Tehran Relies On The Military Rather Than The People, Critic Says

“Out of respect for the month of Ramadan,” authorities closed parks and blocked roads to northern forests and other locations where people traditionally picnic on this day but videos posted on social media show huge crowds singing and dancing despite the restrictions and even chasing away the government-sponsored vigilantes from their picnic grounds.

In the city of Qazvin, capital of Qazvin province, for instance, the municipality said parks were closed until five in the afternoon, an hour and a half before iftar (the end of fasting day) “for the comfort of citizens and respect for Ramadhan.”

Armed police attacking merrymaking people with tear gas in northern Iran.

Parks were also closed in several other cities including the religious city of Qom and Rasht in Gilan province where many have flocked for the holidays. Even some museums and sightseeing locations were closed for the day in some places such as Kermanshah in western Iran.

Such restrictions did very little to stop people from gathering and dancing wherever they could but at least in one place, on the road to the touristic village of Masouleh in the forested northern mountains of the Caspian Sea region, armed police tried to disperse the merrymaking crowds with tear gas. Social media users said in Tehran the Basij militia tried to prevent people from entering some parks, but the crowds were too big and they had to give way.

This year, many women have taken the opportunity of the secular Nowrouz holiday season to demonstrate their opposition to the government by flouting their hijab and dancing in public as civil disobedience.

Authorities, who have been rattled by mass defiance, responded by shutting down businesses, hotels, cafes and restaurants where “hijabless” women were offered services or sang and danced, often alongside men. In some cases, such as at Kermanshah’s Taq Bostan historical site, authorities prevented “hijabless” women from entering.

People including “hijabless” women celebrating Sidebedar in Rasht in northern Iran

The 13th day of the holidays is called Sizdebedar, or more correctly Sizdah be Dar (casting off [the inauspiciousness] of thirteen].

The regime reluctantly tolerates some of the country’s ancient festivals such as the New Year (Nowruz) and other occasions such as Charshanbeh Souri (Last Tuesday of the old year) and Sizdebedar due to their extreme popularity. Nevertheless, after the Islamic Revolution of 1979 it renamed Sizdebedar as Nature Day because the religious establishment particularly opposed the “superstition” implied by it.

People chasing away government sponsored vigilantes in Anzali from their picnic site.

People should not remain home on this day to avoid the inauspiciousness of the number thirteen according to a tradition of obscure origins. So, they will go out and picnic wherever they can with food and music and dancing.

But this year, the Iranian New Year holidays (Nowrouz) coincided with the Islamic fasting month of Ramadan.

In Iran and some other Islamic countries eating, drinking, and smoking in public are strictly banned during the fasting month. Many Iranians who fast during Ramadan, and many others who do not, nevertheless, believe that such restrictions are pointless and even unfair.

The rallies were held on Islamic Republic Day, a public holiday in Iran marking the anniversary of the beginning of the Islamic Republic, with hundreds of Iranians coming out to demonstrate.

According to the regime, the results of a public referendum in 1979 were a resounding 98.2% vote for the establishment of an Islamic state, but today, the picture looks very different.

Iranians held rallies in US and Canadian cities while videos from Sweden, Oslo and Denmark show the opponents of the Islamic Republic going to symbolic ballot boxes to say "NO" to the regime.

Similar events were also held in Brisbane, Leeds, Karlsruhe, Berlin and Barcelona.

In 2021, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Iran published statistics, which showed that 4,037,258 Iranians are living abroad, an increase from previous years. It is believed those numbers are growing, the largest population found in the US.

In an April 1 report, Khabar Online website has interviewed 8 social scientists and commentators about Generation Z's role in Iran's new revolution. Mostafa Mehraeen, a sociologist told the website that "This generation has a thorough understanding of life and human beings and wishes to spread peace on earth." Mehraeein further described Generation Z as "a generation that is an expert on philosophy without having studied it."

Referring to views that this generation is cut off from the past, Mehraeein said that various generations are not separate from each other. In fact, we live in the past, present and future at the same time. "We are facing a generation that has been educated by the previous generation," he said.

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Demographer Shahla Kazemipour also pointed out that the Generation Z is not a separate entity far from the mainstream society. But they do not need to be in the streets to see embezzlements and financial corruption by officials. They can see everything on social media from behind their computer monitors.

She added, "While the previous generation came from families with up to 7 children, Generation Z comes from smaller families who can spend more on their children's education. At the same time, unlike the previous generation, they have access to communication tools such as the Internet. So, their world is bigger than Tehran or Iran. That is why they are socially more mature than the previous generation.

Mohammad Taghi Fallah, a teacher, said, "Generation Z is looking for its own independent identity. In their world, the individual is an active member of the society and his or her uniqueness is the most eye-catching characteristic element.

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Ahmad Bokharaei, a sociologist, said the members of Generation Z were in the forefront of the protests in Iran. They were brave and had very little to lose. Although protesters were from different age groups but Generation Z's presence was more visible.

He warned that if their voice is not heard, the chances are that they will be disillusioned and left with no more motivation. This can even lead them to commit suicide or try drugs.

Another sociologist, Mehdi Ghavamipour, told Khabar Online that although there is a generational gap in most other societies, the characteristics of Iran's ideological society has made the divide between Generation Z and previous generation wider. He added that the conflict between traditions and modernity has made Generation Z's interests, demands and prejudices different from those of other generations.

