Lorraine Adams

@vali_nasr @raghavanreports How do you know this?

I told @raghavanreports that Iran is today led by a leadership, particularly in IRGC, who didn’t believe that Khamenei’s restraint, and the restraints of the previous generation of IRGC leaders that Israel eliminated, actually protected Iran. They think Khamenei was wrong, and that his stance invited the current aggression that they are facing. They’re more willing to take risks. They’re willing to do things that, previously, wouldn’t have been done, and basically saying, “You escalate, we escalate, or we escalate even more....They are more dangerous, but at the same time we’re seeing they’re not averse to talking. And maybe even more willing to talk than Khamenei who had a strategy of no talking and no war. The new leadership is basically saying, we’re not afraid of war, but we’re also not afraid of talking.

@bungarsargon Charisma? You must be kidding

I once saw Adam Driver live on Broadway in Burn This. He had this raw, electric charisma that was apparent even from the nosebleed seats. During one scene that begins with Driver’s character offstage, there was a knock on the door. I will never forget how the entire audience inhaled audibly with the sheer anticipation of seeing Adam Driver again. It turned out to be a different character at the door, at which point the entire audience audibly exhaled in what I can only describe as sheepish disappointment. This charisma is why Lena Dunham cast Driver in Girls. So it’s kind of awful that she is now trying to recast herself as the victim of the very thing she wanted from him. My column: batyaus.substack.com/p/lena-dunham-…

Iran’s imprisoned Nobel peace laureate Narges Mohammadi may have had a heart attack washingtonpost.com/world/2026/03/…

What a poignant piece 💔 nybooks.com/online/2026/03…

@KatrinaNation Wow

Not satire •Rubio said it's hard for the mediators to communicate with Iranian officials because they are staying away from their phones out of fear they will be located and assassinated. That has slowed the pace of communications, Rubio said, according to sources.

Here’s a photo I took of the Tomb of Hafez, in Shiraz, Iran. A 14thC Persian poet, his grave is a cherished destination. This verse of his is on the tombstone: “On the day of my death, give me a minute’s time to set eyes on thee/Then, from the world and life, I will be set free.”

This profile of Zolghadr, Iran’s New Secretary of the Expediency Council, comes from the National Council of Resistance of Iran. It details the “Chain Murders,” his coordinated assassination of intellectuals & dissidents 1988-1998. ncr-iran.org/en/news/terror…

An art institute director in Tehran feels torn between rage and sympathy for the young teenage armed Basij stationed in front of her mother’s doctor’s office. bostonreview.net/articles/the-c…

@MrEfrah @AJEnglish There are men inside the highest ranks of the regime who are telling Mossad exactly where their fellow insiders are located in real time.

@AJEnglish Why is it so easy to kill these Iranian generals?

BREAKING: Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) confirms that General Ali Mohammad Naeini, its spokesman, has been killed in an Israeli-US missile attack. 🔴 LIVE updates: aje.news/lg5uoa

@zara140769 This is ghastly and I'm so sorry about your uncle.

Islamic regime just executed 3 protesters on the eve of the Iranian New Year. Executions close to Nowruz is one of the Islamic regime’s traditions. My uncle too was hanged on the 23rd of Esfand (a week before Nowruz) and the family was informed only afterwards.

@mehdiy_fa Fascinating point

The Iranian government has chosen to project normalcy. They could easily have created a wartime atmosphere by engineering shortages of electricity or gas and blaming enemies, but they have not. They are also not making major propaganda use of civilian casualties. By projecting normalcy, they avoid showing weakness or preventing the population to see the regime as on the downward spiral. The downside to this strategy is that this prevents getting the support of anti-war crowd internationally. Not many gruesome videos of killed civilians are published to mobilize the left in the West. We haven’t seen any major anti-war protests in the West. The regime is also failing to turn parts of the Iranian population against the war by not imposing serious hardship on them. I am not sure how long they can keep the pretense of normalcy in the country. Sooner or later serious shortages will start.

@MaryamAlemzadeh @meriponline I admire your essay, and would love to know more about the IRGC--it's almost impossible to learn anything online about the young men that currently constitute its militia. If you have any suggestions for more reading, please share! Thank you, Maryam

I wrote a short piece in the @meriponline roundtable, on how chaos is the IRGC's bread and butter. Honored to be in such stellar company in thinking about the current war.

WSJ: Israeli intelligence officials began placing calls to individual commanders, threatening them and their families by name if they didn’t stand aside in the event of an uprising, according to people familiar with the matter.

Ordinary Iranians are sharing locations of regime hardliners, Revolutionary Guard offices & motorcycle squads. Some are camping in tents in forests north of Tehran. wsj.com/world/middle-e…

This reporting ⁦@msrmichaelson⁩ extraordinary nuggets about the massive wealth in London that Iran hardliners have amassed while their own people suffer from astronomical inflation, and food & water shortages. observer.co.uk/news/internati…

I’m fascinated by this exclusive interview by @fpleitgenCNN in Tehran where he’s the only western journo in all of Iran. He elicits some revealing details about the regime’s perspective I’ve not seen anywhere else. cnn.com/2026/03/09/mid…

CNN's Fred Pleitgen is back home in Germany, but says he wouldn't hesitate to return and do more reporting on topics still uncovered, like "to what extent the government still has the support of the people. Because there were very few people who were still out on the streets, and a lot of people are afraid to speak to you." theguardian.com/world/2026/mar…

In the midst of the Israeli and American war in Iran, it’s important to remind ourselves of the rich beauty of Iran. I’ve stayed at this amazing hotel in Qazvin, its decor is more than just fascinating design, it’s a tribute to the ancient architecture of Persia.

I have immense respect for @vali_nasr and @MAliKadivar for their deep knowledge of Iran…

@fpleitgenCNN @vali_nasr I’ve stayed at this hotel and your photos are glorious!

With everything going on I just want to say, I think Iran is one of the most beautiful places on earth with near endless economic potential. People extremely industrious with a love for detail. On our way in and out of Iran we stayed at two amazing small boutique hotels. The Zanjan Boutique hotel and the Saraye Ghahramani boutique hotel in Qazvin, check them out.