Iran To Crack Down On Mahsa Amini Protests?

Depending on how one reads the tea leaves, Iranian authorities are either running scared or are getting angry over the ongoing—and escalating—protests over the death in police custody of Mahsa Amini, who was detained for wearing her hijab “improperly”.

Yesterday, the head of the Revolutionary Guards, Hossein Salami, “informed” protesters that yesterday would be the “last day” of protests.

The commander of Iran's powerful Revolutionary Guards, Hossein Salami, warned protesters that Saturday would be their last day of taking to the streets.

"Do not come to the streets! Today is the last day of the riots," he said.

Iran has been gripped by protests since the death of 22-year-old Kurdish woman Mahsa Amini in the custody of the morality police last month.

While there is a certain bravado to Salami’s words, the reality of the protests has been that Iran’s security forces have been unable to quell the protests thus far.

Security forces have struggled to contain the protests, which started with women taking to the streets and burning their hijab headscarves and have evolved into a broader campaign to end the Islamic republic founded in 1979.

Students protested on Saturday, the start of the working week in Iran, at campuses in Tehran, Kerman in the country’s south, and the western city of Kermanshah, among others, online videos showed.

“Shameless, shameless,” students shouted as they clashed with security personnel at a university in Ahvaz, southwest Iran, in footage published by the 1500tasvir social media channel.

Even using live ammunition and killing protesters has not served to dissuade Iranians from taking to the streets to voice opposition not just to the morality police, but to the entirety of the theocratic Islamic Republic regime in Tehran.

The massacre at the Shah Cheragh mausoleum came on the same day that thousands paid tribute to Amini across Iran, 40 days after her death in police custody.

Ultraconservative President Ebrahim Raisi appeared on Thursday to link the shrine attack, one of the country’s deadliest in years, to what his government calls “riots” sparked by Amini’s death.

Commemorations were also held Saturday for protesters killed in a what Amnesty International has labelled an “unrelenting brutal crackdown”.

“Death to the dictator,” mourners chanted at a ceremony to mark 40 days since the slaying of a protester in the western city of Divandarreh, using a slogan aimed at supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

As I have noted previously, the immediate impact of the Iranian government’s willingness to use lethal force has been to create a new host of martyrs to the protest movement, and thus giving people ever more reason to gather and protest against the regime.

Iran Is Creating More Symbols For Opposition By Firing On Mahsa Amini Protests

While one should never underestimate the capacity of the Islamic Republic for repressive brutality, one still has to wonder what more can the Revolutionary Guards or any other part of the regime’s security apparatus can do that has not already been done, without apparent success.

Salami’s edict to the Iranian people to cease protesting sounds very much like a “red line” being drawn. If the Iranian people cross that line and the regime fails to respond effectively, we might be looking at the moment when critical mass has been achieved by the protesters, after which regime change becomes an inevitability.

Much hinges on what happens in Iran over the next few days.