ABSTRACT
This chapter presents an outline of the main foreign policy objectives of Iran in the aftermath of the revolution. It can be divided into specific periods, namely under the leadership of Ayatollah Khomeini, and then the presidencies of Hashemi Rafsanjani, Mohammad Khatami, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and Hassan Rouhani. Khomeini was convinced that imperialism posed the biggest threat to the Islamic Republic of Iran. He believed the United States and Israel were the main enemies of the Muslim world and the Third World. At the end of the Iran-Iraq war Hashemi Rafsanjani was convinced that foreign policy should be insulated from domestic ideology. Rafsanjani also had to cope with factional tensions and focus more on internal affairs, especially those of an economic and social nature. One can distinguish the main features of the Iranian foreign policy at the beginning of Ahmadinejad’s presidency, namely: anti-Zionism; closer relations with the Russian Federation; a closer cooperation with Afghanistan and Pakistan; and so on.
