Wartime propaganda has evolved for the social media age, and Iran is now vying with the U.S. to be the world’s biggest keyboard warrior.

As the real-world bombardment in the Middle East continues and casualties mount, both sides in the month-old war are also firing off ironic, pop-culture-steeped memes on the online battlefield. Iran’s new leaders have quickly assumed an online fighting posture, amping up their memes and pointed attacks on the U.S. and Israel.

“What we’re seeing is not just a war of weapons, but it’s also a war of aesthetics,” said Nancy Snow, a professor and author who studies propaganda. “Whoever controls the meme controls the mood.”

Iran’s prime target is President Donald Trump, with state media and top officials alike relentlessly mocking and amplifying criticisms of the U.S. leader.

Top members of Iran’s parliament, its Revolutionary Guard and even its president, Masoud Pezeshkian, have sought to insult or undermine Trump in their messaging. And they’re using the world’s most popular social media platforms, such as Facebook and X, to get the word out.

Among the most striking examples: a series of seemingly AI-generated videos depicting Iranian military successes against the U.S. and Israel in a Legoesque cartoon art style.

One shows a panicked Trump ordering an airstrike after reviewing the “Epstein File” alongside Satan and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Another, a rap diss track, calls Trump a “loser” and accuses him of being Netanyahu’s “puppet” over images of stock market sell-offs, missile strikes and coffins.

Those and other messages out of Iran regularly reference Jeffrey Epstein, the late notorious sex offender and former Trump friend at the center of conspiracy theories that the president launched the Iran war to distract the public from headlines about releases of files related to the Epstein investigation.

The plain intent of Iran’s messaging is not just to project defiance and counter U.S. assessments of Tehran’s military weakness, but also to undermine Trump by homing in on some of his biggest political vulnerabilities.

“Iran is blending grievance with meme culture — mixing Epstein, anti-war sentiment and pop visuals to penetrate fragmented Western audiences,” Snow said.

As for why they’re using Legos to convey their message, it may be because of their universal appeal, said Dan Butler, a political science professor at Washington University in St. Louis who uses the toys in his teaching.

“The same reason it works in education is the reason actors would use it for propaganda: people like Legos and will tune in to watch Lego-based films,” Butler told CNBC in an email.

“In fact if something is violent, using Legos might make people lower their defenses and also be more likely to share the material,” he said.

The Trump administration, meanwhile, has melded wartime messaging with internet culture even more literally.

In the early days of the war, official accounts shared videos splicing clips from sports, movies and video games into real footage of military strikes.

The visuals dovetail with the relentlessly bombastic and boastful rhetoric from Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who have repeatedly trumpeted the “obliteration” of Iran’s military while assuring that the U.S. is rapidly nearing its objectives for victory.

But the White House officials involved in creating the videos say they have proven effective in drawing attention and connecting with young people. One of them told Politico the efforts are meant to tout U.S. troops’ heroic work “in a way that captivates an audience.”

The White House told CNBC it intends to stick with its messaging strategy.

“The legacy media wants us to apologize for highlighting the United States Military’s incredible success, but the White House will continue showcasing the many examples of Iran’s ballistic missiles, production facilities, and dreams of owning a nuclear weapon being destroyed in real time,” spokeswoman Anna Kelly said.

On the latter metric, the strategy has been a success: Four videos posted on the official White House X account on March 5 and 6 have garnered nearly 100 million impressions as of April 1.

Iran’s goal isn’t to convince or corral its own people — who are reportedly facing extended internet outages — but rather to craft a “response offensive” to undermine the U.S. globally, Stahl said.

“There’s a lot of erosion with regard to potential [U.S.] ally support for this war, and these messages from Iran are playing right into that.”

It’s not all memes and trolling. Iranian officials are also homing in on the war’s destabilizing impact on the global economy and energy prices.

On Monday morning, Trump wrote on Truth Social that the U.S. is “in serious discussions with A NEW, AND MORE REASONABLE, REGIME to end our Military Operations in Iran.”

