Donald Trump won his first term in 2016, Iranian Kurdish opposition groups hoped that the United States would attack Iran. Back then, Trump’s rhetoric boosted their maneuvering. The traditional Kurdish oppositional parties—namely the Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iran (KDPI) and the Komala party—rebuilt their military camps in the mountainous border areas and resumed their insurgency. Other smaller parties also reorganized, including some that were supported by the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) in Iraq, such as Hussein Yezdanpanah’s Kurdistan Freedom Party (PAK), despite its limited support within Iranian Kurdistan. But to their disappointment, Trump never responded to their calls for political, military, and financial backing.
Meanwhile, traditional parties failed to expand their ranks or meaningfully engage a new generation of Kurds. The main reason is the clear disconnect between the younger, educated, urban generation and the old, conservative leadership of these parties. Although nationalism remains a force, it is not sufficient to mobilize with traditional conservative themes. The “Woman, Life, Freedom” revolution exposed this gap dramatically. It revealed how far removed the traditional parties were from the new political and social consciousness developing in Kurdish society. Aside from the Free Life Party of Kurdistan (PJAK), the Woman, Life, Freedom movement has no space in the traditional, male-dominated Kurdish parties. Yet PJAK itself is not a mainstream force in Iranian Kurdistan; its influence remains limited.
While PJAK has maintained mountain bases near Iran since its 2004 founding, it has observed an unofficial ceasefire since 2011 following an intensive Iranian bombing campaign of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK)-PJAK headquarters in Qandil. While PJAK retains a disciplined armed presence, it has not escalated its operations, nor has it taken a clear stance in the current crisis.
Opposition groups want regime change, but without certainty about its likelihood or direction, they remain hesitant to trigger uprisings.
At the moment, only PAK has called for regime change and pleaded for Israeli support. However, many Kurds view PAK as marginal and opportunistic. The major parties—KDPI, Komala, and PJAK—have not endorsed Israel’s attacks on Iran, although their leaders have called events a “golden opportunity” to reshape the future of the country. These opposition groups want regime change, but without certainty about its likelihood or direction, they remain hesitant to trigger uprisings, dispatch peshmerga forces, or activate clandestine cells inside Iran. Additionally, the Kurdish Iranian opposition fears that if they endorse the overthrow of the regime explicitly let alone make any moves against it, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps will attack the refugee camps in which their families live, as they did in 2018. Iran, Iraq, and the Iraqi Kurdistan Regional Government also have a security agreement not to use Iraqi territory to attack the Iranian regime.
To avoid repeating the tragedies that unfolded in Syria, Iraq, and Libya, two types of unity are essential. One is a national cross-ethnic unity—a shared front among all anti-regime forces in Iran. The other is internal unity among Iran’s ethnic groups, including among the Kurds themselves. Without these, the post-regime vacuum could quickly turn into another cycle of chaos and factionalism.
This crisis might become a golden opportunity to get rid of the Islamic Republic, but it could also serve to revitalize the regime’s legitimacy. Already, the Iranian regime is seeking to reignite Iranian nationalism by portraying itself as the only force capable of defending the country from an existential threat.
The Kurdish political leadership must understand that disunity is not only a historical curse—it is a strategic liability. Without a collective vision, shared objectives, and internal reconciliation, the Iranian Kurds risk being sidelined once again.
