Iranians Launch Online Storm For Journalists Who Broke Mahsa’s Death

The latest was online retailer Digikala whose office building was sealed and a renowned bakery has also been closed.

The incidents were prompted by the publication of pictures showing female employees of Digikala’s online shop without hijab, sparking demands from hardliners to take action against the company and its employees.

Following the publication of the photos, the Mizan news agency, affiliated with the judiciary, reported that a court case had been filed against the employees. Police officers sealed the company's building on Sunday evening, citing the refusal of some female employees to comply with the mandatory hijab. Despite the sealing of the office building, Digikala said operations continue.

In addition, France Confectionery, a renowned bakery in Tehran, also made headlines by announcing its closure. Although the reason was not explicitly mentioned, speculation suggested employees had also forgone the hijab. It is one of many companies targeted by the regime which has closed innumerable businesses where either employees or customers had broken hijab rules.

The incidents come amid a recent trend of women choosing to opt out of the mandatory hijab, spurred by the "Woman, Life, Freedom" protests and the tragic death of Mahsa Amini while in the custody of morality police.

In response to this civil disobedience, Iranian authorities have taken various measures, including sealing commercial and recreational centers, barring women without hijab from public services, issuing warnings, and even resorting to car seizure and violent arrests. However, these measures have so far been ineffective in quelling the growing defiance among Iranian women.

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“The revival of the hijab patrols, under any label and by different methods will erode public trust,” Jalil Rahimi Jahanabadi, a member of parliament’s national security committee, told local media Sunday.

At the same time, the Islamic Republic’s parliament has expanded a proposed hijab bill from 15 to 70 articles, another lawmaker announced Sunday. 

Anti-regime protests that began last September changed the mood of women who were more or less abiding by the clerical government’s compulsory hijab rules. For months now, thousands of women in cities are simply ignoring the requirement to cover their heads with long scarves and dress according to the government requirements.

Authorities who faced the most serious challenge to their rule in 44 years, backed down from confronting these women, fearing renewed protests. But this month they decided to re-deploy the morality or hijab police in the streets and immediately street confrontations began.

Jahanabadi said that the hijab crackdown is an insult to the people and will lead to more emigration of educated and professional groups from the country. Hijab police patrols will also create public fear and will agitate the people and turn to a new challenge for the Islamic Republic.

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Other politicians and pundits have also warned that hijab crackdown can lead to new anti-regime protests, similar to when the killing of Mahsa Amini in September last year sparked unexpected nationwide protests. Although the unrest was triggered by an incident over hijab, but the underlying driving force was overall frustration with repression in general and economic hardship.

Jahanabadi did refer to the “deeply wounded” populace, that daily hears about “embezzlement, corruption and nepotism,” and also has to put up with an obligatory Islamic dress code. He implied in his remarks that those who continue to annoy and anger the people should know that they are sowing the seeds of “regime change.”

Hardliners, however, having the backing of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei are determined to force women to back down. One explanation is that they want to subdue any dissent ahead of the protest anniversary in September. 

Women and young people is what the regime fears most. Reports on Saturday said that security officials want to make sure the universities are pacified before September.

“The enemy has not given up. They’ve said that universities are the first place where new riots should begin,” the official in charge of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s representatives in universities across the country, Mostafa Rostami, said at a gathering Friday.

In advocating for preventive measures, Rostami said, “They will completely be defeated if they can’t do something on the anniversary of last year’s riots.”

Although by killing more than 500 protesters and detaining more than 20,000 security and intelligence forces were able to stop street protests earlier this year, they are aware that the potential for another flare-up is real. The hijab crackdown now is some sort of tactic preferring to attack rather than be on the defensive.

At the same time, activists both inside Iran and abroad have been discussing on social media the importance of the protest anniversary to show the regime that the movement is alive and strong.

The series of terrifying incidents took place in December, leaving the 28-year-old activist fearing for her safety and demanding recognition and protection from the Australian government.

The distressing ordeal began when Tina Kordrostami noticed a heavily tattooed man following her through Drummoyne on her way home to Dee Why. The situation escalated further when the man brazenly climbed into her car while she briefly stopped at a Sydney petrol station late at night.

Consequently, Kordrostami's father started receiving threats against her life, and she found herself under surveillance, with unidentified men taking photographs of her during rallies and public events.

In response to such alarming reports, several Australian-Iranians have broken their silence, highlighting how the Iranian regime monitors their activities in Australia. This has raised concerns among the community, who are now demanding protection from the Australian government.

Senator Chandler, who led a Senate inquiry into human rights abuses late last year, expressed her concern over the harassment of Australian citizens and the lack of action taken by relevant authorities.