The S&P 500 ended the trading day lower while oil prices continued to rise.

Ghalibaf on Tuesday shared a CNN article on Americans struggling with the war-induced spike in U.S. gas prices.

“Sad, but this is what happens when your leaders put others ahead of hard-working and ordinary Americans. It’s not America First anymore … it’s Israel First,” he wrote.

The U.S.-Israeli war on Iran is a “misadventure” whose goals and exit strategy remain unclear, Russia’s ambassador to the U.K. told CNBC.

Andrey Kelin said Russia has “a lot of sympathy” with Tehran and said “the best end” to the escalating Middle East war is for it to “show only that they are senseless.”

“We still are trying to understand, what are the goals of President Trump in this campaign. You know that lots of doubts have been expressed about the exit strategy that the American administration can have in this endeavour,” Kelin told CNBC’s Steve Sedgwick in an interview recorded on Thursday.

Russian President Vladimir Putin sent a message to Iran’s new supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, earlier this week, offering his “unwavering support” to Tehran and saying the country “has been and will remain the Islamic Republic’s reliable partner.”

The war has been raging for two weeks, with heavy strikes reported across Iran’s capital city and shipping traffic through the strategically vital Strait of Hormuz severely disrupted.

The White House has said the objectives of Operation Epic Fury have been to destroy Iran’s ballistic missile arsenal and production capacity and its navy, sever its support for proxies in other countries and ensure Iran can never acquire a nuclear weapon.

The White House said on Thursday these objectives “have remained unchanged unambiguous, and consistent” since the operation began on Feb. 28.

“We have a lot of sympathy with Iran. We have a lot of sympathy as well with the Persian Gulf states, there is no doubt at all. As for the beginning, I cannot understand the position of when everybody is blaming Iran,” Kelin said.

“[The] crisis has started with the, as I have said, with Israel and U.S. aggression against Iran and it was in the middle of talks, of course,” he continued, referring to negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program held in the Swiss city of Geneva last month.

“My president discussed this issue with the president of the United States, and we can make a good contribution by the way to finish it, to wrap it up.”

CNBC has contacted a spokesperson at the White House and Israel’s Foreign Ministry and is awaiting a response.

Alongside China, which has received millions of barrels of oil through the Strait of Hormuz even as war chokes the waterway, Russia stands as one of Iran’s most influential diplomatic partners.

U.K. Defense Secretary John Healy told reporters on Thursday that Putin’s “hidden hand” appears to be behind Iran’s military playbook as well as potentially some of Tehran’s military capabilities.

Iran has reportedly fired off more than 2,000 Shahed drones across the Middle East since the war began. These drones, which were first designed in Iran, have been used extensively during Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said earlier this week that the Kremlin’s own assessments estimate that more than 1.3 million Russian soldiers have been killed and wounded on the battlefield since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. CNBC could not independently verify this report.

A report from the Center for Strategic and International Studies published in January said Russian battlefield casualties are significantly greater than Ukrainian fatalities, with Ukrainian forces likely suffering somewhere between 500,000 and 600,000 casualties.

Kelin said he was sure that both Moscow and Kyiv would eventually agree to a diplomatic resolution to the war.

“I cannot say when it is going to happen, but a diplomatic solution is badly needed,” Kelin said.

Kelin said The U.S. was “playing a constructive role in this diplomatic effort,” but added: “Since Ukraine is not prepared at the moment and since Europe still prefer to back up Ukraine as much as possible, to supply it with weapons, with money … making no efforts to solicit or to help this diplomatic solution, this will last for some time.”

U.S-brokered talks on the Ukraine war have been put on hold due to the Iran conflict, with U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff telling CNBC on Tuesday that the discussions would now likely take place next week. Ukraine’s Zelenskyy had urged the U.S. not to remove sanctions on Russia ahead of those talks, although the White House has since moved to temporarily lift sanctions on Russian crude at sea.

