When it comes to Iran, the transition from the Obama administration to the Trump administration is a hopeful one.

There is high hope the incoming administration will challenge Iran’s domestic policies, expansionism and support of terrorism, and its controversial nuclear program.

Those who have negotiated with the regime and trusted its envoys have actually deceived themselves, and in the process endangered the rest of the world, including particularly the people of Iran. Their hopes blind their eyes to the truth.

Nothing has changed in Iran under Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and Iranian President Hassan Rouhani. In fact, there is a good argument to be made the status quo has excessively deteriorated.

The Nuclear Ordeal

We are now moving to a new administration, not protective or defensive of the Iran nuclear agreement, but ready to challenge it. President-elect Trump has emphasized in his words the disastrous nature of the agreement. It is in his words a disaster, as agreed by many across the American political spectrum. He has even expressed his readiness to tear up the entire agreement.

It’s almost 18 months since the Iran nuclear deal was signed. We have to ask, has anything about Iran’s behavior changed? No. Iran, under the alleged but not real moderate Hassan Rouhani, has already violated terms of the Iran nuclear agreement. These are real substantial terms. The limits on heavy water production and ballistic missile development, both contrary to a United Nations resolution embracing Iran nuclear agreement.

Middle East Mayhem

Iran continues to violate the sovereignty of the neighboring countries of the region. Under Rouhani, Iran extended its funding and training violent extremists terrorists in the Middle East and beyond.

Iran-backed militias, commanded by Revolutionary Guards Quds Force commander Qassem Suleimani, have launched horrendous crime and killing sprees across Syria and Iraq, and most recently in Aleppo, targeting even innocent women and children in summary street executions.

The appeasement policy adopted by the West during the past four decades has provided both the political green light and the economic greens necessary for Iran to pursue such atrocities. The international community must recognize the failure of this approach and begin tracing a new road map.

Disastrous Human Rights Record

Iran under Rouhani continues to punish and imprison Iranians who speak their minds against the regime or advocate independent ideas. Unprecedented numbers of citizens of Iran have been executed under this allegedly “moderate” regime.

Numerous international human rights figures and organizations have expressed grave concern as over 3,000 have been sent to the gallows under Rouhani’s tenure. 2015 came to be a year when an average of nearly three people each day were executed in Iran.

The regime in Iran is holding this country’s proud nation, its culture and history hostage. While claiming to be a religious government, the mullahs in Tehran are continuously resorting to measures considered profoundly sacrilegious. It is denying the people of Iran the human rights provided by most religions, including Islam, as are the direct endowment from God Almighty.

The Way Forward

U.S. Congress has been the bulwark and the foundation on a truly bipartisan basis of support for measures against the Iranian regime. Just recently, Congress returned to the bipartisan ground on Iran policy and extended the Iran Sanctions Act with overwhelming bipartisan support.

This is a very helpful sign and provides open territory and responsive ears as the case for more sanctions and a tough administration policy against Iran are made. Those continuing to advocate the appeasement policy believe it is actually possible the current regime in Iran could become a democratic entity respecting the rule of law. However as the past 38 years have shown, don’t hold your breath.

Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin declared long ago, “Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God.” That is the same mantra adopted by National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), a political umbrella group of opposition movements seeking peaceful transition to peace, freedom and democracy for all people in Iran.

NCRI President Maryam Rajavi, a Muslim woman who is strongly against a fundamentalist interpretation of Islam and who enjoys vast international support, has placed forward a 10-point plan. This proposal provides a realistic solution for a future Iran ensuring gender equality, freedom of speech, religion and the media, an end to all executions and torture, a nuclear free Iran and more of the values cherished by today’s free world democracies.

Iran Will be Free

A new day is dawning for the cause of a liberated, stable, free and independent Iran, free of the rule of the mullahs.

We must choose to become part of history, not to sit passively by, but to act in support of the long and proud history of courageous people who have fought and achieved their freedom, often against extreme odds.

History is on the side of those struggling for freedom, democracy, and human rights. Iran seeks to return to its place in the community of civilized nations.

Seeing horrifying scenes from Aleppo and the entire Middle East in chaos, one questions is it really possible that the regime in Iran, with its growing wealth and military strength, can be stopped and overturned? Based on history, this is possible.

We must never underestimate the capacity of a small group of ordinary citizens in bringing about huge change in this world. In fact, history has proven this is the only method such changes have ever formulated.

“The moral arc of the universe often bends slowly. But it always bends towards justice,” the great Dr. Martin Luther King once said.

The evil regime that now rules over the good people of Iran will also collapse, and it will happen in our time. Iran will once again be free.