“There are individuals in the community that are concerned they're being targeted. And they're reporting that to the relevant authorities, but they're worried those concerns aren't being taken seriously,” Senator Chandler stated.

The Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has conducted operations across a wide range of countries beyond the Middle East including the UK, where it targeted the Iran International staff and forced the offices to relocate to the US after British authorities failed to protect the team.

In a letter sent out from Tehran’s Evin prison, she noted that the compulsory hijab is a ploy devised by the religious and anti-women government to exert "control over women" and "remove" them from the public life. 

Her remarks came in reaction to the return of the notorious hijab or ‘morality’ police, which had vanished from the streets following nationwide protests sparked by the death of Mahsa Amini in the custody of hijab patrols last September. 

Mohammadi stated that the world now witnesses the power of women's resistance, which has elevated them in Iranian society to a position never seen since the establishment of the Islamic Republic in 1979. “

“Iranian women have achieved power and a historical position in their struggle to create revolutionary and peaceful changes,” Mohammadi said.

The fight against compulsory hijab is “a matter of freedom and liberation from tyranny, an issue of justice against oppression, a means to achieve peace, democracy, and human rights, and breaking free from violence and discrimination."

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Highlighting the regime’s "inability" to confront Iranian women who are fighting for their basic rights, she said, "The terrified regime is engaged in a fierce struggle to prevent its collapse, but it is clear that it has no hope of succeeding."

A lawyer often defending dissidents, Mohammadi has been imprisoned several times over the past two decades for her work fighting for human rights. She is the vice-president of the Defenders of Human Rights Association, the Chair of the executive board of the Peace Council of Iran, and a member of "Step-by-Step Abolition of Execution" campaign.

She was freed from Evin Prison in September 2020 after serving more than five years on trumped up charges, without due process of law. She was arrested again on November 16, 2021, released for a short time and one year later was detained again. Currently, she is serving a total sentence of 9 years and 8 months, along with 154 lashes and additional penalties in Evin Prison. She has also been denied access to medical care amid deteriorating health and was deprived for long periods of any contact with her husband and children who live abroad.

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The return of morality police patrols’ has immediately led to online uproar as well as a few bouts of street protests, the biggest of which broke out in the northern city of Rasht.

As the anniversary of the Mahsa Movement in September approaches, the regime is worried about the possibility of unrest in universities spilling over to the streets.

“The enemy has not given up. They’ve said that universities are the first place where new riots should begin,” the official in charge of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s representatives in universities across the country, Mostafa Rostami, said at a gathering. 

People on social media have reacted to the resurgence of hijab patrols, saying if Iranians do not pour into the streets on Amini's death anniversary, the regime will further tighten the noose. 

Iran’s former president Mohammad Khatami also warned that the return of morality police may lead to the regime's overthrow by itself and social collapse. “It seems that the danger of self-overthrow, which has been talked about many times, stands out more than ever with the return of morality police."

Top officials of the regime refuse to take responsibility due to “concern over the upcoming elections," according to Tehran's leading reformist daily, Etemad. President Ebrahim Raisi's aides have advised him against implementing any plan that could provoke people until after the next presidential election in 2025 to secure his re-election. 

According to German media outlet Presseportal, Hossein-Ali Nayeri was admitted to a private neurosurgical clinic -- the International Neuroscience Institute (INI) -- headed by Madjid Samii, a prominent Iranian-born neurosurgeon.

Nayeri, a cleric, judge and chief adviser to Iran’s judiciary, was one of the main figures in the "death committee" responsible for the mass execution of political prisoners in Iran in 1988. President Ebrahim Raisi was also a key member of this committee. 

On July 7, Volker Beck, the president of the German-Israeli Society, notified Germany’s Federal Public Prosecutor, the Foreign Office, and the Federal Interior Ministry about Nayeri’s stay, urging them to initiate criminal prosecution measures against him.

While people are murdered and tortured to death in Iranian prisons, those responsible for the human rights violations travel to Germany with impunity, he said, stating, “This must come to an end.” He also referred to another Iranian judge -- Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi – who was treated in the same clinic in Hanover in 2018. 

In July 2022, Nayeri defended the massacre in an interview with the Islamic Republic Documents Center, a government entity that collects the history of the 1979 revolution and more than four decades of rule by the Islamic Republic in Iran.

He tried to justify and explain away the killing of thousands of political prisoners, saying, “The country was in a critical state. If Khomeini [the Islamic Republic's first leader] did not stand firm... perhaps the regime would have not been able to survive.”