Tear gas is in the air, shots can be heard and a helicopter is circling above the heads of the demonstrators: near the capital Tehran, protests against the authoritarian government course have again turned violent.
“We’ve been to several protests, but this is in a different league,” reported an eyewitness in the city of Karaj, west of Tehran. The images, shared again on social media on Thursday, showed injured protesters and security forces.
Crowds flocked to the streets – mostly women. Cries like “we fight, we die, we don’t endure any humiliation” could be heard again and again, as eyewitnesses reported. Security forces are said to have shot at the demonstrators. Some fought back. “Somehow no one was afraid,” said another man on the fringes of the protests. “People’s eyes were filled with hate, there was no room for fear.”
triggers of the demonstrations
Thursday’s protests marked the end of the 40-day mourning period following the death of young Iranian woman Hadis Najafi, who was reportedly shot dead by security forces during protests in Karaj in September. The authorities deny this. Najafi is now one of the symbolic figures of the protests. A mourning period of 40 days is customary in Islam. “When you see the family suffering over the death of their daughter, it fills you with anger,” said one young man.
The protests in Iran have not stopped for more than six weeks. The traditional period of mourning has now become a ritual for many people to take to the streets regularly. It’s not just sadness and anger that drives people. “Karaj is a center for the protests because many middle-class people live here, but they are increasingly falling into the lower classes.” Iranian media also reported that a police post was said to have been set on fire. Additional images shared on social media showed people stealing guns from an abandoned police car.
A suspected attack on a clergyman also caused a stir. The Tasnim news agency reported that a cleric was attacked and wounded during the protests. A picture on social media is said to show the injured cleric in the back seat of a car. The circumstances could not initially be independently verified. Iran’s mullahs have been criticized for weeks as a symbol of the authoritarian leadership in the Shiite state. In the southeastern city of Sahedan, which has already seen protests that have left many demonstrators dead, state media on Thursday reported a deadly attack on a Shiite preacher.
The mass demonstrations were triggered by the death of another young woman, the 22-year-old Iranian Kurd Mahsa Amini. The vice squad arrested her in mid-September for allegedly violating Islamic dress codes. She then died in police custody. Since then, tens of thousands have taken to the streets against the Islamic Republic’s repressive policies. According to human rights activists, more than 280 people have been killed since then and more than 14,000 arrested.
