Iran International
The political storm over a marathon on Iran’s Kish Island may have started as a dispute over unveiled participants, but it now reflects a deeper struggle between a society pushing for change and institutions intent on reasserting control.
The sixth Kish Marathon was held on Friday morning with nearly 5,000 runners on the Persian Gulf resort island, including hundreds of unveiled women, despite opposition from Iran’s Athletics Federation which had cited concerns over “legal and religious requirements.”
Hardline factions swiftly framed the event as an assault on Islamic values. Outlets like the Revolutionary Guard-linked Tasnim News Agency accused organizers of deliberately encouraging moral decay, and a local prosecutor confirmed the arrest of a regional official and an organizer.
“This is no longer negligence; the relevant officials must be immediately punished… The Kish Marathon … has turned into a symbol of promoting and advertising licentiousness,” Tasnim wrote.
Ultra-hardliners repeated this framing across social media. Some described the event as “an organized move to promote corruption and widespread uncovering of hair.”
One user, Mehran Karimi, argued in a post on X that “the priority… must be to confront the roots of promoting corruption and prevent the repetition of such a disgrace.”
Ultra-hardliner lawmaker Ali Shirinzad called the marathon a deliberate provocation: “Holding a women's marathon without hijab is a nose-thumbing of the legal and religious principles of the Islamic Republic,” he posted on X.
Much of the criticism has directly targeted President Masoud Pezeshkian’s government, accusing it of enabling hijab violations. One ultra-hardliner wrote on X: “The government has become the main supporter of this organized indecency.”
Double standards exposed
Critics of the crackdown argue that the outrage is selective. Moderate website Rouydad24 highlighted a virtually identical event held at Tehran's Ravagh Mall, where women also participated without full hijab.
“No cries of outrage were raised… Why? Because Ravagh operates under the supervision of a senior state official’s son. Therefore, there is no reprimand whatsoever.”
The report initially identified the senior state official as Ali Asghar Hejazi, the deputy chief of staff to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, but later removed his name from the article.
Social media users also shared images of similar marathons held in 2021 and 2023 under former hardline president Ebrahim Raisi—events that violated hijab rules yet went unchallenged.
“The zealots must explain the difference… they remained silent about the first one and declared the second one a crime!” conservative journalist Reza Mansournia remarked on X.
Even the conservative Khorasan newspaper, aligned with Parliament Speaker Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf, warned that the backlash had gone too far, arguing it could harm tourism and the local economy
“Such incidents could not only overshadow a positive event like the Kish Marathon but also cause tensions that are currently not in the interest of national cohesion.”
A crisis the crackdown can't solve
Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s recent directive to Pezeshkian’s government, urging tougher enforcement of hijab laws, has fueled fears of a renewed crackdown. Yet even pro-Ghalibaf journalists warn that harsh measures are counterproductive.
Ali Gholhaki wrote that past crackdowns only “amplified the harm several times over,” adding: “Yet now we long for the hijab situation of 10 years ago!”
Former Rouhani-era official Roohallah Jomei contrasted the thousands who joined the Kish marathon with the handful of vigilantes camped outside parliament earlier this year demanding stricter hijab enforcement.
“They couldn't get a hundred people to join them, but more than five thousand went to Kish… Iran will not return to the time before the fall of 2022!” he posted on X.
Moderate politician Sina Kamalkhani added: “The likelihood that the hijab situation will return to what it was before is as much as the likelihood that the dollar (now over 120,000 tomans to the dollar) will return to 3,000 tomans (a few years ago).”
The feminist group Enghelab-e Zanane (Women Revolution), in a statement released on social media, called the arrests evidence of the state’s inability to contain growing public defiance: “The government neither intends to retreat nor is capable of fully enforcing repression; therefore, any free presence of women becomes a security crisis for it.”
