Iran International
State media in Iran have widely circulated images of damaged mosques and burned Qurans inside, blaming protesters they brand “terrorists” and portraying its deadly crackdown on a protest uprising as a sacred defense of holy places.
Officials assert that dozens of mosques and shrines across the country were deliberately attacked during protests.
Reports by eyewitnesses point to multiple mosques set ablaze in Tehran and Gilan province and in other major cities including Karaj and Isfahan.
In the past week, due to the near-total ongoing internet shutdown, state media have effectively become the primary source of visual material related to alleged damaged during the protests for many Iranians.
Tehran Mayor Alireza Zakani said on Thursday that more than 61 mosques were torched during unrest in the capital. President Masoud Pezeshkian echoed the condemnation on January 12, stating that “Iranian society does not accept those who burn mosques.”
Pezeshkian went further, saying: “They have trained some people inside and outside, brought terrorists into the country from abroad, and they burn mosques.”
State media are widely circulating images of charred interiors and half-burned copies of the Quran in Abu Dhar Mosque in Tehran and CCTV footage from an unnamed mosque in Isfahan that appears to show individuals setting fire to the building and its contents.
In pro-government rallies, some participants were seen holding half-burned Qurans, and the state TV showed several interviews with them reinforcing the narrative that demonstrators were “terrorists” attacking Islam itself.
Amplification beyond Iran
The images have not remained confined to Iranian media. They have been reshared widely on social platforms by supporters of the Islamic Republic, including some foreign influencers.
Accounts such as “Partisan Girl” (Sirin Girl) and Hamza Adi reposted the images, accusing supporters of Reza Pahlavi of burning the Quran.
Even amid internet restrictions, many pro-government users inside Iran continued to circulate the material online.
The repeated sharing has helped frame the unrest in some Muslim countries such as Pakistan as an attack on religious sanctities rather than a political protest.
Criticism and Fact-Checking
Some opponents of the government argue that the information released is selective and misleading. They say the extensive focus on mosque imagery by outlets such as state broadcaster IRIB aims to discredit protesters and provoke religious sentiment against them.
Iranian fact-checking website Factnameh wrote: “What is being presented is an incomplete and misleading picture of reality, designed to stir religious emotions and mobilize the government’s religious supporters, as well as to inflame Muslim public opinion against protesters in Iran.”
At the same time, some anonymous social media accounts have explicitly encouraged attacks on religious sites. An account posting under the name “Imam Tusi” wrote on X: “People burned Fatemeh Zahra Mosque in Isfahan, too. People should torch all shrines, mosques, and religious seminaries together with the mullahs in them.”
Most mosques and religious employees receive state backing in the Islamic theocracy.
Some opposition figures have implicitly acknowledged mosque burnings.
Darya Safai, an Iranian-born member of the Belgian parliament, wrote on X: “In western Tehran, a great mosque burned. For forty-seven years, its minarets echoed with ‘Allahu Akbar,’ and in that name, Iranian women and men were chained, silenced and broken.”
Yet other observers blamed authorities for the damage,
“They did this themselves to provoke the people—impaling the Quran on spears, setting fires, and destroying the mosque are just the tools of deception used by these hypocrites,” a user posting as Hatam wrote on X, without providing evidence.
Mosques as security hub
Iran has an estimated 75,000 mosques, around two-thirds of which are believed to be largely inactive. Tehran's critics argue that unlike in other Muslim-majority countries, mosques in Iran function not only as religious spaces but also serve as function halls for the state's repressive apparatus, including the Basij militia which quashed protests.
Iranian authorities openly acknowledge this role. On January 9, Revolutionary Guards commander Hossein Yekta called on government supporters via state television to gather in mosques and Basij bases to confront “the enemies of the revolution.”
In August 2024, Iranian media quoted Brigadier General Heydar Baba-Ahmadi, head of the Mosques and Neighborhoods Affairs of Basij militia force, as saying that “79 percent of Basij resistance bases are located in mosques, with another 5 percent in other religious sites.”
Factnameh estimates suggest nearly 50,000 Basij bases operate within mosques nationwide.
During the 2021–2022 protests, CNN reported on networks of secret detention sites, some allegedly located inside mosques. The report asserted that these spaces were used for temporary detention and torture of protesters, run by Basij units based in mosques.
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.