the Moral Police returns to the streets, 10 months after the death of Masha Amini

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The Iranian authorities announced this Sunday a new campaign to force women to wear the Islamic headscarf. Thus, the Morality Police returned to the streets 10 months after the death of a woman whom they had arrested triggered protests throughout the country.

Islamic religious police had largely withdrawn following the September death of 22-year-old Masha Amini. Authorities had trouble containing mass protests calling for the overthrow of the theocracy that has ruled Iran for some four decades.

Protests in Iran left a balance of at least 500 dead. (Photo/AP)

The protests have mostly died down this year after an intense crackdown in which some 500 protesters were killed and nearly 20,000 detained. But many women continued to ignore official dress codes, especially in the capital Tehran and other cities.

The Morale police were hardly seen patrolling the streets and in December there were even some reports, later denied, that the body had been dismantled.

Throughout the crisis, the authorities insisted that the rules had not changed. The country’s ruling clerics see the hijab as a pillar of the Islamic revolution that brought them to power, and see more casual attire as a sign of Western decadence.

The morality police returned to the streets of Iran

General Saeed Montazerolmahdi, a police spokesman, said Sunday that the morality police would again notify and then detain women who did not wear the hijab in public. In Tehran, men and women of the morality police were seen patrolling the streets in marked vans.

The battle over the hijab became a powerful protest issue last fall, when women played a key role in the demonstrations. The marches were quick to incorporate calls to overthrow Iran’s ruling clerics, whom most young dissenters accuse of being corrupt, repressive and out of touch with reality. The Iranian government attributed the protests to a foreign conspiracy, without offering proof.

Several Iranian celebrities joined the protests, including prominent filmmakers and actors from the country’s renowned film industry. Several Iranian actresses were detained after going public without a hijab or expressing support for the marches.

In the most recent case, actress Azadeh Samadi was banned from social media and ordered by a court to receive “antisocial personality disorder” psychological treatment after appearing at a funeral two months ago wearing a cap on her head.

* With information from the Associated Press