"Today, [Iran's] Islamic system faces an all-out economic war that is carefully guided by a war room, but along with this war, there is a major media and propaganda warfare that is often neglected," Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Thursday in a speech before the Council of Experts, a senior deliberative body.
"The goal of this media war is to create worry, disappointment, desperation as well as pessimism among people toward one another and state institutions, and to exaggerate economic difficulties in the minds of the public," he added.
Khamenei cited intelligence reports suggesting that US and Israeli intelligence "financed by the super-rich of our region, have set up an organization for this media war," and said that these forces were "seriously planning and trying to infect the advertising space and the minds in our community."
On May 8, President Trump announced that the US would be withdrawing from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, a landmark nuclear deal signed in 2015 by Iran, Russia, China, France, the UK and Germany, as well as the United States. After its withdrawal, Washington announced the introduction of a series of increasingly tough sanctions, including restrictions targeting the country's energy sector, ports, and shipping, and foreign companies and financial institutions doing business with Iran. With these measures set to go into effect on November 4, the remaining signatories of the Iran deal have scrambled to try to salvage the nuclear deal and preserve economic ties with the Islamic Republic.