Threats By Iran's Hardliners ‘Provoke’ More Popular Anger

People in several Tehran neighborhoods poured into streets and chanted slogans against the Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei while women unveiled in public as a gesture of solidarity with antigovernment protests, which have been raging for the past 54 days since 22-year-old Mahsa Amini was killed by the country’s hijab, or the so-called morality police. 

Wednesday’s protests were in the memory of those killed during the regime’s crackdown on protesters 40 days ago. The 40th day after one’s death carries immense significance in the Iranian culture. The Bloody Friday in Zahedan, the provincial capital of Sistan and Baluchestan took place September 30, when security forces killed at least 93 people, and injured many more. Zahedan is one of the few Sunni-majority cities in predominantly Shiite Iran.

People prefer to protest after darkness falls primarily to avoid easy identification and targeting by government agents, while also they can about their business during the day.

According to videos posted on social media, several neighborhoods in Tehran as well as Mashhad in northeastern Iran, Shiraz in the southern Fars province, Esfahan (Isfahan) in central Iran, Rasht and Kianshahr in northern province of Gilan, and BandarAbbas in Hormozgan province on the southern Persian Gulf coast, and Kerman were scenes of demonstrations in support of the protesters in Sistan and Baluchestan province. 

Moreover, people in the Kurdish majority cities of Mahabad, Saqqezz – the birthplace of Mahsa Amini – Kermanshah, Shahrekord, and Sanandaj – the provincial capital of Iran’s Kordestan province – also held rallies against the clerical regime. Situation was also tense in several Turkish-majority cities such as Ardabil and Bukan and Mahabad in West Azarbaijan province. 

Clashes have been reported in some western cities such as Marivan, where people are mourning the death of Nasrin Ghaderi -- a PhD candidate in philosophy who died November 6 after being beaten by security forces with batons during protests in Tehran a day earlier. 

Also on Wednesday, university students across the country and people on streets held ceremonies and performances for Khodanour Lajei, one of those killed on Bloody Friday in Zahedan. A photo of him that was taken about three months ago when he was arrested by security forces has become one of the symbolic pictures that show the atrocities of the Islamic Republic’s security agents. 

Holding rallies on the 40th day of people died during the Islamic Republic’s crackdown on protesters is reminiscent of a similar turn of events 44 years ago, during the revolution against the monarchy that culminated in the overthrow of the Pahlavi dynasty under Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, and the establishment of the Islamic Republic in 1979. Marking the 40th day for people who were killed during the revolution turned into fresh protests that fueled the movement.

The US-based Iranian Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) reported on Wednesday that about 15,000 people have been detained in Iran, adding that at least 328 people, including 50 minors, were also killed.

The US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) said Wednesday that at least 50 minors were among the casualties.

The new numbers cover the period between September 17 and November 8.

The group added that at least 41 government agents, including the Revolutionary Guards, paramilitary Basij forces and police, have also been killed during the unrest.

While the Islamic Republic has not provided accurate figures of those detained in the recent protests, HRANA says nearly 15,000 people are estimated to have been arrested, with the identity of 1,928 confirmed. About 431 of the detainees are students, it added.

According to HRANA over 877 city and university protest gatherings have been held in 137 cities and 136 universities during the period, while protest rallies show no sign of abating in what has become the boldest challenge to Iran's clerical regime since the Islamic revolution of 1979.

The Oslo-based Iran Human Rights Organization (IHR) said November 6 that at least 304 protesters, including 41 children and 24 women have been killed in the current protests.

Protesters have been killed in 22 provinces, with the most reported in Sistan and Baluchistan, Mazandaran, Tehran, Kordestan and Gilan respectively, says IHR.

As columnist Mehdi Beigoghli noted in a commentary in the reformist Etemad newspaper, November 8, the neo-cons led by Majles (parliament) Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf have been trying to convince others in Iran’s political circles that they are prepared to establish "new governance," and bring about "reforms in the system" based on "new plans."

These are the buzz words heralding change from within the system at a time when young men and women in the streets do not seem to be listening to anyone representing the regime.

Ghalibaf officially announced the move towards new governance earlier this week by saying, "I hope security will be completely restored in the country soon, so that legitimate and necessary changes would begin to establish a new governance in economic, social and political areas within the framework of the Islamic Republic."

This comes while according to Etemad, most observers in Iran believe a return to the situation before the murder of Mahsa Amini, a young Kurdish woman by ‘morality police’ in mid-September is impossible.