The European Union’s foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, recently said there appears to be “no end in sight” to Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Speaking at a news conference on Monday, she said it is clear Russia’s army was “bogged down” and its economy is in steep decline.

“Russia’s maximalist demands cannot be met with a minimalist response,” Kallas said. “It’s just common sense, if Ukraine’s military is to be limited in size, Russia’s should be too.”

The conflict in the Middle East is rapidly expanding across the region as the U.S. and Israel-led war with Iran enters its sixth day.

Images published Thursday showed destruction across Tehran after nearly a week of strikes on Iran’s capital.

Iran has retaliated by launching a wave of missiles and drones at Israel, as well as targeting U.S. allies in the region.

Explosions have been reported in Qatar and Bahrain, while oil-rich Azerbaijan said it was attacked by two Iranian drones and Tehran claimed naval fighters had struck a U.S. tanker in the north of the Persian Gulf.

U.S. President Donald Trump has said the Iran war could last for four to five weeks but warned the campaign could also “go far longer than that.”

Spain has pushed back against the White House’s claim that it agreed to cooperate militarily with Washington amid the conflict with Iran, doubling down on its anti-war stance despite the U.S. president’s threat to sever trade ties.

White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said on Wednesday that Madrid’s position of refusing to allow the country’s military bases to be used in the ongoing Iran war had now changed.

“With respect to Spain, I think they heard the president’s message yesterday loud and clear, and it’s my understanding, over the past several hours, they’ve agreed to cooperate with the U.S. military,” Leavitt told reporters.

“The president expects all of our European allies, of course, to cooperate in this long sought-after mission, not just for the United States but also for Europe, to crush the rogue Iranian regime.”

Spain swiftly and “categorically” rejected Leavitt’s assertion, however.

“The Spanish government’s position on the war in the Middle East … and the use of our bases has not changed at all,” Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares told private radio station Cadena Ser, according to Reuters.

The chaotic messaging between two NATO allies comes shortly after U.S. President Donald Trump vowed to cut off all trade with Madrid, calling Spain “terrible” and repeating his criticism of Spain’s defense spending.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez responded on Wednesday by describing the sprawling Middle East crisis as a “disaster” and summarized his government’s position in just three words: “No to war.”

Sánchez has emerged as one of the European Union’s leading critics of U.S. and Israeli strikes against Iran, having also been an outspoken critic of Israel’s war in Gaza.

Arancha González, former foreign minister of Spain, told CNBC on Thursday that Trump’s attacks on Sánchez were not the first time the U.S. president has criticized a European leader.

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Denmark’s Mette Frederiksen have all previously been singled out by Trump.

“What do they all have in common? They have said ‘no’ or they have questioned motives by the U.S. president,” González said. She added that political leaders who stood firm were more likely to be in a better position over the long term.

González, who now serves as the Dean of the Paris School of International Affairs (PSIA) at Sciences Po, also issued a warning to Washington over Trump’s threat to sever trade ties with Madrid.

“Let me say that it would be foolish of the U.S. to have a trade embargo on a country with which it has a trade surplus. The U.S. has a trade surplus with Spain. President Trump always complains about imbalanced trade relationships. Well, here is a great trade relationship where he is a winning,” González told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Europe” on Thursday.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez on Wednesday doubled down on his criticism of the U.S strikes against Iran, describing the escalating Middle East conflict as a “disaster.”

His comments come after U.S. President Donald Trump pledged to cut off trade with Madrid after Spain’s government prevented two jointly operated bases in its territory from being used in the strikes.

“Spain has been terrible,” Trump said on Tuesday, during a White House news conference alongside German Chancellor Friedrich Merz. “We’re going to cut off all trade with Spain. We don’t want anything to do with Spain,” he added.

In a televised address on Wednesday morning, Sanchez said: “Very often great wars start with a chain of events spiralling out of control due to miscalculations, technical failures, and unforeseen circumstances. Therefore, we must learn from history and cannot play Russian roulette with the fate of millions,” according to a CNBC translation.