Tehran’s unveiling of a towering statue depicting the Roman Emperor Valerian kneeling before pre-Islamic Persian King Shapur I has renewed criticism of the Islamic Republic’s appeal to nationalist sentiment following the June war with Israel.
For over forty years, the theocracy purged ancient Persian history from schoolbooks, replacing it with post-Islamic narratives. But after the 12-day conflict with Israel, officials have turned to the distant pre-Islamic past to rally a divided society.
From murals of ancient kings and soldiers to patriotic songs added to Shi’ite mourning ceremonies performed before Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, Tehran now embraces imagery once deemed heretical by its own revolutionary ethos.
'Kneel before Iran' campaign
Tehran’s Revolution (Enghelab) Square was the scene of an unusual spectacle on Friday as officials unveiled a massive bronze statue depicting Roman Emperor Valerian kneeling in submission before Sassanid King Shapur I, commemorating Iran’s victory at the Battle of Edessa (260 AD).
The event was held under the slogan “Kneel before Iran,” part of what authorities describe as a campaign to project “national unity and historical pride” following the June war with Israel.
Tehran Mayor Alireza Zakani, a staunch ultraconservative, said on X: “Enmity with Great Iran can only end in kneeling before this historic nation.”
Municipal official Davood Goodarzi said the installation would be accompanied by visual displays depicting “other victories of Iranians over foreign aggressors,” including the defeat of British forces by local commander Rais-Ali Delvari, Mirza Kuchak Khan’s resistance against Russian troops, and Surena’s triumph over Rome at the Battle of Carrhae in 53 BCE.
The goal, Goodarzi said, is “strengthening concepts such as national dignity, social unity, and Iranian identity.”
The statue, he said, would remain temporarily at Revolution Square before being moved to a city gateway “where it will stand as the first emblem of Iran before diplomats and foreign visitors.”
Unveiled women were allowed to attend the unveiling ceremony—an uncommon scene at events organized by Tehran’s ultra-hardline municipality.
The turn to the pre-Islamic past
The sharp reversal also recalls remarks once made by Khamenei. In a 2011 speech, he asserted that “all the great military victories of this nation came after Islam,” dismissing pre-Islamic accounts as “things that are not documented.”
In 1987, he had said that prophets triumphed over kings such as Cyrus and that “nothing remains of these monarchs in history but names remembered with derision.”
Nevertheless, pro-government social media accounts have now gone so far as to circulate posters equating Khamenei himself with Shapur, showing him standing with a staff as Benjamin Netanyahu and Donald Trump kneel before him. The caption reads: “You will kneel before Iran.”
'Hypocrisy'
Pro-government figures have hailed the move as a patriotic success. Conservative political reporter Hossein Saremi posted: “Today’s grand Iranian gathering showed that people and the state share one essence: Iran itself. Nothing can take our homeland away.”
Others, however, called the spectacle “hypocrisy.” Journalist Gholamhossein Pashaei wrote on X: “Every year you close Pasargadae to stop people from celebrating Cyrus Day, yet you unveil Shapur’s statue in Enghelab Square with drums and fireworks during Fatimiyya (mourning period)!”
Dissident commentator Hamid Asafi called the ceremony “a perfect snapshot of the Islamic Republic’s contradictions.”
On Telegram he wrote: “A week ago they closed Cyrus’s tomb out of fear of the crowds, and now they glorify Shapur in the same breath. The Islamic Republic fears living history but poses for selfies with its corpse.”
He added: “They know people no longer respond to rosaries and sermons. That’s why they’ve brought history back to the stage—in a controlled costume. If they can’t erase the past, they’ll try to own it.”
The irony deepened as UNESCO formally recognized Cyrus’s Charter as one of the earliest human-rights documents.
President Masoud Pezeshkian wrote on X: “Iran, the cradle of dialogue, justice, and coexistence, can still inspire peace today.”
Users swiftly replied, questioning how such pride could coexist with a government that blocks access to Cyrus’s tomb each year to those wishing to visit it on his birthday.