The flag of the pre-1979 Islamic revolution, featuring a lion and a sun, is banned from stadiums at the World Cup
“The Iranian team is not playing. The Islamic Republic’s team is.”
For Roozbeh Farahanipour, there is no separating football from politics.
Before Iran has kicked a ball in Los Angeles, the team’s presence at this World Cup is already fraught.
Farahanipour, an Iranian-American activist and chief executive of the West Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce, fled Iran in 2000 after years of political activism.
Since then, he has built a life in Los Angeles, home to one of the world’s largest Iranian communities outside Iran.
The neighbourhood of Westwood, on Los Angeles’ west side, has long been known as ‘Tehrangeles’.
Farahanipour’s opposition to the government in Tehran is deeply personal.
“My mother was killed. My cousin and friends were killed,” he says. “There is no peace between me and this regime.”
Yet he rejects the idea that the answer lies in war.
“I hate this regime and I hate this war,” he says. “Nothing justifies killing innocent people.”
Those contradictions are becoming increasingly familiar for Iranian Americans as Iran prepares to play two World Cup matches in Los Angeles, and one in Seattle.
These are difficult times to be an Iranian football fan especially here in the US.
Iran is a football-loving nation, and many here have followed Team Melli, the country’s national team, for years.
But this World Cup arrives amid a fragile ceasefire, continuing hostility between Iran, the United States and Israel, and deep divisions over what Iran’s team represents.
There have been protests in Los Angeles prior to the World Cup
Outside SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles, where Iran will face New Zealand on 15 June, those tensions are on full display.
Opponents of the government in Tehran have gathered waving the Lion and Sun flag. It was Iran’s flag from before the 1979 Islamic revolution, and for many here, a symbol of resistance to the current regime.
From a distance, they look like Iranian flags.
But a closer look reveals the symbol at the heart of the dispute.
For protesters here, the Lion and Sun represents Iran.
“It is a stance against the Islamic Republic. This is the real flag of Iran,” says Arezo Rashidian, one of the protest organisers.
The emblem on the national team’s jerseys, they argue, represents a government they want gone. That post-revolution flag has the same green, white and red stripes but also features the Islamic emblem of four crescents and a sword in red. The Arabic inscription ‘Allahu Akbar’ which translates to ‘Allah is the greatest’ and Muslims recite during prayer, is also featured on the flag.
Many of those gathered outside SoFi Stadium accuse the Islamic Republic of using sport to project legitimacy abroad while repressing dissent at home.
“Regime change is the goal. We’re here to show solidarity with the people of Iran,” says Ms Rashidian.
She says they are against “the mass killings of individuals protesting freely,” referring to the anti-government protests in January and February and the widespread crackdown by the regime forces which resulted in thousands of deaths.
At the time, state officials acknowledged several thousand casualties, while activist groups and medical sources documented mass shootings, overwhelmed hospitals, and leaked mortuary records indicating the true scale of the violence.
Around her demonstrators chant against Iran’s leadership and call for democracy and freedom.
Some carry placards reading: “Shame on Fifa.”
Football’s governing body has banned the Lion and Sun flag inside World Cup stadiums, classifying it as a political symbol under tournament rules.
“We’re in the United States — the land of the free,” says Mr Farahanipour. “The First Amendment guarantees freedom of expression and speech. Fifa should not interfere when people want to express themselves.”
The Iranian Football Federation reportedly made “respect for the official Iranian flag” one of its conditions for taking part in the tournament.
Separating the team from the regime
The players themselves have repeatedly called for politics to be kept out of football.
But for many of the protesters gathered outside SoFi Stadium that is impossible.
Almost everyone the BBC speaks to insists they cannot separate Team Melli from the government they say it represents.
“I wish I could” Tannaz Parsi says, getting emotional.
“This is not an easy thing for us to do – demonstrating against our people – these are our kids” she said referring to the players. “But they put their hands with the Islamic republic.”
While Farahanipour says that the team is being used as a propaganda tool for the regime, he admits the situation is not straightforward.
“The players are Iranian athletes. They are talented people. I respect them individually,” he said.
“But when they wear the uniform of the regime, to me, they represent the regime.”
But he says he has sympathy for the athletes who will play on American soil against one of the most politically charged backdrops any team at this World Cup will face.
“I feel bad for them,” Farahanipour says. “They have to play under so much pressure.”
When asked whether he can imagine separating the team from the government, his answer comes quickly.
“Only if they separate themselves from the Islamic Republic’s anthem and flag.”
When Iran plays here, football will be the centre of focus. But geopolitics will be hovering over the stadium.