Baffled By West’s Reluctance To Negotiate, Iran Is In Tight Spot

All signs on Saturday pointed to an escalation by government forces who have started to fire assault rifles and there is one picture evidence of snipers deployed.

Friday was supposed to be a “normal” day when no protests were announced by the anonymous group, Youth of Tehran Neighborhoods, which has routinely called for demonstrations on Saturdays and Wednesdays throughout October.

But apparently young people, university students and an increasing number of middle aged and older Iranians feel there is no need for an announcement as they come out during the day and night to defy the stretched-out security forces who must be always everywhere. Protests were reported in 15 cities across the country.

As the unrest intensified, the chief commander of the Revolutionary Guard, Hossein Salami in a Saturday speech announced that it is the last day of protests, and no demonstrations will be allowed to happen on Sunday. This is easier said than done without use of military firepower that could result in hundreds and perhaps thousands of civilian deaths.

It is not just the capital Tehran or a disgruntled outlying province where a protest may flare up. It could be on any university campus or city where a protester was killed 40 days ago and residents according to Iranian tradition come out to pay their respects.

These always turn into new antigovernment demonstrations with chances that more people might be shot by security forces and create another martyr for the next round of protests. It was the same scenario in 1978 when protests were gaining traction against the monarchy.

Saturday began with university protests and more mourning gatherings in the streets as the chief commander of the IRGC sounded another warning that the regime will not tolerate “foreign plots” to destabilize the country. This has become a new straw to grab for the embattled regime, as it feels the need to use more brutal force against protesters.

In the evening, the situation in the University of Tehran and Mashhad became dangerous for students as government forces encircled that campuses and seemed ready to storm the dormitories.

Almost a similar situation existed in 1999, when security forces stormed Tehran University after midnight and killed several students, in some cases throwing them out from upper floors of the dormitories.

Below, we provided coverage of events on Saturday, October 29, 2022. Our coverage ended at 01:00 on Sunday.

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In this video from Yazd the commander of a security forces' unit is yelling at his troops that "People beat you up like chickens." The voice of the person filming says, "This is the end of them."

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In the religious city Mashhad, people heard cries for help from inside the university and broke down the gate to rescue students under attack by regime forces, but they began firing at the people to pin them down near the gate. The video below is a small glimpse into the developing standoff.

A protester pouring flammable liquid on a large garbage can to block the street to prevent the movement of security forces.

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A national student organization tweeted Saturday evening that plainclothes agents have entered the campus of Tehran University and fired shotguns at students. The concern is that after midnight regime forces will assault the students with full force.

One person tweeting from inside the school said that security forces "filled three vans" with students and took them away. They were firing guns but still some students "were resisting".

There are reports of attacks on university dormitories in Esfahan, Qazvin and Arak Saturday night.

In the video below, Tehran students chant "Liberty, liberty."

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Security forces firing military weapons in Kuhdasht, Lorestan Province in another sign of escalation by government forces.

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Protesters in the northern city of Astara chanting, "This year is the year of blood, Seyyed Ali will be gone," referring to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.

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In this video security forces are firing assault rifles at protesters in Marivan, western Iran. Clearly, the government has unleashed military weapons against unarmed protesters.

The same use of military weapons can be seen in this video from the Kurdish town of Saqqez, the hometown of Mahsa Amini who died in police custody in September. Her brutal killing triggered the six-week-old protests.

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A tweet by an Iranian human rights group with presence on the ground says security forces have closed off a street near Tehran University's campus and asks people to march to the area to prevent violence against students.

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A man, Aref Gholampur, was shot dead in a district of Rasht in northern Iran. Here is a scene of protests in the district Saturday evening.

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Students in Mashhad's Azad University are under siege by security forces, this tweet says. "Their lives are in danger."

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As darkness fell, the usual evening and night time protests began in various cities and town. This video shows Piranshahr.

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Saturday evening October 29 in Bukan. Regime forces setting fire to the homes of people in an act of escalation.

