Iranian American Muslim Warns Of Islamic Fundamentalism, Recounts Life Under Iran’s Regime

August 20, 2026; The Dallas Express

Homeira Hesami, chairwoman of the Iranian-American Community of North Texas, speaks with The Dallas Express about Iran’s 1979 revolution, the Islamic Republic and Islamic fundamentalism. | Image by The Dallas Express.

An Iranian American Muslim and former political prisoner who lived through the aftermath of Iran’s 1979 revolution sat down with The Dallas Express to discuss the rise of the Islamic Republic, the impact of Sharia-based governance on Iranians, and why she believes Islamic fundamentalism has developed into a threat extending far beyond the Middle East.

 Homeira Hesami, chairwoman of the Iranian-American Community of North Texas, was barely a teenager when the revolution toppled Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. IACNT describes itself as an independent nonprofit that has served North Texas’ Iranian community for more than three decades, with a focus on Iranian culture, human rights, civic participation and educating Americans about conditions in Iran.

Hesami’s connection to the subject is personal. Born in Iran in 1966, she graduated from high school with honors at 16, according to a biography published by the U.S. Foundation for Liberty. Hesami said Iranian universities vetted applicants based on political beliefs after the revolution and would not allow her to attend.

She said authorities later arrested her and several friends while they were researching women’s rights and accused them of being part of the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran, also known as the MEK or PMOI. Hesami said authorities could not prove the accusation against her and released her after several months.

“I wasn’t political. I thought that I’m just doing some research and my whole goal was to get into a good place in university and have a career and go on. But that wasn’t the case,” Hesami told The Dallas Express.

Hesami eventually left Iran for the United States, where she continued her education and earned a master’s degree from UT Southwestern Medical Center. She works as a medical physicist in North Texas and has remained active in efforts supporting a free, democratic, secular and non-nuclear Iran.

Hesami recalled that many Iranians initially welcomed the revolution because they hoped the Shah’s authoritarian government would be replaced by greater political freedom and democracy.

“But of course things didn’t turn out the way that … people were hoping,” Hesami said.

Those expectations did not last.

Hesami said Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini ultimately consolidated power under velayat-e faqih, or guardianship of the Islamic jurist, placing religious authority at the center of Iran’s new political system.

Iran’s constitution requires civil, penal, financial, economic, administrative, cultural, military, political and other laws and regulations to be based on Islamic criteria. It also gives the country’s supreme leader extensive powers, including setting general policies, commanding the armed forces and appointing key judicial, military and media officials.

Women push back against the new regime

For Hesami, restrictions imposed on women provided one of the earliest indications of what the new government would become.

She recalled demonstrations against compulsory hijab requirements shortly after the revolution, including demonstrations involving both women who wore the hijab and women who did not.

“The first large demonstration against the regime just happened a couple months after the revolution,” Hesami said.

The demonstrations began on March 8, 1979, one day after Khomeini directed women working in government offices to wear hijab. The Iran Human Rights Documentation Center says demonstrations and sit-ins continued for five days, while compulsory hijab later became law for all women in 1983.

Hesami stressed that her objection was not to women voluntarily wearing religious clothing but to governments dictating what women must wear.

 “The bottom line is that the Iranian people want no forcing of hijab in or out,” she said.

Hesami also cautioned against portraying pre-revolutionary Iran as entirely free. While the Shah’s government did not impose the same religious restrictions, she said political freedoms were limited and political prisoners remained a significant concern.

Sharia and Iran’s theocratic government

Hesami said Iran’s experience demonstrates what she views as the danger of merging fundamentalist religious doctrine with government authority.

Hesami described Iran’s state-enforced interpretation of Sharia as especially severe and argued that the danger comes when religious doctrine becomes government law.

Hesami argued that religious rules that might otherwise exist alongside civil government were incorporated into Iran’s political and legal system following the revolution.

“In Iran those laws are actually incorporated into the system,” she said.

That distinction is reflected in the constitution’s structure. Article 4 requires laws and regulations to conform to Islamic criteria, while Article 5 establishes leadership by a qualified Islamic jurist. Article 110 assigns the leader powers over national policy, the armed forces and key government appointments.

