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Iranians Protest Against Islamic Rulers (Worthy News Focus)

By Stefan J. Bos, Chief International Correspondent Worthy News

PARIS/TEHRAN (Worthy News) – Spontaneous protests broke out in Iran with people shouting “Death to the Dictator,” “Death to [Supreme Leader] Khamenei the Murderer,” and “Death to the Islamic Republic” around the 46th anniversary of the 1979 Islamic Revolution, according to videos shared Sunday and reviewed by Worthy News.

Witnesses said that citizens loudly expressed their disapproval, including from balconies in western Tehran, the capital, and other cities such as Arak in central Iran and Kermanshah in the west, as authorities celebrated the Revolution with fireworks.

The videos, shared by broadcaster Iran International, came after thousands of Iranians from across Europe rallied in Paris to urge world leaders to pressure the Islamic republic’s ruling clerics.

Saturday’s protest in the French capital came as Iran’s opposition abroad has been emboldened by the fall in late 2024 of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

“Instead of appeasing the mullahs, (the international community) should stand side by side with the Iranian people,” Maryam Rajavi, president of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), told the rally.

The NCRI is the political wing of the People’s Mujahedin of Iran, which Tehran regards as a “terrorist” group.

“As Syria did with Bashar al-Assad, the Iranian people will free themselves of the mullahs, and it will be in 2025,” added Belgium’s former prime minister Guy Verhofstadt.

COMPLACENCY CHANGE

“The strategy of complacency has to change,” he argued, adding: “I don’t think it’s going to happen that way with the US administration this time.”

“The Iranian regime will fall like the Syrian regime fell, at a speed that no one would have predicted,” former Syrian rebel leader Riad al-Asaad told the crowd by video link.

Several speakers at Saturday’s rally voiced hopes that US President Donald J. Trump’s promise to exert “maximum pressure” against Tehran would help their cause.

Trump has in the past lashed out at Tehran’s nuclear program but has also expressed a desire to reach a peace deal with Iran.

Police put the turnout at the Paris demonstration at around 6,000.

It came as Iran is still reeling from a crackdown on nationwide anti-government protests in which more than 500 people were reportedly killed.

The rallies began two years ago in the aftermath of the death of young Kurdish woman Mahsa Amini, who passed away in police custody after being detained for not wearing the Islamic head coverings, the hijab, “properly.”

VIRAL VIDEO

Earlier in November last year, a video went viral on social media capturing the moment the woman, named Ahoo Daryaei, undressed on a university campus before being forcibly detained.

After international pressure, the Iranian judiciary said the woman had been treated in hospital and returned to her family later in November.

Her detention drew international condemnation, with advocacy group Amnesty International among those calling for her immediate and unconditional release.

“Considering that she was sent to the hospital, and it was found that she was ill, she was handed over to her family… and no judicial case has been filed against her,” judiciary spokesman Asghar Jahangir told media.

A student movement organization first published the video of the arrest, reporting that Daryaei had an altercation with security agents over not wearing a headscarf, leading to her undressing during the scuffle.

Iranian authorities at the time said she was “sick” and had been taken to a psychiatric ward.

It is not the first time Iranian authorities have branded a woman protesting compulsory hijab laws with a mental illness.

Following Daryaei’s arrest, Iranian activists on social media condemned what they said was a pattern of diagnosing women’s rights activists.

WOMAN PRESSURED

One woman who fled Iran for Canada in 2018 said the Iranian regime had pressured her family to declare her mentally ill.

“My family didn’t do it, but many families under pressure do, thinking it’s the best way to protect their loved ones,” Azam Jangravi told Britain’s broadcaster BBC. “This is how the Islamic Republic tries to discredit women, by questioning their mental health,” she said, after being sentenced to three years in prison for removing her headscarf during a protest.

It became mandatory for women in Iran to cover their hair and dress modestly following the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

On Friday, the Islamic Republic’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said he would continue his hardline policies and warned against negotiations with the United States.

“You should not negotiate with such a government; it is unwise, it is not intelligent, and it is not honorable to negotiate,” Khamenei told a meeting of the military top brass.

In Paris, Rajavi told the rally that the Iranian government’s “cascade of failures” had “pitted the regime’s internal factions against each other over the question of whether or not to negotiate with the United States.”