Iranian Protests of 2019: Repressed But Not Broken
Too Much to Bear
Major changes in society don’t happen in a vacuum, especially something as significant as countrywide protests. The current unrest in Iran, ongoing since November 15, is a culmination of years of civil discontent. In the last two years, right after Donald Trump applied sanctions to Iran, life became harder for Iranian citizens: the Iranian rial began a long decline in value, prices started to climb, and food and medicine shortages hit the country hard.
With each passing day, people lost confidence in the state that was supposed to guarantee them a stable life. Although the sanctions were certainly a huge contributor to the protests, accusations of corruption and misuse of power were repeatedly leveled against the Iranian government and Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. The straw that broke the camel’s back came when the government announced a shocking hike in fuel prices — 50–300%.
Violence erupted on the streets of Iran the evening of the announcement and hasn’t stopped since. Prominent media outlets have already reported more than a 1,000 casualties and numerous human rights violations by the government. This highlights the Iranian protests as one of the most dangerous and heated in a year marked by global unrest. An event this significant deserves a deeper look.
A Country On Fire
Initially, protesters gathered in peaceful groups to voice their concerns, amassing people all over Iran. That brief moment of civility didn’t last long, though, as the protests quickly got ugly. Security forces in Sirjan reportedly shot down a protester, sparking anger among his compatriots: people disrupted traffic, set fire to gas stations and banks, and quickly expanded their ranks with new participants, outraged at the unlawful killing.
The Iranian government clearly realized the scope of the problem and tried to curb it in the worst way possible — by shutting down Internet access across the country on November 16, just one day after the fateful price hike. Connectivity across the nation fell to a miniscule 5%. This week-long blackout evidently did more bad than good: startups lost business, people couldn’t contact their family members abroad, services that relied on the Internet took a major loss. The weeklong shutdown is already estimated to have caused anywhere between $1 and $1.5 billion of damage to the Iranian economy. More than that, the conspicuous blackout got the protests more attention than any societal disruption ever could.
The narrative turned quickly. The Iranian protests had initially come off like an inverse of the Hong Kong ones, the latter largely peaceful, well-coordinated, structured with reasonable demands while the former immediately appeared dangerously violent, disorganized, and reactionary rather than constructive. Where Hong Kong had reports of citizens organizing their protests via Telegram and, in cases of blackouts, decentralized messengers like Briar, Iranian protests seemed more spur-of-the-moment, volatile. But this attempt by the state to silence dissent and hide the events on the streets of Iran was more than enough for everyone to realize that the other side wasn’t squeaky clean either.
During this week-long shutdown, over 1,000 people were arrested, including minors, and Amnesty International reported 143 people killed at the outset of the blackout. The Iranian authorities disputed that number but it’s difficult to trust them when they’ve been accused of stealing dead protesters’ bodies and with other reports corroborating the shocking death toll, including at least 18 children.
As if gunning down protesters in the streets and covering up the death toll wasn’t bad enough, reports have surfaced of the state threatening protesters’ families. They were told to reject all contact with the press and forbidden from holding funerals for their fallen loved ones. The state clearly feels it’s in a position of power as evidenced by the leader of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps — Hossein Salami — openly calling for a ‘death penalty’ on the protesting citizens.
While the death toll of 1,000–1,500 is mortifying, the situation isn’t much better for those detained in the protests. Local prisons are overflowing with prisoners as young as 15, many of them subjected to torture. In spite of the clear danger, Iranian citizens aren’t backing down. Students are gathering en masse to protest the killings, the unrest still raging on with little hope of a reasonable response from the state.
In and Out of the Blackout
The full-scale blackout lasted from November 16 to November 23, more than enough time to see many protesters shot down and do lasting damage to many businesses. But the restoration of internet access brought more than relief, it also posited questions. What prompted the government to give people back the internet?
During the blackout, U.S.-based experts did their best to restore it, to no avail. It seemed like the Iranian government had a rather firm chokehold on the internet access in the country. Amir Rashidi, an internet security researcher at the New York-based Center for Human Rights in Iran, has stated that the end of the blackout did not come about because of external pressure:
“No external pressure, really. Some countries criticize, but if you look in the past, the pressure today is not comparable. In 2009, everywhere around the world, they were condemning Iran. If you look at 2018, the US wanted to take the case to the Security Council. But by comparison, in 2019 it was nothing.”
This certainly tracks, as the world at large is captivated with the current protests in Hong Kong, giving limited time to the injustices taking place elsewhere. Perhaps the blackout ended because it wasn’t airtight and videos of the protests and killings were leaking onto Twitter, Reddit, and other popular social sites. Per Mr. Rashidi:
“Generally the Iranian government is very sensitive to how people [online and in the news] talk about Iran.”
The blackout was meant to keep the image untarnished and it failed to do so.
But it is too early to celebrate as the Supreme National Security Council is already trying for damage control. They’ve officially announced the arrests of 8 people claiming they’re tied to the CIA and were the main ones who sent out videos. This is a clear attempt to control the narrative and scare people away from leaking any more information.
Rashidi has also stated:
“I heard from one of my sources in Iran that there was a meeting at the Ministry of the Interior on Monday, briefing that another shutdown would happen, and to be ready to be on Twitter to control the narrative.”
His source was absolutely correct as mobile internet access is, indeed, being cut again in the country. It’s just another round in the brutal suppression of dissenting opinions in Iran and it’s likely not the last.
With no end in sight and the death toll rising steadily, the protests in Iran are likely to become 2019’s bloodiest example of an oppressive regime fighting its own people. One can only hope that the brave and resilient citizens of the country continue to stand for their freedom and justice.
In Conclusion
Ever since the internet became widespread around the globe, we have all become privy to more and more information that would have escaped us otherwise. This has lead to greater public awareness of issues such as the Hong Kong fight for independence, the military coup in Bolivia, the protests in Lebanon and Oman. Messaging apps and social media accounts often served as key sources of information on crimes committed by governments in these cases. So the Iranian government shutting down internet access for the whole country while it continued to kill protesting citizens is all the more cruel. While the death toll is currently estimated at around 1,000 people, many more are being oppressed in the country and the blackout gave the state a chance to sweep the tragedies under a rug.
The fight continues for the brave Iranian people but it’s going to be harder than it is for many other protesters around the globe. Cutting off their access to the world wide web means not only stealing their voices but taking away their ability to witness the outpouring of support for the cause. Walled away from the world with their core means of communication compromised, the Iranian citizens continue to fight. Whether or not you agree with their cause or methods, it’s important that you pay attention to these events. Not only will they influence the shape of partisan resistance in the Middle East, they will also show ways of organizing communication sans internet in our highly connected world.
These protests are not a model example of citizen resistance: they are quite violent on the protesters’ side as well and have not been too successful so far. But every battle for freedom and an honest government matters and it’s important to know the facts, no matter how hard the Iranian government tries to muddy the waters.
