As a young boy growing up in Kermanshah, in western Iran, Payam Feili, now 40, would race to a shelter with his parents when air raid sirens pierced the air, signaling incoming Iraqi bombings during the Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s.

In a surprising twist of fate, decades later, Feili once again found himself running for cover — this time as his native country launched ballistic missiles at his adopted city of Haifa last month in retaliation for Israel’s preemptive strike on Iran’s nuclear program.

A gay poet and political dissident who was arrested multiple times before he fled Iran, Feili made headlines in 2015 when he visited Israel and sought asylum in the Jewish state. Ten years later, he experienced the Israel-Iran war “as a child witnessing his parents fighting,” he told The Times of Israel.

“My family was there getting attacked,” he said. “I live here and I was under attack from the ayatollahs. It was a confusing situation.”

Yet, according to Feili, not only he, but millions of his fellow Iranians, saw the Israeli military operation as a beacon of hope, a sign that change might finally be possible in their country.

“Persian people inside Iran were under attack and still said thank you because they thought [Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali] Khamenei would go to hell,” he said, sharing a profound disappointment about the regime surviving the war.

Feili spoke with The Times of Israel in his small apartment in Haifa, surrounded by pictures, books and an affectionate cat.

During the interview, a projector beamed Iran International — an all-news Persian-language station based in London — onto a white wall in the kitchenette. The Islamic Republic designated the outlet a terrorist organization in 2022.

Payam said he watches Iran International a lot.

“I don’t like to watch the news, but I have to understand what is happening there,” he said.

Feili was born to a Kurdish family in 1985. He said religion was never part of his upbringing.

“Despite growing up in this Muslim Shia country, I did not receive any religious education, and my parents always encouraged me not to take part in any religious ceremony,” he said.

When he was a teenager, Feili moved to Karaj, a large city some 30 kilometers from........

© The Times of Israel