He added that some scholars see this as a gap between the official culture and the pop culture as well as the impact of the crisis of inefficiency in the government. This new generation, he said, stresses the significance of modern life and ignores or totally rejects traditional concepts. They follow a different lifestyle than the previous generations.

Mohammad Reza Niknejad, a teacher, said the main characteristic of this generation is its bravery and knowledge. They have proven that older individuals are not necessarily more knowledgeable than the youths. In fact, in many families, the elderly have realized this difference and adapted their lifestyle to what their children want.

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Iranian sociologist Mostafa Abroshen, on the other hand, says Generation Z is a manifestation of the post-modern approach in the Iranian society. This generation challenges and questions both traditions and modernity. They demand pluralism and oppose unilateralism. They also challenge the traditional society's sanctities. They look down at the kind of obedience that was prevalent in the traditional families.

Nearly all these characteristics have been observed during more than six months of protests in Iran when the new generation challenged the values propagated by Iran's traditional clerics and the regime during the past four decades.

Nargess Malekzadeh, a teacher, observed that "Generation Z was not born during the 2022 protests. They are the children of a silently protesting previous generation that nurtured the new generation."

As the regime fights a losing battle against the wave of women bravely participating in a nationwide hijab rebellion, the tide against oppression continues.

In Kashan, Esfahan (Isfahan) province, Karim Ahmadi, an IRGC commander, said more than 40 shops have been shut down for their customers not complying with Islamic dress code.

Meanwhile, upon the order of the city prosecutor, Kashan Mall, the largest commercial and tourism center of the city has also been sealed for mass breaking of the compulsory hijab rule.

A video from Kermanshah in the west shows the staff of Taq-e Bostan historical complex preventing women without the headscarf from visiting the ancient monument.

In the southern Khuzestan province, Dezful's prosecutor, Mehdi Amadeh said "one of the city’s tourist sites has been sealed since Friday due to non-compliance with moral standards".

As women across Iran defiantly dance in public as protest against female oppression, Amadeh also said, “While not observing the hijab, some women also danced without the veil.”

On Thursday, the Dezful prosecutor announced several people have been arrested on charges of embarking on a tour in the Dez Lake area and "norm breaking" during the event. Government authorities are not backing down on this issue. On Saturday, President Ebrahim Raisi declared the compulsory hijab "obligatory" adding that "it is a religious necessity”.

There has been a torrent of comments by clerics and hardliners in recent days against women who ignore hijab rules, while thousands appear in public without a headscarf. As regime vigilantes are encouraged to stop women and admonish them, another serious conflict is brewing in the country.

A video from the CCTV of a convenience store in Shandiz near the religious city of Mashhad went viral on social media Friday that showed a man dumping a large tub of yogurt after an argument on the head of a ‘hijabless’ woman and her mother, who was wearing a headscarf.

The man, apparently a member of the Revolutionary Guards’ Basij militia, had been carrying out his Islamic duty of “calling to virtue and forbidding wrong”. Local authorities said Saturday the man was arrested for disturbing public peace and insulting the women. Officials said that carrying out the duty of hijab enforcement should remain limited to verbal warnings only.

Both women were also arrested for defying hijab rules and the owner of the business was given a warning for allowing violation of the hijab law on his premises.

Dr Mohsen Borhani, a professor of criminal law at Tehran university, who was recently sacked for criticizing the regime after the execution of four young protesters, argued in a tweet Friday that even according to Islamic Sharia and laws, carrying out the religious duty of calling to virtue and forbidding wrong should never go beyond a verbal warning.

Attacking people and their property or violating their dignity and rights are criminal acts and victims have the right to self-defense according to Article 156 of the Islamic Penal Code of Iran, Borhani, a well-known religious scholar, wrote.

Moderate Muslims, including some clerics, have also been critical of hardliners intimidating women to impose the hijab.

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“This was not a tub of yogurt that was thrown on a girl’s head. It was bigotry and a putrid sludge crammed into the head of the yogurt-thrower over the years,” reformist politician and cleric Mohammad Ali Abtahi who served as vice-president under Mohammad Khatami in late 1990s and early 2000s protested in a tweet.

‘Hijabless’ girl in Gonbad-e Kavous, a rather conservative city in northeastern Iran

In July 2022, after weeks of harsher measures on the streets, President Ebrahim Raisi ordered all government entities to strictly implement a “chastity and hijab” law approved by the Supreme Cultural Revolution Council under hardliner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2005. He insisted again today, Saturday, that women should abide by the hijab rules.

“Chastity and hijab are religious matters and all pious Muslims stress on its necessity. Hijab protects the individual and the society from all harms and deviations,” he said, adding that since there is a law, even those who say they do not believe in hijab must abide by the rules. “Women and girls have shown that they abide by the law and will continue to do so.”

In the past four decades women generally demonstrated their opposition to compulsory hijab by making their headscarves smaller and letting their hair cascade on their shoulders from under it or making their tunics tighter and trousers shorter, wearing colorful clothes and putting on make-up.

Authorities referred to these women’s hijab as ‘bad’ or ‘improper’ and called them ‘bad-hijab women’.

It was only in 2018 that some women in Tehran and other larger cities began to wear their headscarves on their shoulders rather than their heads wherever they could. Now many are not even carrying a headscarf in their bag to use if they get into trouble. They are referred to as ‘hijabless’.

Defiance of hijab rules as a form of civil disobedience has hugely grown across the country after the death the 22-year-old Mahsa (Jina) Amini in custody of morality police in mid-September. Many believe that there is no sign ‘hijabless’ women will allow to be bullied again into wearing the hijab.