Demonstrations in Iran: “the repressive machine of power is well run”

Deadly repression, counter-demonstrations, disruption of the Internet… The Iranian government is trying by all means to put an end to the demonstrations which have spread in the country since September 16, after the death of a young woman arrested by the police mores. A strategy that has already proven itself during the last major popular mobilizations. As in 2009, in the face of the “green” movement against electoral fraud, or during the gigantic anti-government demonstrations of 2017 and 2019, against a backdrop of socio-economic frustrations and protests against rising prices, the Iranian authorities seem determined to kill in the bud any protest that calls it into question. Faced with a new wave of protest since September 16, the date of the death of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old young woman arrested three days earlier in Tehran for “wearing inappropriate clothes “, the authorities have once again opted for a murderous repressive strategy. At least 76 dead in the demonstrations An official report including demonstrators and police reports 41 dead in ten days of protests. But this assessment could be heavier: the NGO Iran Human Rights (IHR), based in Oslo, counted at least 76 deaths in the demonstrations in 14 provinces of the country. Claiming to have obtained “videos and death certificates confirming the firing of live ammunition on demonstrators”, the NGO specifies that “six women and four children” are among the dead. On Sunday, the head of the judiciary, Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejeï , threatened to show “no leniency” towards the demonstrators and called on the police to act “firmly” against “those who undermine security”. In addition to the human toll, Tehran announced the arrest of 1,200 demonstrators, including women, throughout the territory. Meanwhile, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) said Iranian authorities have arrested 18 journalists since the protests began. “The country has already been the scene of several protest movements which have all been repressed in unprecedented violence, recalls Iranian activist Sussan Tahmasebi, director of Femena, an organization for the defense of women’s rights in the Middle East and West Asia. With the current mobilization and unrest, it is expected to see with [le président ultraconservateur] Ebrahim Raisi, an outburst of violence that will be much worse than the one that had already shocked the Iranians in 2017 and 2019, who did not expect such levels of violence during the mandate of the [président modéré] Hassan Rohani”. According to Amnesty International, 304 men, women and children were killed by Iranian security forces during the 2019 protests. But the NGO believes that the real number of deaths is higher. The Bassidjis, spearhead of repression”During the last major waves of protest, the Iranian regime succeeded each time in overcoming mobilization thanks in particular to a well-honed repressive machine and a strategy that was exported to Iraq, to ​​put an end to the uprising of 2019, analyzes Fereydoun Khavand, academic and journalist, specialist in Iran. It is in this sense that the forces of repression have been put in place, and this, in particular to put down the demonstrations”. This Iranian repressive strategy, rests on several pillars, continues Fereydoun Khavand, including the Bassidjis, the Islamist militias of regime which had played a capital role in the repression of 2009, or even on the Pasdarans, an elite corps of the army, which can also be engaged, in uniform or in civilian clothes.>>Also read: “In Iran, women no longer allow themselves to be taken “in the face of growing repression by the morality police”. , who are called upon to act in particular circumstances, in particular when the power feels in danger, underlines Fereydoun Khavand. They are the ones who organize the counter-demonstrations or who launch outright assaults on the demonstrators in an often brutal and ferocious way as can be seen in the videos circulating on social networks”. Many videos published in recent days on networks by Iranians show women burning their veils, demonstrators tearing up effigies of the leaders of the Islamic Republic, but also security forces firing on the crowd. A conspiratorial discourse to mobilize its militant base According to Fereydoun Khavand, the regime can also count on its own social base by playing on the revolutionary fiber.At the call of the authorities, demonstrations have taken place in recent days in several Iranian cities, including Tehran, in favor of the government and the Islamic veil, more than ever questioned after the death of Mahsa Amini.” This base is certainly no longer as important as at the beginning of the 1979 revolution, but s it remains a traditionalist force very attached to the religious values ​​of the Islamic Republic, explains the specialist in international relations. In order to mobilize it, the regime uses a particular language that speaks to this base hostile to any change. , the sworn enemy of Tehran, or by accusing the protesters of collaborators and traitors.”The attempts of the United States to violate the sovereignty of Iran on the question of the demonstrations sparked by the death of a woman in police custody view will not go unanswered,” the Iranian Foreign Ministry said on Monday. its traditional defendants, the United States and Israel, to which must now be added neighboring Arab countries such as Saudi Arabia and the millions of Iranians based abroad who are also accused of expensive constantly seeking to overthrow the Islamic Republic”, deciphers Fereydoun Khavand. “This type of conspiratorial discourse, he continues, is mainly intended to mobilize the military force and the social base of the regime, by victimizing itself in this way, by explaining that the difficulties encountered by the Islamic Republic are the result of a conspiracy that has always existed against Islam and Shiism”. the country from the rest of the world, by imposing drastic restrictions on an Internet already under high surveillance.”By decision of the authorities, it is no longer possible to access Instagram in Iran since yesterday evening (Wednesday) and access to WhatsApp is also disrupted,” the Fars news agency reported on September 22. She even specified that the measure was taken because of “the actions carried out by counter-revolutionaries against national security via these social networks”…”The disruption of the Internet created a climate of fear because we know that leaves a free hand for security officials to commit violence behind closed doors,” says Sussan Tahmasebi. In 2019, a similar restriction had already been imposed on the Internet to block Internet users from sharing videos of the unrest. “By attacking the Internet, the interest of the regime is twofold since it is a question of preventing not only that the Iranians alert the rest of the world in real time of the situation in the country, but also that information does not reach Iranians since several very influential media in Iran, such as Radio Farda, whose headquarters are in Prague, or Iran International, the most watched channel in Iran, are broadcast from abroad via the Internet”, i Says Fereydoun Khavand. Starlink will ask for an exemption to Iranian sanctions in this regard— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) September 19, 2022 In response, Washington announced on September 23 the lifting of certain trade bans with Iran, in order to allow technology companies to provide platforms and services enabling Iranians to access the internet. A few days earlier, the owner of SpaceX, Elon Musk, declared that he intended to request an exemption from the sanctions against Iran from the American administration in order to offer internet connection services there via his constellation of satellites. Starlink. “How long could he hold on like this?” So far, the ultra-repressive strategy of the Iranian authorities has allowed him to hold out against the great waves of spontaneous demonstrations of anger, even if the latter are becoming more and more “I doubt that this mobilization can create a real change, because unfortunately the authorities have never taken into account the demands of their citizens, whatever the way in which these are expressed, especially those of women, they have only very rarely backed down on any kind of law, points out Sussan Tahmasebi. Usually, when there are protests, they refuse to do so because they see it as a sign of weakness, when in fact it would be a sign of a government that listens to its own people.” Khavand, who recalls that it is the fruit of an Islamic revolution accompanied by slogans promising justice, prosperity and democracy after the fall of the Shah of Iran. “Today the Iranians can only see that the current regime commits unjustifiable atrocities at each popular protest, that corruption is as widespread as under the Pahlavi monarchy and that inequalities and social discrimination remain glaring, he concludes. However, the great waves of demonstrations are certainly always repressed, but each of them has contributed to significantly weakening the power and the Shiite clergy, who benefited from a solid base and the support of part of the population. when could he last like this?”