Iran’s Special Clerical Court has sentenced dissident cleric Abdolrahim Soleimani Ardestani to six years in prison, a fine and removal from the clergy, months after his public challenge to state-backed Shiite narratives drew threats and political pressure.
Soleimani Ardestani, a religious scholar, former Mofid University professor and member of a reformist association of Qom seminary teachers and researchers, is being held in Qom’s prison.
According to Mojtaba Lotfi, an official from the office of the late dissident cleric Hossein Ali Montazeri, the court convicted him on all eight charges brought against him.
Lotfi said Soleimani Ardestani does not plan to appeal unless the court agrees to hold a public hearing.
In a letter from prison, Soleimani Ardestani said the charges against him included disturbing public opinion, insulting sacred values, insulting the leadership in relation to Ali Khamenei and his son Mojtaba, taking part in a gathering over the house arrest of Mir-Hossein Mousavi, and assembly and collusion against domestic security.
Mousavi, a former prime minister, has been under house arrest since 2011 after rejecting the official result of Iran’s disputed 2009 presidential election and becoming one of the symbols of the Green Movement protests.
Soleimani Ardestani also listed accusations such as propaganda against the system, spreading falsehoods online, insulting senior religious authorities, damaging the dignity of the clergy and “mind control and psychological suggestion” – a striking charge even by the standards of Iran’s broad political indictments.
He has called the indictment weak and baseless, criticized his arrest and solitary confinement, and said he wrote his defense not to seek acquittal but to leave a record for history.
The case began with remarks in a debate with pro-government cleric Hamed Kashani. Soleimani Ardestani questioned long-promoted Shiite accounts about the death of Fatemeh Zahra, the daughter of the Prophet Muhammed and wife of Ali, the first Shiite Imam.
In Iran, the story of Fatemeh’s martyrdom is not only a religious narrative but part of a vast state-backed culture of mourning, ritual and political identity.
Soleimani Ardestani argued that if Ali had merely watched his wife being attacked and had not intervened, then the traditional account would raise questions about his justice. He later said he had not insulted Fatemeh and was challenging what he called the “stories told by religious singers or eulogists (maddahs).”
He also questioned mourning ceremonies for Muhammad Taqi, the ninth Shiite Imam, saying his death was linked to jealousy by his wife after he remarried and that mourning the event 1,300 years later was meaningless.
The backlash was immediate. Pro-government eulogists, who play an influential role in mobilizing religious crowds, attacked him with vulgar and sexist language. Reports also emerged of a group attack on his home.
Hardline figures called for prosecution and defrocking, while some religious voices went further, suggesting that denial of Fatemeh’s martyrdom could amount to leaving Shiite doctrine.
The controversy also split parts of the political middle ground. Reformist figures criticized Soleimani Ardestani’s tone and timing, while others warned that violent threats, home attacks and denunciations violated freedom of belief.
The sentence is significant because it shows how quickly the Islamic Republic can convert a dispute over religious history into a security case.
Soleimani Ardestani was not an outside critic of clerical rule. He was a cleric from inside the seminary world, which makes his challenge more sensitive.
By sentencing him to prison and stripping him of clerical status, the system is not only punishing one man. It is policing the boundaries of who is allowed to interpret religion, how far internal debate can go, and what happens when religious scholarship collides with the political theology of the state.
Messages sent to Iran International from cities across the country paint a picture of households slipping steadily down the hierarchy of human needs.
Many say their tables have been reduced to the level of survival, where staying full matters more than quality, variety or nutritional value.
If many families had already removed red meat, fish and even chicken from their diets in recent years, messages received by Iran International suggest that fruit, eggs and dairy products have now also become luxuries for a large share of households.
Instead, they say they rely on filling foods such as pasta, potatoes, onions, bread and plain rice.
One citizen summed up the sense of despair bluntly: "If the Islamic Republic remains, we will be buried in the graveyard of our dreams."
Another said that most days their family eats little beyond potatoes, onions and lentil soup.
The accounts reflect a shift toward the most basic physiological needs required for survival, with little room for long-term health, development or security.
One citizen said that after months of buying food from weekly street vendors because shops had become too expensive, even those purchases are now out of reach.
"I only buy the absolute necessities now, things like potatoes, tomatoes and onions, and even then I buy the lowest-quality produce available," the person said.
A resident of Isfahan said the family's meals now consist largely of potatoes, pasta, or bread and cheese.
Official figures show some food categories rising well into triple digits over the past year while wages have failed to keep pace.
According to Central Bank data for the past month, year-on-year inflation reached 161 percent for milk, cheese and eggs, 267 percent for oils and fats, and 176 percent for meat products.
