How images came to carry Iran’s protest dead
Niloufar Goudarzi
Iran International
Digital art and AI-generated images of protesters killed in Iran have flooded social media, turning victims of recent unrest into national icons.
Iran International
Digital art and AI-generated images of protesters killed in Iran have flooded social media, turning victims of recent unrest into national icons.
While the identities of many remain unconfirmed, the stories behind these images have helped create a shared narrative for a public mourning thousands of deaths during just two days of crackdown on Jan. 8 and Jan. 9.
In the weeks since, artists have used technology to blend modern tragedy with Persian mythology. These digital tributes often place fallen protesters in settings reminiscent of the Shahnameh, Iran’s national epic, lending the dead a sense of timeless honor.
The firefighter
One of the most widely shared figures is Hamid Mahdavi, a firefighter from the northeastern city of Mashhad, who was killed on Jan. 8 after being shot in the throat.
Social media posts and witness accounts say Mahdavi spent his final hours carrying wounded protesters away from lines of security forces. Digital artists have reimagined him as a guardian figure.
Videos circulating online show a man carrying the injured, but activists say it is difficult to confirm with absolute certainty whether the person in the footage is Mahdavi. For those mourning, however, the image has become inseparable from his story.
The firefighter from Mashhad is now widely seen as a symbol of rescue.
“He was brave, kind and honorable,” one user wrote in Persian on Instagram, where Mahdavi had been active before his killing. “His memory will remain eternal.”
Another wrote: “I’ve watched this video a hundred times and I still cannot stop crying.”
The man as shield
In another story that has become central to the narrative of the January uprising, a man identified by social media users as Mohammad Jabbari, or “Mohammad Agha,” is reported to have died while protecting others.
In a video that has gone viral, a man is seen holding open a building door to let protesters inside for safety, then attempting to force it shut against advancing security agents.
According to activist accounts, agents shot the man at close range after forcing their way through. Digital artists now depict him as a literal shield, with some comparing the scene to moments from the Shahnameh.
While the man’s identity cannot be verified with certainty, the narrative of “the man at the door” has taken on powerful symbolic meaning as an act of self-sacrifice.
Social media comments reflect a deep emotional connection to the scene.
“One day we will see this statue standing in the heart of Tehran,” one person wrote. Others simply posted, “Hold the door,” a phrase that has become shorthand for the act shown in the footage.
“These symbols must be built in our Iran so that future generations remember their history,” another user commented.
Shared memory for the future
The use of AI and rapidly produced digital art has allowed Iranians to create a visual record in real time.
As the government restricts traditional media and periodically shuts down the internet, these images offer a way to preserve stories the state cannot easily erase.
“We do not know the names of everyone who fell,” one user wrote beneath a viral tribute. “But these images carry the meaning of what happened. They are the glue that holds our story together.”
By focusing on individuals like Mahdavi and the man at the door, the protest movement has moved beyond statistics. Even when identities remain unconfirmed, the images ensure that stories of resistance continue to circulate—inside Iran and beyond it.
Ali Shakouri-Rad said the protests on January 8 and 9 were a predictable outcome of years of accumulated social discontent, even if the scale of the response surprised political factions and security institutions alike.
Shakouri-Rad rejected remarks promoted by official media that foreign intelligence services or opposition networks orchestrated the violence.
“I do not believe this, and I think many people do not believe it either,” he said, referring to claims that Israel’s Mossad or networks associated with exiled Prince Reza Pahlavi were responsible for the violence.
Protests and unexpected scale
Shakouri-Rad said the breadth of demonstrations across almost 400 cities exceeded expectations across Iran’s political spectrum. “Reformists, conservatives and the security institutions did not think this many people would respond to Reza Pahlavi’s call,” he said.
While protests were foreseeable given sustained grievances among workers, teachers and retirees, he said, the social response exposed a deeper rupture that institutions had failed to anticipate.
‘Injecting violence’ to justify force
The reformist politician argued that violence was introduced by those seeking to suppress protests and then use that violence as justification. “I can more easily believe that those who wanted to suppress what they called unrest carried out these acts,” he said.
This approach, he noted, was not new, arguing that security agencies have historically escalated confrontations to rationalize harsher measures. “From the beginning it has been like this, and it has grown worse over time,” he added.
Shakouri-Rad cited an academic article by a doctoral student at Guards-run Imam Hossein University that described “manufacturing deaths among one’s own forces” as a method for controlling unrest. He said the model included the killing of Basij or police personnel or attacks on symbolic sites, later attributed to protesters to justify coercive action.
Shakouri-Rad described an incident in which protesters who fled into a dead-end alley were shot and killed by a Basij member. The shooter, he said, was not inherently violent but shaped by an environment of polarization that placed weapons in the hands of poorly trained forces.
Criticism of the presidency
Shakouri-Rad criticized President Pezeshkian for publicly relying on security briefings to explain the killings, saying it stripped the president of his standing as a centrist figure. Repeating those assessments on state television, he said, alienated the public, which had witnessed events firsthand.
“People were present and knew what had happened,” he noted, adding that the president should have questioned the security bodies over how such events unfolded.
He also questioned how alleged armed networks could operate across hundreds of cities without the knowledge of Iran’s security agencies, saying the lack of accountability, resignations or formal inquiries underscored the credibility gap.
A leader-backed presidency
Shakouri-Rad said Pezeshkian’s rise to the presidency was a project backed by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, rather than the result of open political competition. Reformists, he said, assisted the process without understanding its nature.
Pezeshkian, he said, could have acted as a bridge to defuse crises only if real authority had been delegated.
Shakouri-Rad described the January killings as among the “darkest moments in Iran’s modern history,” saying the wounds left by injustice and the killing of young people – most of them under 30 – would not heal without truth, accountability and a fundamental change in governance.
Referring specifically to the bloodshed on January 8 and 9, Shakouri-Rad said: “It is not something we can erase easily in the coming years, or even in decades to come.”
