With dogs, dance and uncovered hair, Iranians defy 'unholy alliance' of socialists, radicals: ‘Hypocrites!’

"You’re hypocrites!"

The shout cut across H Street NW last week as about 500 Iranian Americans supporting regime change in Iran marched toward a smaller group of pro-China socialists gathered two blocks away across from the White House, backing the radical clerics leading Iran.

"We are here for freedom of Iran," Jay Gorbani, an Iranian American, explained as he held his Labradoodle puppy, Bella, while other members of a fledgling group, the Singham-funded network includes the People’s Forum Inc., the ANSWER Coalition, the Party for Socialism and Liberation, CodePink Women for Peace and the Palestinian Youth Movement, which has helped organize these protests. 

The Democratic Socialists of America, which helped elect Zohran Mamdani as mayor of New York City, also co-sponsored the protests. The organizations didn’t respond to requests for comment.

The confrontation in the nation’s capital reflects a broader struggle unfolding not only in Iran but also in the West.

From radical Muslims, many wearing black robes, turbans and headscarves.

"This is the very familiar, what we call, unholy alliance between the black and the red that is the communists and the very reactionary people or strata. We always see it because they are both against the progress and happiness of the country," Pahlavi said years later.

It's an alliance now called the "red-green alliance," with green symbolizing the color of Islam.

Last weekend, an Iranian American woman with another nascent group, DCProtests4Iran, faced off against women in black robes from the Manassas Mosque in northern Virginia, where mosque leaders support the Iranian theocracy. Her hair loose in the wind, she flashed a "V" for victory and shouted, "Down with the Islamic regime!"

Staring down H Street NW at the socialists, Reza Rezavi, an engineer from Rockville, Maryland, and a volunteer with DCProtests4Iran, said his group supports Pahlavi’s son, Reza Pahlavi, as the leader of a new transitional government that would realize a "democratic Iran."

"Freedom for Iran!" screamed another Iranian American woman, holding her Lhasa Apso dog, Cocoa, rescued in 2019 from Tehran, where the regime has ruled dog walking illegal in many cities.

At protests from London to Washington, D.C., Iranian diaspora activists say they are confronting far-left groups they accuse of stealing democracy from them dating back to 1979, when they defended radical clerics who came to power in 1979, overthrowing Pahlavi.

"It’s cultural warfare," said Paul Mauro, an attorney, former New York Police Department counterterrorism inspector and a current Fox News contributor.

"Marxism is probably the most malevolent single idea ever devised," Mauro said. "And our culture has now become infected with a tolerance for Marxism that is being translated into a very dangerous political energy that is working with Islamists to undermine America as we know it."

LIke clockwork, members of the Party for Socialism and Liberation, the ANSWER Coalition and other socialist organizations had arrived at 2:28 p.m. last weekend at the corner of 16th and H Street NW. One woman sipped an iced coffee, while another pulled a red wagon piled with megaphones. A third pushed a grocery cart filled with a marching drum and fluorescent yellow signs that said, "STOP THE WAR ON IRAN!" 

A young woman dragged a dozen or so signs, asking, "Would you like a sign? Sign? Anyone like a sign?"

Tourists looked away as far-left activists, including CodePink co-founder Medea Benjamin and DC coordinator Olivia DiNucci arrived with a new protest banner. Ignoring the approaching crowd of Iranian Americans, Benjamin posed for a photo with Korean Americans who support China, Iran and North Korea’s communism. 

Soon, the group broke into familiar anti-American chants heard at protests for years, but this time they were muffled by the chants of the Iranian protesters, chanting, "USA! USA!"

Asked about Singham’s funding of the protest's socialist sponsors, Benjamin said, "I’d rather not talk about it."

Minutes later, the Iranian American groups rounded the corner from L Street NW and stopped about 200 yards from the far-left activists on 16th Street NW. They blasted Iranian music and danced.

In defiance of strict interpretations of Islam, families walked pet dogs near Bella and Cocoa as women shouted with their hair in the wind, and men and women freely danced beside each other to Iranian pop music, acts mostly banned in Iran. The scene stood in defiance of the strict religious rules imposed by Iran’s clerics, who have barred pet dogs, forced women to cover their hair and suppressed music, dancing and dissent.

An Iranian American woman smiled and slowly raised her middle finger at the socialist activists, their chants of "Down, down with the USA," drowned out by music blaring in Farsi.

Across the police line, field marshals from the Party for Socialism and Liberation corralled elementary-aged girls swaddled in black headscarves to the microphone, filming them close up as the children stumbled over their words, reading chants from a phone as activists egged them on.

When a girl got in the shot, the field marshal filming the canned chanting tried to shoo her away. 

"Those people are supporting terrorists," said one Iranian American with the reform-era Iranian flag draped over his shoulder like a cape that featured a lion emblem. "We are against them."

"We do not support the regime," said Siamak Aran, an organizer with the National Solidarity Group for Iran, as Iranian Americans marched behind him, chanting, "USA! USA!"

Fox News Digital's Azziana Solomon contributed to this report.