Citizens reported that lamb currently sells for around 22 million rials ($12.5) per kilogram, while beef costs roughly 15 million rials ($8.5) per kilogram.
Masoud Rasouli, secretary of the Meat Packaging and Protein Industry Association, said in early June that demand for red meat had fallen by about 50 percent compared with the previous year.
Many families told Iran International they had eliminated animal protein entirely from their diets despite warnings from health experts that prolonged protein deficiencies can lead to widespread malnutrition, particularly among children and adolescents.
Doctors have warned that shrinking household food baskets and a shift toward cheaper, lower-quality products could contribute to rising rates of anemia, weakened immune systems and other long-term health problems.
'Nothing but bread and cheese'
Several citizens said an ordinary package of breakfast cheese now costs around 2 million rials ($1.1).
"Many days our lunch and dinner consist only of bread and cheese," one person said. "But even if you live only on bread and cheese, you would still need about 150 million rials ($85) a month."
Iran's minimum monthly wage currently stands at around 160 million rials ($90).
Citizens reported prices of around 250,000 rials ($0.14) for a single egg, more than 10 million rials ($5.6) for a liter of cooking oil, and about 5 million rials ($2.8) for a 2.5-kilogram container of yogurt.
Many said that salaries which barely reach 200 million rials ($113) a month have left them struggling to secure even protein-free meals.
The messages also point to a more troubling development: the gradual replacement of food with whatever can fill an empty stomach.
A resident of Tabriz said they now buy meat stock instead of meat simply to create the flavor of meat in stews.
A mother from Dehloran in Ilam Province said her children have not eaten meat for months and that even chicken has become unaffordable.
Others described selling household belongings to cover food expenses.
"We have cut costs everywhere possible and there is almost nothing left on our table," one citizen said. "I have not eaten a proper meal in a week. We are reaching a point where we cannot afford three meals a day."
For a growing number of Iranians, the question is no longer how to maintain a standard of living, but how to secure enough food to get through another day.
Tourism businesses in Iran are struggling to survive as economic hardship and a sharp decline in travel leave eco-lodges empty, operators facing bankruptcy and workers at risk of losing their jobs, according to a report by Shargh newspaper.
Once promoted as a way to boost local economies and preserve traditional lifestyles, eco-lodges across Iran are now grappling with falling visitor numbers, rising costs and mounting financial pressure.
"The damage caused by the war will take months to repair, and tourism will need a long time to return to previous levels," Yavar Abiri, head of Iran's Association of Eco-Lodge Professional Societies, told Shargh.
Abiri said many Iranians have shifted their priorities from travel to basic survival as economic uncertainty deepens.
"People are saving whatever money they have for essential needs in case another war breaks out," he said.
Travel slips down household priorities
Tourism operators say domestic travel had already been weakening before the latest economic shocks.
Official statistics cited by Shargh showed that nearly half of Iranian households did not take a single trip during the spring of 2024. Industry representatives say rising prices have forced many families to either cancel travel altogether or cut costs by camping, avoiding restaurants and reducing leisure spending.
Officials have also questioned whether travel remains a priority for many households.
Hani Rastegaran, secretary of the National Travel Services Coordination Headquarters, previously described declining domestic travel as a warning sign for the tourism sector and called for an assessment of whether economic pressure had pushed travel out of family budgets.
Eco-lodges face closures
Mahlagha Mahdavi, who operates an eco-lodge in Shiraz and has worked in the sector for a decade, said the downturn has intensified over the past year.
"We faced a sharp drop in visitors and had to offer significant discounts because people simply could not afford to travel," Mahdavi told Shargh.
She said many eco-lodge employees are women and heads of households, prompting operators to avoid layoffs despite worsening finances.
"We do not know how long we can continue without reducing staff," she said.
Many former tourism operators, according to Mahdavi, have already left the industry, while the profile of travelers has changed. Visitors who once belonged largely to the middle class have been replaced by wealthier Iranians who can no longer justify foreign trips but continue to travel domestically.
Revenue collapses, costs soar
Operators in other provinces described similar challenges. Abas'ad Sharafkhani, who runs an eco-lodge in Hamedan province, said revenue between January and April amounted to only a fraction of what he had expected.
"Out of the income I had projected, I earned only about 10 percent, and even that barely covered operating costs," he told Shargh.
Sharafkhani said many eco-lodges are nearing complete bankruptcy and that some properties sustained physical damage during the conflict.
He criticized authorities for failing to provide meaningful support or compensation.
