Here is another reaction I managed to obtain, directly from Tehran, in reply to questions I forwarded a few days ago:
Thank you for asking these questions. Please note that I can’t be very reactive under the current circumstances, but I will try to say what I think a dedicated journalist could use, or concerned citizens should know.
Also while I know it matters to know the identity of a correspondent, I cannot be identified for obvious reasons. I may be confronted with charges such as “conspiracy” or “plotting with enemy elements” or similar things, the punishment for which would be televised confessions and many years of imprisonment, and even more. Please understand that I am on a “need to know basis”. Also, I'm not a political activist, I don't represent anybody, I never was elected to anything, and I only express myself as a citizen.
1) About the reasons we take to the streets.
A great majority of the people is sick and tired of this government. If you look at the history of protests and the elections that have happened throughout the past few decades, you will see that we have shifted from a general yearning for “reform” to flat out toppling the system. I am no different. I'm sick and tired. And I can see no hope, anywhere, other than by overthrowing this regime. Whatever it takes.
To make a short list, tho...
- The oppression of social and political freedoms,
- The deep and ever expanding amount of corruption, with astronomical numbers that would humble any giant money embezzlement occasion in the history of humanity
- The hypocritical lifestyle of the elite - almost all of the powerful people in this government, the family and children of whom are often found in the richest areas of the western world, enjoying anything “the free world” has to offer,
- all this and more, combined with years of unpredictable sanction-riddled economy that has become back breaking even for the higher middle class these days, the heavy handed crackdowns, judiciary sentences of years of imprisonment, death sentences, and idiotic or outrageous comments about anything, ranging from average facts of life to bold "scientific achievements" (like the invention of a device that detects the COVID-19 virus from a 100 meters distance),
I don’t know! I could go on all night.
This last trigger, Mahsa's death... this was the straw that broke the camel’s back. A reminder of the death of Neda, of course, but this time it did not even happen during a protest (albeit peaceful), but literally for a few strands of hair.
I watched my whole country burst into tears, once more, when the news about this poor girl's death broke.
People are fed up and furious. I am fed up and furious.
2) About what is happening exactly, in the streets (what do the protesters do, what reactions are they met with)
Nobody knows exactly, really. We can only see what we are confronted with in our own bubbles. Now that Whatsapp and Telegram and every other means of circulating information have been restricted, we know even less. We are being detained inside an information bubble. Not completely sealed from the outside, of course (thanks to some VPN or TOR that still works – works sometimes tho, and needs skills and better equipment and knowledge than most people have) but disconnected, severed like a limb.
The info still finds its way through the black out. Word gets spread that the rendez-vous is at 5 pm, at a nearby crossing or a square.
We put our phones in airplane mode so they can’t be located in the system, and when we get there, gradually a crowd is formed. One or two of us might stand and shout a slogan, like “Death to the dictator!” and then the crowd explodes.
Troops are being moved across the city in packs, to extinguish one burst after another. They are able to zoom around, bypassing traffic, using “special lanes” and “bus lanes”. They arrive with various kinds of equipment and it’s usually a great deal of tear gas and pellet guns – with steel pellets. And sometimes direct gunshots are used. Not all troops are allowed to carry real guns. Electric shockers and water cannons etc. are available too. Unlike the previous time, I haven't seen (or heard of) snipers being used yet..
Normally those who are captured will disappear for at least two or three days before any news transpire. They will be heavily sentenced later. Even executed, like Navid Afkari was.
Protesters all know that we are up against torture and deaths sentences. It is astonishing how some perform in the face of these dangers.
Cars keep honking their horns for hours and hours everyday, and try to create traffic. But the troops are normally free from traffic because they have their separate lanes. These “special lanes” were mostly created after the 2009 protests.
3) about the situation with internet /phone access
In short, the situation is terrible!
There is hardly anything left in terms of access to communication. Normal phone calls can still be made. Emails still work. But neither are "safe" in terms of confidentiality.
The rest, it’s not really possible anymore. They keep changing the way the system is set up. If you figure out a way to get your TOR browser to work for example, it may last ten minutes, or a day, and then it’s back to experimenting again. Some very efficient VPNs are rendered completely useless.
My Instagram has been showing the same things from three days ago until now. I have no idea if I can even send an email in a few days. Nothing is predictable.
Satellite TV is available, but the satellite TV users are confronted with random and rotating parasite noise.
4) about how the situation is evolving in the past few days/hours
I don’t know what may compare to these days in our lives here in Iran. The Islamic Republic is ready to murder its own citizens on the streets; just to prove that they "didn’t kill Mahsa”. That is exactly how ridiculous and outrageous it has become.
They will stop at nothing to muffle out these protests. They are going to use every available power they have.
And if they succeed, when they are done, they will take revenge. The consequences of defeat will be enormous.
Those who know this, and have the courage, fight with great conviction and intent. This confrontation is very different from any previous one. Women are literally dying on pavements just to preserve a right to their own human integrity, just so they don’t have to be lethally punched in the back of the head, because maybe a headscarf slipped and fell on their shoulders for a moment.
The physical confrontations are very violent, very vast, scattered, and the regime has tapped into very young men, maybe even 16-17 year olds from high schools to fill in their scary looking combat uniforms.
These kids are subject to abuse themselves, by their superiors. What has happened on the streets can be seen on many videos and photographs. We hope they get spread widely across the world.
The protesters are of very diverse ages and types. And the slogans have become almost entirely very terminal: “This is the last message. The Regime is the target now!” is being shouted. From what I have witnessed, a lot less is heard about Royalist sentiments.
The other main and very leading slogan is “Woman – Life – Freedom”.
The average amount of time any of these group outbursts can be held is no more than 15 minutes before the troops arrive and tear gas is fired.
When I talk to almost anybody these days, they burst into tears. There is hardly anything else one could think about. Especially with the Internet being damped so much and even completely cut for hours, not much work could be done.
I’d describe the mood with “frustration” - An amount of frustration that you cannot imagine - People are fed up, angry, tired, wounded, and stranded. And we feel that we may very well end up being massacred, under a curtain of darkness and silence.
Iranian lives matter...
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