Hey, Orange Pigs America first hoops, Oh boy, that was the slogan you sold.
Iran's wartime propaganda videos featuring AI rap music and lego characters are getting millions of views online. They praise the Islamic Republic and mock Trump, but their message is also dark, anti Semitic and leaning into conspiracy theories.
Make Israel great again.
They vorted you to die for Israel.
For Israel, they lied to you.
So how's a regime that shut down the Internet and isn't known for its sense of humor captured the zeitgeist? So well, I'm Nicole Johnston and you're listening to seven AM today Holly Daggers, an Iranian American analyst from the Washington Institute, on Iran's viral meme war and what it
tells us about the regime. It's Thursday, April thirty. Holly, I've got to say I've become a bit addicted to watching these Iranian lego videos over the last couple of weeks, and they really seem to have taken the world by storm. But before we get into who made them, what's behind it, let's talk through a couple of them.
What's one that's really stuck out to you.
I think that the one that really stood out to me recently was the one about Secretary of War Pete Hagsath Pete Hexas.
This one especially for you, so rapa faress here Persian language.
Rap is big in Iran, and so it doesn't surprise me that they would take rap and make it a medium, especially since it also has u US pop culture, as in.
As Secretary, what a joke, bro cheated on lives, multiple kids in the mixed family man, hell No, handsy with women, and Fox drunk on the job, your own.
Team say yo, this dude's taxic.
I think this is purely for an American audience, at least the lego videos, because they're very US centric.
We hit in the ball works, the Ben Epstein Island crewe the ones who hurt the kids, revenge for every American soul.
You and Trump's dirty crew up Preston.
Did we take paper? Of course, there's this nod to the Jeoffrey Epstein files, and that's also a very popular theme that you see in these lego videos, highlighting the hypocrisy of elites in America and the corruption and the lack of accountability in the US while they're wagging their finger at Ran Russia China about human rights abuses.
Yeah, make America great again, now mega would we would see what happens. Yeah, watch this sec with defense. We're protecting the sort of while you sat face sold just to pay for your oil.
Each and every one of them has a lot of attention to detail, not just in this video specifically, but other ones as well, Like it depicted President Donald Trump as a gambler, and actually that was a nod to IRG Sigarette's Force Commander loss Some Solomony, who was actually killed by the first Trump administration in the US airstrike in Iraq, and Solomony famously used to describe Trump as a gambler.
We were talking about one earlier. It goes through Trump's business deals in the Gulf. It's God Jared Kushner in it, and then it lists this long list of US wars around the world. The creators have really done their homework.
Yeah, and I think it really leans into this anti imperialist lens.
So the Islamic Republic.
I would say, in very simple terms, sees itselves as the rebels and star wars, and the US is the Empire, the Mountain the.
Files day, but another common name is standing you strike one man, we just sat in your brain, we put another in.
The US has a history, especially in the Middle East and to the east of Iran in Afghanistan, where they've had these forever wars that they have not successfully been able to win. The team behind these videos explosive media is honing in on these US historical contacts, and so it's not surprising to me that they would focus on that to say, yes, this is yet another failed US war in the Middle East that could be a potential
forever war where American troops are killed. And these are real sensitive issues for the American public, especially the magabase, who are mostly isolationists and opposed to these kind of wars because it should be America first. We shouldn't be going back to wars in the Middle East, and so this really clashes with what the President's been saying.
Holly, how has Israel featured in the videos, Because one of the most striking images that I've seen recently has Israeli soldiers looking over US citizens in chains in a bombed out America. That was the final sort of scene of one of the recent ones.
Well, I think that there's a lot of anti Semitism that are president in these videos. It basically is saying that Israel's controlling the strings of the United States. They're depicting Israeli Prime Minister of Benjamin Antanyahu drinking the blood of I assumed children. I think it even had the double wearing the Star of David. So it's really leaning into that anti Semitism that, unfortunately the Islamac Republic has been known for.
Holy you're American but you haven't around him background. Can you give us any insight into why you think they chose Lego for these videos?
So my understanding because one of the team members behind Explosive Media is said that it's because Legos globally resonate, but I think just unpacking why it's so surprising that they're able to lean so well into these themes that.
Resonate with Americans.
And of course, if there's also these Iranian embassy accounts that are posting memes, some of which are just related to viral moments, it's because they're of that access and it's because there are young Iranians that are curious about the outside world. I know that Iran's relatively isolated from much of the world, but Iranians have to use circumvention tools to get online historically. Unfortunately, now there's an internet shut down, the longest in modern day history since the
war began. And so I don't necessarily think that everybody that will be working on this team is pro regime, but are and it perhaps for the money, because they have a real good understanding and sense of American POLP culture, the news cycle, and of course English language skills.
That being said, Explosive Media.
Has said that they are a customer of the Isslatmak Republics are not really as independent as they had initially suggested. So I wouldn't be surprised if the company that's behind these lego videos are also behind the Iranian embassy accounts and even a speaker of Parliament, Mohammed barer Ldibov, who's also been very cheeky in his tweets in recent weeks.
I mean, how different is this to the type of propaganda that Iran and the regime would have put out in the past.
