A crisis of crises: What is going on in Iran?

From left, right, and centre, Iran is facing pressure from all sides. Crises on the domestic front have left Iran politically divided and weakened, while foreign losses against Israel, coupled with the collapse of close allies, have plummeted Iran’s regional influence in the Middle East.

At home, Iran is facing unprecedented droughts. The capital, Tehran, is being ravaged by a water crisis that has been building for over 20 years and is now reaching unavoidably catastrophic consequences. Water shortages have been a threat in Iran since 2011, with Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei acknowledging the issue several times in his addresses. Tehran’s rainfall in the first two years of this water year (which began on 1 October) was near zero.

Thus far, Iran has managed to delay the crisis through heavy reliance on groundwater, drawing extensively from aquifers (underground layers of water) to meet their water demand, denying the mounting drought and dismissing warnings from scientists. However, Iran’s groundwater resource has been overdrawn for decades and no longer has the capacity to further stave off the drought. Rapidly approaching Tehran is a ‘Day Zero’ incident, when the water supply completely runs out and taps run dry city-wide. Officials report this may occur in the very near future, in matter of a few weeks or even days.

There are no cures, only treatments; the water crisis is so severe and has been intensifying for so long that there is no immediate solution that will avoid significant harm

Officials in Tehran have endeavoured to rescue the situation by reducing water pressure, imposing cuts, and suggesting the introduction of rationing for the largest consumers of water, industry, and agriculture. The situation is at such levels of desperation, the potential action that has been raised is the evacuation of Tehran, or, as per the Iranian president’s suggestion, the displacement of the capital to a city on the southern coast. What is essential to understand about this situation is that there are no cures, only treatments. The water crisis is so severe and has been intensifying for so long that there is no immediate solution that will avoid significant harm.

One of these potential solutions is cloud-seeding, a process where seeding agents in the form of crystals are injected into clouds using planes or drones. Ice then forms around these crystals and becomes heavy enough to drop as precipitation. This technique is growing in popularity due to climate change, but it is not a miraculous, endless source of water. Experts have described the process as marginal and unreliable at best, calling into question the method’s ability to rescue Iran from crisis.

Iran has also been searching far and wide for water reservoirs that could potentially sustain water flow in the capital. This summer, the government was forced to accelerate a project to pipe water to Tehran from 140 kilometres away, from the Taleqan dam. Other potential water sources are the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman, which the Iranian government is considering to address water shortages in more central desert regions.

The ample opportunities for action that have been ignored by the Iranian government signal the issue to be one of national failure. Hubris of immense proportion can be the sole explanation for repeated inaction, and the only true solution is a long-term process of deep economic restructuring.

The water crisis has the potential to be as powerful a blow to the stability of Iran as any external strike, but Iran has additionally been facing weakening regional influence as a direct result of the latter

Iran has been heavily expanding its irrigated agriculture industry over the last few decades. Currently, agriculture accounts for up to 92% of Iran’s water use. Heavy economic emphasis on agriculture has greatly exacerbated Iran’s crisis, and the nation finds itself in desperate need of economic diversification to reduce the pressure placed upon its water resources. The water crisis has the potential to be as powerful a blow to the stability of Iran as any external strike, but Iran has additionally been facing weakening regional influence as a direct result of the latter.

In December 2024, one of Iran’s primary allies suffered political collapse. The Assad regime in Syria was overrun by insurgent forces, bottling Iran’s ability to transport arms, intelligence, and propaganda to the northern border of Israel. Syria was considered by Iran to be a key part of its Axis of Resistance, a coalition of militant and political organisations aligned with Iranian interests across the Middle East, acting as a geographical gateway to Israel from Iran.

The collapse of the Iran-adjacent Assad regime, in combination with military losses through its proxies, has immensely loosened the political control that Iran previously enjoyed across the Middle East, manipulating politics in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and Yemen. The collapse of the Assad regime drastically weakened Iranian communications with the Lebanese paramilitary group Hezbollah.

Hezbollah is Iran’s primary lever of influence over its greatest Middle Eastern enemy, Israel. Since its inception, Hezbollah’s existence as a proxy for Iranian interests has seen it leveraged as a means of exerting pressure on Israel and the US through Lebanon. However, intense Israeli offensives in the past year severely weakened Hezbollah, Israeli airstrikes demolished key military structures, resources, and killed senior officials.

The conflict reached a peak in the 12-day war in June. Starting on 13 June, the ensuing two weeks saw hundreds of military targets in Iran destroyed by Israeli airstrikes. The weakness and vulnerability of Iran’s systems of defence were laid bare, representing a powerful blow to Iranian perceptions of resilience and invincibility.

Heavy losses from Israeli offensives and the collapse of the Assad regime have completely undermined the political hegemony that Iran once held over most of the Middle East

Themes of weakness and division are confirmed by the actions and behaviour of the Iranian government. Infighting over whether the 12-day war could have been avoided by restoring the JCPOA, missed opportunities for deterrence, and disagreements on political messaging paint a picture of political paralysis in the face of mounting domestic and foreign crises. Morale in Iran has been further rattled by US intimidation, with President Donald Trump answering inconclusively on whether the US would join the Israel-Iran conflict: “I may do it, I may not do it”.

On the foreign front, heavy losses from Israeli offensives and the collapse of the Assad regime have completely undermined the political hegemony that Iran once held over most of the Middle East. Claims of Iranian invulnerability are now reduced to little more than rhetoric, albeit rhetoric to which Iran is deeply wedded. While the mounting water crisis may serve as the final straw to dismantle this narrative for good, it seems more likely that the solution employed by the Iranian government will be based on rhetoric rather than a substantive solution.