Today, in the midst of this fragile ceasefire, negotiations between U.S. and Iranian delegations have begun in Islamabad. But these negotiations do not mark the beginning of peace. In a situation where neither side has been able to decisively impose its objectives, there is no prospect of a lasting settlement. What is emerging is not the end of the war, but a prolongation of negotiations and the continuation of the same confrontation in another form.
This war began with lies and has advanced through destruction. From promises to “save the Iranian people” to threats of total annihilation, what has materialized is neither freedom nor liberation, but death, devastation, and a direct assault on working-class life. Behind systematic attacks, bombs have fallen on workers, centres of production, and the vital arteries of society. From the outset, this war has been, on both sides, a war against the working class and social life.
The Islamic Republic has exploited the war politically to temporarily reconstruct its domination. Repression has intensified, executions have increased, and society has been pushed deeper into suffocating control. What was presented as “pressure on the regime” has in practice reinforced its repressive machinery. Rather than weakening it, the war has granted it a temporary reprieve.
What is being declared today as a ceasefire is not peace. It is a fragile pause, not an end to the war. Neither the underlying contradictions have been resolved nor the objectives abandoned. The war has not stopped; it has merely changed form.
The power that initiated the war has failed to conclude it on its own terms, while the regime under deep crisis has not been forced into decisive retreat. The result is neither victory nor peace, but suspension—a war that continues.
The real nature of this war is revealed most clearly in the targeting of economic and social infrastructures. From Asaluyeh to the steel and petrochemical industries, what is being attacked is not merely facilities, but the very existence of the exploited and of social labour itself. Workers have been killed and injured, jobs destroyed, and the livelihoods of millions placed at risk. This is not an attack on “the economy”—it is an attack on the working class.
At the same time, an ideological lie overshadows this war: “saving the people.” But people are neither liberated by bombing nor under repression. The same powers that speak of freedom destroy people’s lives, while the regime that speaks of defence suppresses its own population. This war is waged from both sides against the working class: from outside with bombs and missiles, from within with prisons and executions.
This war has not ended. The current ceasefire is neither a solution nor a peace, but an opportunity for military reorganisation and the continuation of war in other forms and dimensions.
Against this destructive cycle stands a real force: the working class. Only this class can disrupt the course of the war. The same economic arteries that are now bombed can, through conscious and organised intervention by workers, be paralysed and transformed into a means of stopping the war.
Neither imperialism nor reactionary regimes offer a path to liberation. Only the independent and organised intervention of the working class can break this cycle of war, repression, and destruction.
Internationalist Workers’ Organization (IWO)
10 April 2026
