On Saturday morning (28), the and began a joint military operation against which resulted in the death of supreme leader Ali Khamenei. The news spread around the world throughout the day, with Iran responding with missiles and the Strait of Hormuz being closed. In Brazil, in addition to following developments, many people went to WhatsApp to process what was happening.
Data from monitoring of more than 100,000 public WhatsApp groups by Palver shows that the topic of Iran, which in previous days represented less than 1% of circulating messages, jumped more than 20 times during Saturday, with debate persisting on Sunday. Reading the messages allows us to identify three main narrative axes.
The largest of the three axes, responsible for just over half of the classified messages, is that of the right, which processed the attack as an extension of the ideological dispute. Khamenei’s death was celebrated in terms that combine geopolitics and election: “2026 is being a disastrous year for Lula. Two dictators who were his friends got screwed by Trump. Maduro arrested and Khamenei dead.”
The Itamaraty technical note condemning the attacks was recoded as “Lula supporting Iran”. A post on network X with this reading migrated to the groups and multiplied into different versions. What gained the most attention in this area was Alckmin’s photo. The messages recall the presence of the vice president at the inauguration of Iranian President Pezeshkian, in July 2024, with the framing that he would be “the only one still alive among all those present in the photo”, transforming a legitimate diplomatic event into a narrative of complicity with a regime in collapse.
The second axis, which concentrated around a quarter of the classified messages, framed the attack as imperialism. The recurring question was “what is the next target, Cuba? Brazil, because of rare earths?”. Notes in solidarity with the Iranian people, such as that of the MST, were shared and texts circulated lamenting the “vile attack” against Khamenei, placing the episode alongside the “kidnapping of Maduro”.
The biggest viral hit in this area was an article reacting to an editorial in Estadão entitled “No one will cry for Iran”. The text called Brazilian journalism “necrojournalism” and accused Estadão of “psychopathy disguised as geopolitical analysis”. The Estadão headline itself became an event in the groups, mobilizing the left with an intensity greater than the military action itself.
The third axis was smaller in volume and produced speculation about practical consequences and strong informational noise. The closure of the Strait of Hormuz became a topic with messages commenting on the impact on fuel prices. “Oil will skyrocket”, “on Monday oil will be through the roof”. In this vacuum of reliable information, disinformation filled the spaces, one of which said that the “President of Brazil has just made a statement on national television and calls on the population after attacks on Iran.” There was no statement.
The same vacuum fed a more diffuse layer, where conflict merged with biblical prophecy, conspiracy theories and diffuse fear of civilizational collapse. “The third war is inevitable and will be in our generation”, said a message that followed with speculation about radioactive dust in Brazil. Another interpreted the attack as a fulfillment of the secrets of Fatima and saw Trump as an unconscious agent of biblical prophecies about .
The conflict in Iran, like the action in , was processed as yet another episode in an internal dispute that was already underway before the first missiles. Throughout 2026, more events of this magnitude should take place and open windows to capture attention for domestic political issues, and this mechanism gains particular weight in an election year. In less than 12 hours, Brazilian WhatsApp had built three parallel wars. Neither was exactly what was happening in Tehran.
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