Home » In Iran, the wind of protests is blowing in a new way – Laure-Maïssa Farjallah

In Iran, the wind of protests is blowing in a new way – Laure-Maïssa Farjallah

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In Iran, the wind of protests is blowing in a new way – Laure-Maïssa Farjallah

September 28, 2022 12:31 pm

This time the wind of revolt is blowing in a different way. Undoubtedly, in recent years, the economic crisis that is sweeping the country has provoked popular demonstrations at increasingly regular intervals. In 2017, the Iranians took to the streets to protest against the increase in the cost of living in the face of the devaluation of the riyal. Two years later it was a subsidy reform that pushed people to demonstrate by soaring the price of fuel. Since then, punctual and localized mobilizations have multiplied to demand greater rights for employees and workers, or better access to water for farmers in the Isfahan region.

The socio-economic claims of a population hitherto considered a pillar of popular support for the regime are constantly mixed with criticism directed at that same regime, its mismanagement, and its corruption. In spite of its speech focused on representing and defending the common people against the bourgeoisie, the Islamic republic does not hesitate to activate its well-oiled repressive system to suppress this series of movements.

Now it was the death of Mahsa Amini, the young woman arrested by the religious police for wearing the hijab “in an inappropriate way”, which sparked the protests. The culmination of a series of violent arrests by “morality patrols” against women who did not respect dress codes, this episode aroused strong emotion.

The trigger is socio-political
Although women and students are mobilized at the forefront, many men have joined the demonstrations that place one of the pillars of the Islamic Republic’s political-religious authority and identity at the center of the dispute: the veil. Not only did some protesters burn their hijab in protest, but in some cases the police were also attacked with the cry of “Death to the dictator”, referring to the supreme cuida, whose effigies were torn apart. “Given that the trigger this time is sociocultural and political, the current uprising is quite comparable to the green movement of 2009,” said Ali Fathollah-Nejad, associate researcher at the Issam Fares Institute at the American University of Beirut. Since it represented one of the greatest direct threats to the Islamic Republic since its establishment, that movement had generated mass demonstrations called by the reformist Mir-Hossein Mussavi, an unfortunate presidential candidate, to denounce the election of Mahmud Ahmadinejad, considered the result of fraud.

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Until recently, the middle class, thirsty for freedom, differed in its demands from the poorer classes who asked for bread.

Unlike the green movement, concentrated mainly in Tehran and universities, the current protests extend throughout the country, from Isfahan to Rasht, on the shores of the Caspian Sea, passing through Iranian Kurdistan in the west, from which the high 20 year old came as a symbol of the regime’s repression.

“The demonstrations triggered by Mahsa Amini’s death reflect a far wider anger of the population over the discriminatory legal framework that disproportionately affects women, ethnic and religious minorities and other marginalized groups in Iran,” observes Gissou Nia, prime minister of Iran human rights documentation center and director of the Strategic litigation project at the Atlantic Council.

On the other hand, until recently the middle class, thirsting for freedom, differed in their demands from the poorer classes who asked for bread. The sanctions imposed by Donald Trump after pulling the United States out of the nuclear deal in 2018 have, however, exacerbated the economic crisis affecting Iranians. At the end of August, although discretion is usually imposed on this issue, President Ebrahim Raisi let it slip during a press conference that annual inflation was over 40 percent. “Current conditions in Iran suggest a tendency to unify the two social groups: the middle class has become impoverished in recent years, while the poorer classes appear to be less conservative than before, or compared to what is usually thought” , observes Ali Fathollah-Nejad.

Repression and voices of dissent
Could the alliance between the classes cause the regime to falter? In his speech to the UN General Assembly in New York, the Iranian president did not mention the ongoing demonstrations, although they have been relaunched by all the major international media. At the center of his trip were the nuclear dossier and the lifting of the international sanctions linked to it, while the negotiations in Vienna are once again at a standstill after the Iranian requests deemed unacceptable by the Americans. Several analysts had predicted that the crackdown would accelerate after the head of state’s return to Tehran on 23 September. After the girl’s death and the first demonstrations, the internet was partially suspended and then restored in various areas of the country. The specialized site NetBlocks talks about the largest internet outage since the mass protests of 2019. At the time, a week of digital blackout resulted in more than 300 deaths among the demonstrators according to estimates by Amnesty international.

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Despite its well-established security apparatus, the Tehran regime seems to be showing some anxiety in asserting its political-religious authority, while rumors circulate about the deterioration of the health conditions of the 83-year-old Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. The question of his succession is on everyone’s lips and could help redefine the future orientation of the Islamic Republic.

The presidential elections of 2021 had already brought to light the internal dissensions in the circles of power of the conservative elite, so much so that a part of this, considered too moderate, had been cut off from the supreme leadership to the advantage of Ebrahim Raisi. Some institutional voices have dared to rise up to criticize the religious police, strengthened by the president after his rise to office and considered by many to be responsible for the death of Mahsa Amini. Some parliamentarians have in fact called for a reform of the methods applied, or even the suppression of this unity of the police forces. Ayatollah Asadollah Bayat Zanjani, an important religious figure opposed to the velayat-e faqih regime, defined “illegal, irrational and illegitimate … the set of behaviors and events that caused this unfortunate and deplorable accident”.

(Translation by Francesco De Lellis)

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