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In a serious escalation IRGC snipers are placed on buildings to shoot protesters after chief commander Hossein Salami warned that protests should end. This photo was taken Saturday in Karaj, 20 miles west of Tehran.

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In the medical university in Ahvaz students chant, "This is the last message - The target is the whole regime." It seems the slogan is a response to the IRGC commander who earlier the day issued what seemed to be a last warning to protesters that overwhelming force will be used if unrest does not stop by Sunday.

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A large crowd of people in an spontaneous protest at a metro station in Tehran chanting "Khamenei is a murderer, his leadership is void".

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Government's Basij plainclothes agents attack Tehran university student who were protesting at the main campus on Saturday.

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IRGC's Basij elements enter Esfahan University campus and throw rocks at students who shelter in an enclosure. According to Iranian law, the military and police are not allowed into universities, which have their own campus security, but in the past few weeks this law has been broken numerous times.

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Security forces fired at medical students in Kordestan province, badly injuring a student in the head. The video shows seconds after the shooting.

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Medical students protesting the arrests in the morning on Saturday.

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In the northern city of Babol protesting students cut their hair as a sign of protest against Islamic Republic's mandatory hijab and the death of Mahsa Amini in September.

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Another video showing the size and the mood of the crowd in Arak.

Protesters in Arak are chanting, "For every person killed, a thousand will follow".

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Upon a call by the Association of Families of Flight PS752 Victims, shot down by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard in January 2020, tens of thousands of members of the Iranian diaspora held long lines of people holding each other's hands to express solidarity with the people of Iran, who are holding daily protest rallies since mid-September when 22-year-old Mahsa Amini was killed in custody of hijab police.

In some cities the lines are hundreds of meters long but in cities with a large Iranian population the lines are expected to extend to over 10 kilometers.

The main organizer of the global event, Hamed Esmaeilion -- the Canada-based activist who lost his wife and daughter in the downing of the Ukrainian Airlines flight – has spearheaded several international events in support of the protests.

Last Saturday, October 22, a huge gathering of Iranians, estimated to be over 100,000 people, took to the streets in the German capital Berlin to support their fellow-countrymen struggling against government brutality.

On October 1, Iranian diaspora communities and human rights activists launched unprecedented rallies in over 150 cities throughout the world against the Islamic Republic.

During a speech at the funeral of those killed in an attack on a shrine in the city of Shiraz, Hossein Salami claimed that young Iranians are deceived but they must not sell their honor to America.

“Take off the uniforms of the American army,” stated Salami.

The Islamic Republic routinely blames most economic and political problems on enemy plots, meaning primarily the United States and also Israel and often European countries such as Britain and France

Elsewhere in his remarks the hardliner IRGC commander addressed young Iranian protesters saying that “Some of you may think this isn’t an American plot. But don’t think Joe Biden, General Martin Dempsey, Frank McKenzie, Benny Gantz, Naftali Bennett, Yair Lapid or Mohammed Bin Salman would call you on your phone and ask you to pour into streets. No! They do it through their media.”

Salami also urged the students not to turn universities into a “battlefield for America against the nation.”

In November 2019 when protests suddenly erupted in the country, the IRGC immediately resorted to large scale killing of protesters using military weapons often at close range. At least 1,500 people died, and thousands arrested. This time there has been less use of assault rifles and machine guns against protesters, but shotguns and beatings have killed around 270.

With Salami’s warning, the concern now is that the IRGC will soon resort to fill military intervention against unarmed protesters as a desperate measure against the longest-running daily protests in the 43-year history of the clerical regime.

The Islamic Republic calls the United States its arch enemy and refused to meet American diplomats in direct negotiations during 17 months of nuclear talks from April 2021 to August 2022.

Salami’s statements regarding an end to demonstrations came at a time when students have been staging more protests at different universities on Saturday blaming the IRGC for the Wednesday attack on a Shia shrine in Shiraz in which over a dozen lost their lives and many more injured.

Students chanted slogans against Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and the IRGC forces during their gatherings saying that they are “murderers”.