Hesami’s criticism, however, was not directed at Muslims as a whole.

‘Muslims are the victim of it’

Hesami emphasized throughout the interview that many of those persecuted by or fighting against Iran’s government are themselves Muslims.

“We are the victim. You know, the Muslims are the victim of it,” she said.

She said the regime’s repression also affected her family. Hesami recalled that authorities arrested her 21-year-old cousin in 1981 for supporting the MEK and sentenced him to five years in prison. She said authorities retried him and imposed another five-year sentence after he remained loyal to the opposition group.

The MEK has a controversial political history. U.S. government and congressional records have described its early ideology as combining elements of Islam and Marxism. The United States designated the group as a foreign terrorist organization in 1997 but removed it from the list in 2012 after the State Department cited its renunciation of violence, the absence of confirmed terrorist acts for more than a decade and its cooperation in closing Camp Ashraf.

During the interview, Hesami displayed Fallen for Freedom, a 1,000-page compilation by the Iranian Resistance documenting 20,000 MEK members and supporters it says were killed under Iran’s theocratic government. The organization says more than 16,000 were executed, while others died under torture, in assassinations or during clashes.

“I can tell you that all of them are Muslim,” Hesami said.

Independent human rights organizations have also documented mass executions of Iranian political prisoners. Amnesty International says Iranian authorities forcibly disappeared and extrajudicially executed thousands of prisoners in 1988, with minimum estimates putting the death toll at around 5,000. The victims were primarily supporters of the PMOI.

Hesami also displayed a book about Islamic fundamentalism that she emphasized was written by a Muslim author. She argued that this illustrates an often-overlooked aspect of the debate: opposition to Islamic fundamentalism also exists within Muslim communities.

For Hesami, opposition to the Iranian government should therefore not be reduced to a struggle between Muslims and non-Muslims.

Hesami warns movement has spread globally

Hesami believes the threat is no longer confined to Iran or even the Middle East.

Drawing on her experience in Iran and research conducted by Iranian opposition figures, she alleged that the Islamic Republic has spent decades developing influence and networks internationally.

She pointed to Islamic Fundamentalism: The New Global Threat, a book by Mohammad Mohaddessin published in the United States in 1993. Mohaddessin is chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the National Council of Resistance of Iran.

“They realized that the regime is infiltrating into South America, into East Asia, into Africa, into all these countries,” Hesami said.

Her comments frame Islamic fundamentalism as an international political movement rather than an issue affecting only Iran. The claims about the Iranian government’s specific international networks represent Hesami’s assessment and were not independently verified by The Dallas Express for this interview.

Movement for a democratic Iran

Hesami said Americans should understand that opposition to Tehran’s theocratic government includes Iranians of different backgrounds, including practicing Muslims.

Her own story reflects that distinction: she identifies as Muslim while opposing the Iranian government’s interpretation and enforcement of Islamic law.

“We have to send the message out that there are people who are against the regime and what is practiced in Iran is nothing to do with Islam,” Hesami said.

Hesami said the fight should focus on what she described as the fundamentalist or extremist interpretation of Islam, rather than Muslims broadly. She also said religion must remain separate from government in a democratic society.

IACNT’s stated mission reflects that approach. The organization says it works to educate Americans about Iranian culture and politics, promote human rights, encourage civic participation and support a future in which Iranians can live under a democratic government.

“You can’t just judge based on this is a Muslim or this is non-Muslim and say these are good or bad. So you have to look at their actions,” Hesami said.

Her remarks add a firsthand Iranian perspective to a distinction previously examined by The Dallas Express in North Texas: the difference between private religious practice and religious rules enforced through political or governmental power.

For Hesami, the lesson of the 1979 revolution is ultimately about what can happen when a population seeking political freedom instead sees power concentrated under another authoritarian system.

She believes those experiences should inform how Americans understand both the movement for a democratic Iran and the broader growth of Islamic fundamentalist political movements around the world.