Nonetheless, neo-cons insist that once the country leaves behind the current wave of nationwide protests, everything will be ready for unseating the Paydari Party and changing all the cabinet ministers they believe Paydari strongman Saeed Jalili has imposed on the Raisi administration. At the same time, Paydari members in the parliament and in government keep calling for harsher measures against the protesters, possibly because they do not want the situation to calm down.

Another neo-con who spoke about reforms was Tourism Minister Ezzatollah Zarghami who believes Paydari's excessive pressure to limit freedoms, most notably from within the ‘morality police’ led to the current unrest. Meanwhile he pointed at systematic flaws in the political structure that need to be changed. He also argued that the neo-cons are ready for reforms once the protests calm down.

On the other hand, according to Etemad, Paydari members believe that any change in the previously declared policies will be taken by the public as a humiliating retreat by the hardliner government.

The conservative Resalat newspaper, which traditionally represented the political ideas of heavyweights in Tehran's Bazaar, has aligned itself with Ghalibaf. In its Tuesday's edition, the paper came out in support of the Speaker’s views about making government-controlled media more active rather than focusing on confrontations with foreign-based Persian media. It also attacked Paydari's leading member Morteza Agha Tehrani for calling for a total ban on social media.

Tuesday morning Ghalibaf attacked two leading Paydari members, Vice President and Planning and Budget Organization Chief Massoud Mirkazemi and Economy Minister Ehsan Khandouzi for failing to report to the parliament and explain their approach regarding the country's economic crisis. He called on them to report to the Majles immediately and they did. Mirkazemi on his part blamed the problems partly on the Majles. The whole show, however, revealed that Ghalibaf had the upper hand in the dynamics.

According to Etemad, the neo-cons may be using the situation of protests as an opportunity to attack the ultraconservatives at their weakest point by blaming them for most of the country's problems. At the same time, some observers say the divide between the two most powerful factions of Iran's conservative camp might be a division of roles with the aim of playing a good cop, bad cop game for the public.

While all this means that part of the Iranian government is prepared to introduce minor reforms in the system, protesters have shown during the past seven weeks that they are not prepared to settle for anything short of a regime change.

Kiumars Heydari said Wednesday that “the flies,” implying the protesters, would have no place in the Islamic Republic if Ali Khamenei ordered a tougher clampdown on nationwide protests.

“The enemies” have carried out their “attacks and hostilities” since the day the Islamic Republic was established, but they could not do anything, and now that the Islamic Republic “has become stronger, they definitely cannot do anything wrong.”

Iranian leaders accuse “enemies” including the United States of fomenting the unrest. A group of 227 parliament members in Iran called on the Judiciary Sunday to issue death sentences for people arrested during the ongoing antigovernment protests.

The hardline lawmakers urged the judiciary to “deal decisively” with the “perpetrators” and followed the same unsubstantiated argument that protesters are either foreign agents or have been “deceived” by them.

Government spokesman Ali Bahadori Jahromi also said on Tuesday, “it would have been a “piece of cake” for police forces to use live rounds on the protesters,” and people would be afraid to leave their homes. His comment elicited a lot of angry reactions on social media.

Jahromi argued that the government will not resort to such actions because youths on the streets are not enemies but “our wrongdoer children.”

One of the biggest challenges to Iran's clerical leaders since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, the seven-week-old demonstrations have persisted despite a deadly crackdown and severe warnings from security forces.

Hossein Ashtari, Commander of Iran’s Police, in a decree on Wednesday replaced Ahmad Taheri with Mohammad Ghanbari.

These changes are taking place following four consecutive weeks of protests after Friday payers in the provincial capital Zahedan.

Taheri was the commander of police forces in the province during the massacre on September 30 in capital Zahedan also known as “Bloody Friday” in which nearly 100 people were killed.

On Thursday, the Security Council of the province, dismissed the commander of Zahedan police and chief of a police base in the city to calm the situation.

In response to these dismissals, the Sunni Imam of Zahedan, called the move “inadequate” but “a right act” demanding the formation of an independent fact-finding committee to deal with the Bloody Friday massacre.

Last Friday protests took place in the town of Khash in the province and dozens were killed and injured after security forces opened fire at demonstrators.

Meanwhile, the anonymous groups called Youth of Tehran and Tabriz neighborhoods in a statement called on citizens to stage fresh protests Wednesday afternoon to express solidarity with people in Sistan and Baluchestan.