Is the Iranian society desperate to throw off the yoke of Islamic dictatorship and return to the days of monarchical rule under the Pahlavis? The much-feared Pahlavis were only in power in 1979 – and in a position to be overthrown – because Israel, Britain and the US meddled deeply in Iran to keep them in place for so long.

When Iranians elected the secular reformist Mohammed Mossadegh, a lawyer and intellectual, as prime minister in 1951, Britain and the US worked tirelessly to topple him. His chief crime was that he took back control of Iran’s oil industry – and its profits – from the UK.

Within two years, Mossadegh was overthrown in US-led Operation Ajax, and the Shah was reinstated as dictator. Israel was drafted in to train Iran’s Savak secret police in torture techniques to use on Iranian dissidents, learnt from torturing Palestinians.