The death of university student Jina Mahsa Amini has triggered a wave of protests across Iran. For the last five weeks, the women of the country have been leading the way, but people from all walks of life have joined them. Are they the force that could…
For dancing in the streets freely. For our fear of kissing our loved ones. For my sister, your sister, our sisters.When night falls over Tehran, the people elevate their voices, says Anoush. They step out onto their balconies or head up to the rooftops. Someone begins chanting:"Death to the dictator!" And:"Woman! Life! Freedom!" Others join in, until the streets of the Iranian capital are filled with their calls.
Two women in black veils grabbed her by the shoulders and shoved her into a van full of a number of other women. Anoush says she was then berated by the morality officers, who accused her of being paid by the West to dress like a whore and damage Iran."I couldn’t stop crying,” she says. She says she has taken part in six demonstrations since then. Initially, she would wear a diving mask to protect her from the teargas, but she says she no longer does. Thus far, Anoush has been able to avoid the police at each of the protests she has participated in, disappearing into shops or into the apartments of older Iranians who keep their doors open for the protesters."We are more afraid of being arrested than being killed," Anoush says.
Following the manipulated presidential election in 2009, millions of Iranians took to the streets against the regime. It quickly came to be called the Green Revolution, but it was rapidly and violently put down. There were also protests in 2017/2018 against soaring food prices. Western clichés frequently portray Muslim women either as victims or fanatics, but the Iranian uprising is showing just how great their yearning for freedom and self-determination is. It is an inspiration for millions of women who suffer under patriarchal structures – in the Middle East and beyond.
Amini was there to visit relatives and to buy clothes for the university semester that was about to commence. It was, in fact, just a normal shopping trip – until, that is, she caught the attention of the morality police. They pulled her into their car, according to the account provided later by Amini’s younger brother Kiarash. He says he had wanted to intervene, but the police grabbed his arm and twisted it behind his back.
Pictures show a woman with soft features wearing dark red lipstick, her hijab loosely bound over her head, if she’s wearing one at all. Her relatives told journalists that Amini was not politically involved and had dreamed of leading a quiet, happy life. Her father is a civil servant and her mother a homemaker. An activist from Saghez says that Amini had yearned for a time when women and men could be free, and that she was a proud Kurdish woman.
In Sanandaj, which is also located in the Kurdistan province, only just a few hundred people initially gathered on the market square in the wake of Amini’s death, chanting"Jin! Jiyan! Azadi!" Another mantra was:"Today it’s Jina. Tomorrow it’s us!" Since then, their protest has resembled urban warfare. They sneak through the city streets, changing their clothes several times each day and with a constant eye to escape routes – which always involve just barely avoiding the regime’s minions.
Sahel is another, a feminist from Rasht in northern Iran who was hit in the back by eight shotgun pellets right at the beginning of the protests. Fearful of the regime’s henchmen, she received treatment at home from friends. Now, she is back at it. In a series of voice messages, Sahel recounts in her soft voice what she has experienced and describes how demonstrators who have never before taken to the streets are now learning how to build barricades.
Mehdi says that the murder of women and girls by the morality police triggered this uprising. But in the future, he adds, there will be hundreds of additional reasons for Iran’s citizens to take to the streets. All you have to do, he says, is listen to the song by Shervin Hajipour. Three things are important to keep the revolt going, he says: Keeping people’s hope alive and strengthening their will to resist; free access to the internet; and the support of various groups in society – including oil industry workers, teachers and university professors, businesspeople and, of course, Iranians in exile who are in contact with foreign governments.
Since their founding in 2005 under the ultra-religious President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the morality police are thought to have filed charges against millions of women for not wearing the hijab"properly.” The U.S. classifies the Revolutionary Guards as a terrorist organization, but the European Union does not. EU foreign ministers have now imposed a fresh set of sanctions against Iran, primarily aimed at preventing certain Iranian officials from traveling to Europe and at freezing assets – though the punitive measures primarily affect the morality police.
Iranians in the diaspora tend to agree on very little. Being deeply divided when it comes to the homeland is, of course, hardly uncommon for exile communities, but it is particularly true of Iranians abroad. Still, there is one thing they share: Few with Persian roots have been left unmoved by the images coming out of their home country, the homeland of their parents and grandparents.
Western governments are also now getting to know another side of Iranians in exile: They are now demanding that governments adopt a clear stance. They are demonstrating in many European capitals, they have gathered for a sit-in in front of the Foreign Ministry in Berlin, they have held rallies in front of the Islamic Center Hamburg, considered to be an offshoot of the Iranian regime, and they have written open letters and addressed petitions to the German parliament.
It is unclear, however, under what conditions Rekabi wrote the message or whether she is even its author. Observers have interpreted the lines as a coerced statement. IranWire has reported that Rekabi’s brother has been arrested in Iran. When Jahanfekr criticized the accommodations at an Olympic qualifier event, the federation banned her from competition for several months."I had to explain myself before a committee. They cursed at me and said I was tarnishing and shaming the association.”
Nearly half the children and young people killed belonged to the oppressed Baluchi ethnic minority. They died on the deadliest day since the protests began – September 30 – in Zahedan, the capital of Sistan and Baluchestan province. Security forces crushed a protest there after Friday prayers, leaving a reported 66 people dead.
The prison has dozens of solitary confinement cells, interrogation rooms and its own execution yard. The prisoners are often interrogated for hours, and some are tortured. Time and again, inmates die because they don’t receive medical care in time. Amnesty International calls the prison the"waiting room of death.”
España Últimas Noticias, España Titulares
Similar News:También puedes leer noticias similares a ésta que hemos recopilado de otras fuentes de noticias.
Welche Sanktionen verhängt der Westen gegen den Iran? | DW | 20.10.2022Welche westlichen Sanktionen gab es bereits vorher gegen den Iran, welche sind nun angesichts der brutalen Unterdrückung der Proteste hinzugekommen, und welche Auswirkungen haben sie? Die DW-Autor*innen David_Ehl und InesEis geben einen Überblick.
Leer más »
VOGUE-Shopping: Die besten Neuheiten für Mode, Beauty und InteriorVOGUE-Shopping: Die besten Neuheiten für Mode, Beauty und Interior... voguegermany shopping
Leer más »
Meerbusch-Iran-Connection: Deutsche Firma in Aufbau des abgeschotteten Internets im Iran verstricktEin deutsches Unternehmen aus Meerbusch in Nordrhein-Westfalen ist zusammen mit dem iranischen Internetunternehmen ArvanCloud in den Aufbau eines abgeschotteten Internets im Iran verwickelt. Das zeigen gemeinsame Recherchen von Correctiv, taz und netzpolitik.org. Deutsche Ministerien und Sicherheitsbehörden sind alarmiert.
Leer más »
Meghan Markle: So zeigt die Herzogin ihren Support für Frauen und Mädchen im IranMit dem Slogan 'Frauen, Leben, Freiheit' in Farsi auf ihrem T-Shirt, unterstreicht Meghan Markle ihre Unterstützung für Frauen und Mädchen im Iran.
Leer más »