The remarks made on April 20 by Khamenei strangely resulted in a mutual response from the regime’s various factions. Newspapers affiliated to both major factions of the regime bolded their headlines with the high alert announced by Khamenei in his remarks. Delivering a speech before a number of army officers and personnel, he was unprecedentedly blunt in talking about the threats his regime is facing, calling on “all (military) apparatuses and others” to “high alert”, and emphasizing to take this as an order. Through such remarks he rang the bells inside the regime.

This high alert signal is a mentioning of what threat? Without bringing up any names Khamenei was referring to the remarks made by US Joint Chiefs of Staff General Martin Dempsey once again speaking of a military option. However, it appears that this was more an excuse and pretext, or else repeating the term “military option” shouldn’t result in such a response.

Therefore, one must search for the source of the threat Khamenei was warning about somewhere else. This threat is none other than the Saudi-led coalition and recent developments in Yemen. The same issue that Khamenei in his remarks described as “Yemen’s tear jerking developments”. These events are the same subject that both of the regime’s factions speak of in one voice and similar words. The most significant example is Rafsanjani’s positions, who was always portraying himself as ready to make up and start all over again with Saudi Arabia as friends. Through his close colleagues he continuously signaled his readiness to travel to Saudi Arabia and resolve the bilateral issues. However, following Operation Decisive Storm, Rafsanjani himself attacked Saudi Arabia with much harsher words than Khamenei.

The truth is that the Saudi-led regional coalition has politically cornered the Iranian regime into complete isolation. Militarily, one of the pillars of the regime’s “strategic depth” is crumbling. These developments, if materialized, will without a doubt lead to the fall of the regime’s strategic pillars in Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and …