Victory to the Iranian rebels

‘You never know when it’s going to explode’, CLR James once said of revolution. How true those words ring in Iran today, where outrage over the death of 22-year-old Kurdish woman Mahsa Amini, reportedly at the hands of the morality police, has fuelled a nationwide uprising against the Islamic regime.

Women – and the misogynistic impositions the state places on them – have been at the forefront. (Amini was detained in Tehran for not wearing her hijab properly.) For three weeks now, women have been taking to the streets, burning their hijabs and cutting their hair in defiance of Islamist diktat.

Protests have sprung up across the country, from Iranian Kurdistan to Tehran to religiously conservative cities like Qom, bridging ethnic and class divides. ‘Woman, life, freedom’, a slogan stemming from Kurdish liberation movements, has become their rallying cry. In one video from the capital, protesters can even be seen chanting it in Kurdish, rather than Farsi.

These women have found common cause with young men who feel Iran’s leaders have trashed the economy and left them with no future. Together, they have fought pitched battles against the security forces on the streets and on university campuses. Schoolgirls have even joined the struggle. In one video, a group of girls can be seen heckling a member of Iran’s feared paramilitary Basij force, who was invited to their school to address them. Celebrities, artists and footballers have also found their own subtle ways of expressing their support.

Now the Iranian rebels are demanding nothing short of the overthrow of the brutal theocracy that has ruled Iran since the 1979 Islamic Revolution. ‘Death to the dictator’ is the other unofficial slogan of this revolt. Protesters have ripped down portraits of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, founder of the republic, and his successor, the ageing despot, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

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