Well, I'll just give you another example that you might not have seen. But when there were the American pilots that were down in their jets. A couple of weeks ago, there were all these AI generated pictures of like an US soldier marrying local woman from a tribe in Iran making kebab, and it was to hints at the hospitality of Iranians, and these were depictions by the Iranian diaspora.
They instantly made a lego version where these local.
Tribesmen from the Lure ethnic minority were chasing a pilot with guns, and so it was like to counter the narrative of well, this is an enemy, we're not going to be hospitable.
But the Islamak Republic has been behind the times for a while now.
They've tried to really lean in hard into the narrative of the bloody eight year war with Iraq in the nineteen eighties and the notion of martyrdom, but it really doesn't resonate with Irani and gen z that weren't alive
when that war happened. And so I think over time they realized that actually there's a way to do this, and perhaps they might have even been inspired by the current Trump administration's White House account, which has been using AI generated videos with themes like call of Duty, La Boo boo dolls and honing in on topics like ice rates, the Iran war, and so perhaps they finally looked at that and were like, Hey, I have an idea. Why don't we counter their narrative with this kind of narrative?
And I think that's how it resonated. But it's really because it's spent a lot of time on social media and understanding the information space and understanding how the American public thinks and feels in this moment.
Coming up the hidden hypocrisy of the lego memes. What do you think the reaction would have been to these videos inside the country from both pro and anti regime people. And I also know, Holly that you really focus on young people in Iran. So do you think they would in some ways be sort of loving this attention and this propaganda war or are they just really focused on trying to survive?
Well, I think progme Iranians if they could understand in an entirety of what was being said, I think it would resonate because some of those themes, like the Epstein files or having that deity ball, or the reference to Trump as a gambler, these are themes that we actually see in the pro regime rallies like the nineteen seventy nine Revolution anniversary that happens annually in February, and so
I think that would resonate. But for the average Iranian that's anti regime, I think they would just scoff at it, because for them, in this moment, they're trying.
To get by the little bit that I've been able to connect to Iranians.
Inside Iran, separate from the war, they're still processing the unprecedented massacre of Iranians protesters in January.
Ms International is sounding the alarm over Iran's crackdown on anti government protests that have swept the country. The human rights group says Iranian authorities have committed mass killings on an unprecedented scale, with security forces routinely using lethal force against unarmed protesters.
And so I think that this is not going to be a focus for the average Iranian.
While all of this propaganda war is happening, the actual war is still in this very fragile stage. It's hard to know where it's at.
Neither Tehran nor Washington seem to want to move at the moment.
And meanwhile, the Iranians have sent the foreign minister Arachi to Russia.
While Trump is keeping the door open to diplomacy.
Iraq Shei blames the United States for the last round of negotiations falling apart.
What do you think that the regime wants at this stage? Is it a cease fire or do you think that they could actually be prepared to drag out this war for much longer.
Well, we're dealing with the new face of the Islamic Republic, one that's more hardline and more repressive, and I think this new leadership is willing to take more gambles, and I think that they're willing to escalate because they recognize that this is an existential threat. In that they also want to make sure that another war doesn't happen again. And so that's why you see even on this blockade, there have been entertaining talks, but they haven't decided to go to Islamabad.
So basically they're calling Trump on his bluff.
And I think that for them, they want to make sure this is the war that ends all future wars.
And unfortunately, if.
And when that does happen, I think if they had their brother, they would go all the way and try to develop a nuclear weapon to make sure that a future conflict doesn't arise, because they see it as a form of deterrence.
Finally, Holly, if we could look inside Iran now, Trump initially urged Iranians to rise up against the regime. That didn't happen during this war. And if anything, some analysts are saying iron could become even more repressive with a revolutionary guard so firmly entrenched. Now, what do you think.
Well, you know, I keep saying that Trump I think was hoping for a Venezuela deal, but he's created a North Korea instead, a regime that's more hardline, more repressive, more emboldened, and unfortunately the Iranian people are caught in the middle. An overwhelming majority want the Islamic Republic gone, and this situation has created a place where now Iranians are worried about the Islamic Republic taking revenge on the Iranian people. Just earlier in March, there we're at least
fifteen hundred arrest Those have been growing every day. There's been at least half a dozen executions, and some of them are protesters tied to the January anti regime uprising, but they're really trying to win the propaganda or narrative war, and I think it's important to emphasize we're in the
longest internet shutdown in Iranian history that's been stayed in posed. Meanwhile, these accounts are able to freely post online while the Iranian people are really struggling to get online, or they have to buy these really expensive VPNs that are I would say shady because they are likely tied to the clerical establishment security apparatus, or they're just really struggling even
to get connectivity in these moments. And so it's clear to me that this is part of a narrative war where they're trying to show them a different face to the outside world while they were rophous their own people.
Holly, it's been great talking to you.
Thanks for joining us, Thank you for having me.
I'm Nicole Johnston and this has been my last week filling in for Ruby Jones, who'll be back in the seven am hosting seat next week. It's been great bringing you some of the biggest stories of the year so far, from the beginning of the Iran War to the arrest of Prince Andrew to getting out and speaking with protesters at the explosive rally against Israeli President Isaac Hertzog. Thanks so much for listening.