As missiles rain down on Israel, they carry more than explosives — they carry a message to the free world: the Islamic Republic of Iran is no longer hiding its agenda. It is unleashing it.

The Iranian regime is not merely a regional menace. It is a global threat. For too long, the world has ignored or excused its open declarations to annihilate Israel, erase Jews, destroy the United States, and dismantle Western democracy from within.

This is not a sudden escalation. It is the culmination of more than four decades of methodical, well-funded aggression. Iran has invested not only in uranium enrichment and ballistic missile systems, but in a sprawling terror infrastructure that spans continents. Through its proxies — Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad in Gaza, the Houthis in Yemen, Shiite militias in Iraq and Syria — Iran has exported death and destabilization far beyond its borders.

Its fingerprints are on bombings, kidnappings, cyberattacks, and assassinations. Its propaganda infiltrates social media, academic discourse, and policymaking spaces. And its operatives are embedded in communities and institutions across the globe.

But what makes this moment particularly dangerous is the world’s silence. Carefully worded condemnations. Equivocal statements. Prioritizing optics over moral clarity. Too many Western leaders still treat Iran as a misunderstood player, rather than what it plainly is: a tyrannical theocratic regime at war with freedom.

The media perpetuates this confusion, often blaming Israel for defending itself — as though a sovereign, democratic nation under sustained attack has no right to ensure the safety of its citizens. But Israel’s response is not retaliation. It is survival. It is a necessity. It is strategic, precise, and consistent with what any nation would –and must — do when facing an existential threat.

Since the Hamas-led atrocities of October 7, 2023, we’ve seen a disturbing pattern: Israel is vilified for doing what every other country does when its people are slaughtered and threatened. Leaders in Washington, London, Berlin, and Paris understand this privately. But publicly, they hedge, they placate, and they equivocate.

Even Arab governments, many of which have long regarded Iran as the greatest destabilizing force in the region, are complicit in this duplicity. Behind closed doors, they hope Israel will succeed where they have failed: in halting Iran’s nuclear ambitions and regional domination. But publicly, they condemn Israel — not out of principle, but out of fear: fear of Iranian retaliation and fear of unrest within their own populations, inflamed by Islamist propaganda.

The threat Iran poses to the Middle East cannot be overstated. It funds terror organizations that undermine moderate governments, destabilize fragile societies, and prolong conflict. Its influence extends from Lebanon to Syria, from Iraq to Yemen, from Gaza to the Persian Gulf. In each of these places, it empowers non-state actors that thrive on chaos and violence.

But the Islamic Republic doesn’t only terrorize others — it brutalizes its own people.

In Iran, women are forced into submission under the regime’s extremist interpretation of Islamic law. The so-called “morality police” enforce mandatory hijab laws with violence and imprisonment. Girls and women are denied basic rights, bodily autonomy, and even the ability to sing or dance in public.

LGBTQ+ Iranians face institutionalized persecution, torture, and execution. Simply existing as homosexual, queer, or trans in Iran is punishable by death. Activists, artists, students, and journalists who dare to speak out against the regime disappear into prison cells — or into shallow graves.

And the cruelty does not stop at Iran’s borders. Iranian intelligence services have a long history of targeting dissidents, former officials, and outspoken critics abroad — including in the US, Europe, and South America. Whether through assassination plots, cyber harassment, or coercion of family members back home, Iran has weaponized fear and violence globally. Those who impede its Islamist agenda or speak the truth about its crimes are marked.

This brings us to what we are now witnessing across cities in the West: the rise of Palestinianism — a radicalized movement that has become a central arm of the broader Islamist agenda.

Let me be clear: This is not a call for Palestinian statehood or peaceful coexistence. It is not rooted in humanitarian concern. Palestinianism, as we now see it in marches, riots, violence, desecration of public property, targeting Jewish communities, synagogues, businesses, schools, university occupations across the Western world, and vitriolic anti-Zionist and anti-Israel social media campaigns, is a politicized cult of grievance and destruction. It aligns itself with the Islamic Republic’s goal of eradicating Israel and undermining liberal democracies like the United States from within.

It merges anti-Zionism with antisemitism, cloaking hatred in the language of liberation. It draws in well-meaning activists and allies, weaponizing progressive values — inclusion, equality, anti-racism — only to subvert them from the inside. What begins as solidarity ends as surrender to theocratic fascism.

As someone who has spent my life advocating for Jewish and LGBTQ+ rights, I have seen how Iran, Qatar, Hamas, the Muslim Brotherhood, and ISIS have infiltrated social justice and civil rights movements in the West. Not with compassion — but with coercion. Not with shared values — but with a hijacking of language and platforms.

They use our freedoms to destroy our freedoms. They plant the seeds of division and weaponize identity to dismantle solidarity. Universities, media outlets, and political parties have become vulnerable conduits for their ideology.

I have been warning about this for years. And now, as Iranian missiles target Israel, as terror proxies destabilize the Middle East, and as radicals march in Western cities calling for “Intifada,” the world is finally — belatedly — seeing what we have allowed to fester.

This is not just Israel’s war. This is a global battle for the soul of our civilization.

Islamism — not Islam, but Islamism — is a radical, theocratic political movement cloaked in religious language. It is a modern totalitarianism that uses faith as a weapon. And it is here — on our streets, in our schools, in our governments. We see it in the storming of synagogues, the harassment of Jewish students, the silencing of Israeli speakers, the boycotts of businesses, the glorification of terrorist groups, and the threats against anyone — Jewish or not — who dares to dissent.

The Palestinianist and Islamist uprisings we are witnessing today are not peaceful protests. They are coordinated pressure campaigns –sometimes erupting into outright violence — meant to intimidate, destabilize, and force compliance with a genocidal agenda.

To remain silent is to be complicit.
To equivocate is to enable.
To excuse is to embolden.

To my fellow activists, journalists, human rights defenders, and leaders of conscience:

This is the moment.
To name the threat.
To defend what matters.
To speak truth without apology.

Because the missiles flying toward Israel tonight are not just aimed at Jews. They are aimed at all of us — our values, our freedoms, our future.

And we cannot afford to look away any longer.

Yuval David is an Emmy and Multi-Award-Winning Actor, Filmmaker, Journalist, and Jewish LGBTQ+ activist and advisor. A creative and compelling storyteller, on stage and screen, news and across social media, Yuval shares the narrative of Jewish activism and enduring hope. Follow him on Instagram, YouTube, and X.

The post Missiles Toward Israel, Aimed at Us All: The Iranian Regime’s War on Freedom first appeared on Algemeiner.com.