Iran Faces Rising Pressure as Rebel Groups Intensify Attacks in Volatile Southeast

A newly formed coalition of Iranian opposition groups has launched a series of armed attacks against the clerical government across the volatile southeastern provinces of Sistan and Baluchistan and Kerman.

The six attacks claimed by the coalition, known as the People’s Fighters Front, or JMM, have deepened instability in the region. The escalation is fueling debate over whether armed opposition to Tehran could expand—and whether the government can maintain its grip on Sistan and Baluchistan, a predominantly Sunni province.

Iran is overwhelmingly Shiite, while the country’s Sunni minority has long reported discrimination. Sistan and Baluchistan ranks as Iran’s second-largest province among the nation’s 31 provinces.

Mardo Soghom, an Iran specialist who has written extensively on the Islamic Republic, told News Media that the unrest could place additional pressure on the regime’s military and internal security forces. He said the violence could also affect their morale following the 40-day operation by the United States and Israel. While he said the armed groups were unlikely to seize the southeast, he argued that they could significantly erode Tehran’s authority there.

Soghom said it remains unclear whether the groups are receiving support from states opposed to the Islamic Republic, including Gulf Arab countries, Israel or the United States.

An October report by the Human Rights Activist News Agency, or HRANA, said violence in the provinces had accelerated sharply. Eighteen incidents were recorded during the final 18 days of the reporting period—more than in any previous full month.

The JMM emerged in December 2025 as an opposition alliance bringing together Baloch nationalist groups and the militant Sunni organization Jaish al-Adl.

HRANA said it documented at least 63 armed incidents in Sistan and Baluchistan and Kerman between March 31 and Oct. 10, 2026, describing the period as one of sharply escalating violence in southeastern Iran.

The violence left at least 94 people dead and 33 wounded, according to the report. Official figures cited by HRANA recorded 87 deaths and 10 injuries.

The Baloch coalition jolted the Iranian government on Oct. 14 by claiming responsibility for the assassinations of female Basij members, including a commander and a police officer, in Sistan and Baluchistan. The Basij has been designated a terrorist organization by the U.S. government because it operates under the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, or IRGC, which Washington also classifies as a terrorist group.

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Several days before the female Basij commander was killed, Iranian state-controlled media reported that Nosrat Eftekhari, deputy for Cultural and Social Affairs at the Provincial Law Enforcement Command, died in a roadside bombing in Zahedan, in Sistan and Baluchistan.

Jason Brodsky, policy director at United Against Nuclear Iran, told News Media that Sistan and Baluchistan has experienced recurring unrest over the years, but that the latest wave represents a noticeable increase in activity. He noted that Mohammad Karami, the current commander of the IRGC Ground Forces, previously served as the province’s governor and led IRGC units there. Brodsky said that experience was among the reasons Karami was promoted to his current position in 2025, amid heightened security concerns in Iran.

Brodsky said he did not see an immediate prospect of the opposition taking control of the province. However, he emphasized that maintaining Iran’s territorial integrity remains a red line for many Iranians, particularly those in the opposition—a point he said Western governments should recognize.

Khalilullah Balochi, a Baluch activist and journalist, told Iran International that armed activity by the groups was not new, but that the scale and intensity of the attacks had increased.

The JMM’s high-impact attacks on Iranian government targets have drawn growing attention from dissidents and regional security analysts.

Navid Mohebbi, a former Persian media analyst with the State Department’s Public Affairs Bureau, told News Media that the newly established People’s Fighters Front had carried out several relatively successful attacks against mid-ranking government officials and security personnel in Sistan and Baluchistan in recent months. He said the operations had attracted public notice, particularly as the regime continues to execute protesters. According to Mohebbi, the deaths of some mid-level military and security officials have been welcomed by segments of Iranian society.

He warned, however, that “Nevertheless, the Iranian public remains deeply cautious and largely distrustful of such groups. Two major concerns underpin this distrust: the possibility of separatist ambitions and the influence of radical Islamism, which is fundamentally at odds with the increasingly secular outlook of Iranian society.”

Mohebbi sees encouraging signs from the JMM, including “the coalition’s recent statements, unlike the rhetoric traditionally associated with similar groups, contain no explicit references to Baluch separatism. Instead, the coalition has identified its primary objective as dismantling the system of Velayat-e Faqih (Guardianship of the Islamic Jurist) and liberating the country from its oppression. It has explicitly declared that it seeks ‘an Iran for all Iranians.”’

He continued that “The reality is that these groups lack the capacity to confront the regime in conventional warfare. Through guerrilla operations, however, they can inflict significant psychological blows on the regime and its security establishment. Whether their activities can gain traction beyond Sistan and Baluchistan will depend largely on their ability to sustain what appears to be an effort to earn broader public trust.”

Beni Sabti, an Iran expert at the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) in Israel, told News Media the coalition has “a lot of guns” and created an “armed rebellion” against the Iranian regime in the provinces. He said, however, the armed upheaval is limited to the region Baluchistan.

Sabti, who was born in Tehran, said the clerical regime in the capital Tehran does not exercise solid control over the provinces, which resembles parts of South America where some governments lost sovereignty to militias.

He said that there are no reporters in the restive region. As a result, it is difficult to secure accurate news. Sabti said the “IRGC has a headquarters there to fight against these Baluchis.” The JMM coalition “can only continue to harm the soldiers and, from time to time, kill a commander. There are a lot of these local commanders in Iran. It is not like an air force commander.”