Sanchez warned of “repeating the mistakes of the past,” drawing a comparison with the invasion of Iraq in the early 2000s, and summarized the government’s position as: “No to war.”

Spain’s socialist prime minister has emerged as one of the leading critics of the U.S. and Israeli strikes against Iran among leaders of EU nations.

Trump’s latest comments follow his condemnation of Madrid’s refusal to meet the NATO defense spending target of 5% of GDP.

Spain’s Ibex 35 index traded 1.4% higher at around 10:17 a.m. London time (5:17 a.m. ET), reversing earlier losses amid U.S. trade jitters. The pan-European Stoxx 600 index, meanwhile, advanced around 1.2%.

Trump’s threat to punish Spain on trade would be challenging, given that the 27 EU nations negotiate trade agreements collectively.

“It’s naive to believe that democracy or respect among nations can spring from ruins, or to think that blind and servile obedience is a form of leadership. On the contrary, I believe this position is leadership,” Sanchez said.

“We will not be complicit in something that is bad for the world and contrary to our values ​​and interests simply out of fear of reprisals from someone,” he added.

— CNBC’s Charlotte Reed contributed to this report.

President Donald Trump on Friday said that “I’d love not to use” the U.S. military to attack Iran, “but sometimes you have to.”

But Trump also said, “We haven’t made a final decision” on whether to attack Iran.

“We’ll see what happens,” he said. “We’re talking later today. We’ll have some additional talks today.”

Trump’s comment to reporters outside the White House came after he expressed frustration at Iran’s refusal to comply with American demands to curb its nuclear program.

“We’re not thrilled with the way they’re negotiating,” Trump said. “They cannot have nuclear weapons.”

“I’m not happy that they’re not willing to give us what we have to have,” Trump said, referring to that condition.

Asked by a reporter if there could be a long, drawn-out conflict in the Middle East if the United States attacks Iran, Trump said, “I guess you could say there’s always a risk.”

“It’d be wonderful if they negotiate, really, in good conscience, good faith,” he said. “They are not getting there so far.”

Omani Foreign Minister Badr al-Busaidi, who has been mediating negotiations between the U.S. and Iran, met in Washington, D.C., with Vice President JD Vance and other American officials in a bid to avoid war.

A statement issued by Oman’s government after the meeting put a positive spin on those talks that was not reflected in Trump’s blunt comments.

“The meeting examined the indirect US-Iran negotiations sponsored by the Sultanate of Oman, alongside the diplomatic endeavours seeking to culminate in a just and enduring agreement concerning the nuclear file and to guarantee the peaceful character of Iran’s nuclear energy program,” Oman’s government said.

“I am grateful for their engagement and look forward to further and decisive progress in the coming days,” al-Busaidi said in a post on X. “Peace is within our reach.”

During an interview with MS Now, when asked if there was a chance of the United States attacking Iran overnight, al-Busaidi said, “I can’t answer that question, because I don’t know.”

“I think President Trump is sincerely passionate for a deal,” al-Busaidi said. “He wants to have a deal. He wants to have a diplomatic solution, and this is what we are trying to do.”

But Trump, in a speech later Friday afternoon in Corpus Christi, Texas, said of Iran, “We have a very big decision.”

“We have a country that’s been 47 years blowing people’s legs off, arms off,” Trump said. They’ve been knocking out ships, killing people, lots of people, not only Americans, lots of people.”

Trump said he wanted to “make a deal that’s meaningful.”

“I’d rather do it the peaceful way,” Trump said, while calling Iran’s government “very difficult people, dangerous people, very difficult people.”

The U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem earlier Friday authorized non-emergency U.S. government personnel and their family members to leave Israel “due to safety risks.”

Also Friday, the massive American aircraft carrier, the USS Gerald Ford, arrived off Israel’s coast.

Also on Friday, the State Department said that Secretary of State Marco Rubio would visit Israel on Monday and Tuesday to discuss Iran and other regional issues.