Rising prices force cutbacks
Ahmad Kazemi, an eco-lodge operator in Khorasan Razavi province, said inflation has transformed the economics of the business.
"When we started in 2019, a sack of high-quality Iranian rice cost three million rials ($1.8). Now it costs 64 million rials (about $36)," Kazemi told Shargh.
He said accommodation packages that once cost 4000,000 rials ($2.2) now cost between forty and fifty million rials ($22-28), even after operators reduce their profit margins.
To cope with rising expenses, Kazemi said his lodge has removed lunch and dinner services and now offers only accommodation and breakfast.
"People are not traveling for leisure the way they used to," he said. "Many now choose short local trips because they are cheaper."
Iran's minimum monthly wage is currently equivalent to about $90–$110, depending on exchange-rate movements, while labor experts estimate that many workers earn around $150 per month on average.
Industry operators told Shargh that without financial support and an improvement in household purchasing power, many of Iran's eco-lodges may be unable to continue operating, threatening jobs and a sector that was once viewed as a growing part of the country's tourism economy.
Messages sent by teenagers described a growing gap between what they need and what their families can afford, with some saying even routine activities and modest purchases now feel unattainable.
One teenager said upgrading a computer has become unrealistic after the price of an 8GB DDR5 memory module rose to around 500 million rials (over $280).
Iran's minimum monthly wage is currently worth around $90-$110, depending on exchange-rate fluctuations, while estimates from labor experts put average monthly earnings for many workers at roughly $150.
"With these conditions, buying or upgrading a computer has become a dream," the teenager said.
Another wrote that a mobile phone purchased for 500 million rials (over $280) in February is now worth 930 million rials (over $520).
Others pointed to the disappearance of simple recreational activities from their lives. A 15-year-old said swimming pool fees have more than doubled since early April, while another said that a bicycle that once cost 300 million rials (around $170) now sells for 620 million rials (about $350).
"We Iranian teenagers and young people have reached a point where eating one good meal makes us happy, while our peers in other countries have many things to enjoy," one message said.
Embarrassed to ask
Several teenagers said financial pressure has not only reduced their expectations but also left them feeling ashamed to express their needs.
They described watching their parents struggle with rising living costs and choosing to remain silent about things they want or need.
An 11-year-old girl said her birthday falls in September but she is embarrassed to ask her father to organize a celebration.
She questioned why having a birthday party should be considered a wish rather than a normal part of childhood.
A 14-year-old wrote: "Whenever I ask my parents for something, they say they don't have the money. I feel ashamed when I sit at the dinner table."
Another 15-year-old said gym membership fees had tripled.
"I feel guilty asking for things I need because I know dealing with these prices is not easy for my parents," the teenager wrote.
Some others said they increasingly feel like a burden on their families. One wrote that their parents regularly give up their own wishes to provide for their children, while another said the feeling of being an extra weight on the family has become constant.
A 14-year-old girl said she feels guilty whenever her parents buy something for her and has become pessimistic about her future.
Adult worries replace childhood concerns
Some said their attention has shifted from hobbies, friendships and future plans to concerns about war, economic conditions and daily news.
"Whenever I think about war and ceasefires, I cry," one teenager wrote. "Why can't I enjoy life like other teenagers or go to school wearing what I want?"
A 12-year-old asked why children should be preoccupied with current events instead of enjoying their free time.
Several said the issues occupying their minds resemble adult concerns rather than those usually associated with adolescence.
"I should be thinking about having fun and playing, not working or worrying about politics and the price of gold and dollars," one teenager wrote.
Comparisons with teenagers abroad appeared frequently in the messages.
A 16-year-old girl said she works instead of pursuing leisure activities and is often too exhausted to remain on her feet.
A university entrance exam candidate wrote that seeing graduation celebrations in other countries leaves the strongest sense of longing.
Growing uncertainty about the future
Several teenagers said they struggle to imagine a future for themselves at a stage in life when they should be exploring talents, setting goals and pursuing ambitions.
An 18-year-old said the country's conditions have left little motivation even for ordinary daily life, let alone planning for the future.
Another wrote that, despite being only 18, they are already watching their hopes and ambitions fade.
A 15-year-old said economic pressure, exhaustion and disappointment have become part of everyday life and make long-held aspirations feel impossible to achieve.
Some said uncertainty is even shaping major life decisions.
A ninth-grade student wrote that although they would like to choose an academic path based on personal interests, the future feels so unpredictable that passion has become a luxury.
Instead of focusing on dreams, the student said thoughts are dominated by rising prices, war and the memory of those who have died, creating a sense of being trapped with no clear path forward.