There are also signs that older Iranians have started joining the protests and the regime has begun to fear the wrath of the people who this time clearly have one demand: regime change. They are not asking for reducing the 40-percent inflation rate or lifting the mandatory hijab rule. They are openly demanding a different kind of government.

The regime still has its supporters who are either religious or receive benefits from the government. But they seem to be in a minority.

Doctor Parisa Bahmani, from Zanjan, was killed during the gathering of doctors in front of Tehran Medical Council, after government forces opened fire on demonstrators, Iran International has learned.

Following the announcement of her death, doctors held another round of protests outside the buildings of the Medical Council of the Islamic Republic across Iran on Saturday.

Doctors held a protest rally on October 25 against the government’s policies of preventing medical care for the wounded protesters, using ambulances to transport security forces, and militarizing the hospitals.

According to information received security forces have put pressure on the victim’s family to deny her participation in the protest rally.

Earlier, Iran’s Medical Council announced Dr. Parisa Bahmani, a general surgery specialist, “died in a car crash and the news regarding her killing by security agents is not true. However, the death of Dr. Bahmani in under investigation and the result will be announced soon.”

Up to now, the Islamic Republic has not taken responsibility even for a single death during the demonstrations.

Iran’s government either says the dead people have jumped off the roofs, committed suicide, had some background disease, or lost their lives in car crashes.

The regime has killed over 250 people including tens of children during the protests since mid-September.

The news agency said it had seen a note referring to an “informal UN Security Council gathering” held by the US and Albania, which currently sits on the council. Iranian Nobel Peace Prize laureate Shirin Ebadi, actress Nazanin Boniadi, and Javaid Rehman, the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in Iran,are due to address the gathering, which will be open to state representatives and human rights organizations.

The meeting, Reuters reported, was intended to “highlight the ongoing repression of women and girls and members of religious and ethnic minority groups in Iran,” and would “identify opportunities to promote credible, independent investigations into the Iranian government's human rights violations and abuses.”

The administration of President Joe Biden has been criticized by some Iranian opposition groups over an alleged lack of support for recent protests in Iran or for not ending diplomatic contacts with Tehran. A petition calling for the removal of Rob Malley as the White House’s special Iran envoy has attracted 115,000 signatures.

Some exiled activists have long identified with the Republican Party, which might be seen an area of weakness by Biden’s Democrats as the November 8 Congressional elections approach. But any emphasis on human rights is a double-edged sword. Some Middle-East-focused rights advocates have argued that Biden’s approach to Saudi Arabia over cuts in oil production betrayed a lack of interest in holding Riyadh accountable for human rights abuse.

Iran’s mission to the United Nations in New York this week accused the United States of “hypocrisy, use of a double standard, and selective application of human rights” to their extent that American claims “to support Iranian women to be deceptive and lacking in good faith.”

‘Political sanctions’?

The UN approach to human rights has not been without its own controversy. Ebadi, who left Iran 2009, said in April that Alena Douhan, the UN Special Rapporteur on unilateral coercive measures (‘UN speak’ for sanctions), should not visit Iran unless Tehran also agreed to a visit by the human rights rapporteur Rehman, who has not been allowed into the country. Ebadi in 2018 expressed opposition to US economic measures that penalized the general population and argued instead for targeted ‘political sanctions.’

Douhan issued a report in September, after a visit to Iran, arguing that US sanctions should be lifted due to their impact on the “broad spectrum of human rights” including “the right to life and the right to development.” The report said the delivery of medicines and medical equipment to Iran was “severely undermined” by Washington’s sanctions on finance, trade, shipping and insurance, although humanitarian trade is not sanctioned and Iran imports around $1.5 billion of medicines a year.

The role of Albania in calling the UN gathering will also be noted in Tehran, given Albania has hosted the Mujahideen-e Khalq since 2013, when the US relocated the Iranian opposition group from Iraq, where it had been stranded by the demise of its ally Saddam Hussein. The US Deputy National Security Advisor Jon Finer this week reaffirmed US support for Tirana, including improved “cybersecurity in the face of repeated, disruptive cyber-attacks by Iran.”