Iran Ramps up Crackdown as Regional Tensions Rage

Iranians walk past shops in the capital Tehran on April 21, 2024. (Photo by ATTA KENARE / AFP)
Iranians walk past shops in the capital Tehran on April 21, 2024. (Photo by ATTA KENARE / AFP)
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Iran Ramps up Crackdown as Regional Tensions Rage

Iranians walk past shops in the capital Tehran on April 21, 2024. (Photo by ATTA KENARE / AFP)
Iranians walk past shops in the capital Tehran on April 21, 2024. (Photo by ATTA KENARE / AFP)

Executions of convicts, arrests of dissidents and a resurgence in patrols enforcing the obligatory wearing of hijabs: Iran is stepping up repression at home as tensions flare with its arch-foe Israel, activists say.

Iranians have endured increased repression since nationwide protests were sparked from September 2022 by the death in custody of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, who was arrested for allegedly flouting the mandatory dress rules for women.

But the crackdown has entered a new phase as fears of a regional conflict surge, with Israel launching an apparent strike on Iran on Friday, Agence France Presse reported.

Activists have reported that the dreaded white vans of the "morality police" have returned to city squares across Iran, picking up women deemed to have violated the rule of obligatory hijab.

Tehran police chief Abbas Ali Mohammadian openly announced the latest crackdown on April 13, with local media saying it was codenamed "Nour" ("light" in Persian).

Multiple videos posted on social media -- under the hashtag "jang aliyeh zanan" ("war against women") -- have shown women being bundled into vans by male police in body armor accompanied by female police agents.

Iran “has turned the streets into a battlefield against women and youth," 2023 Nobel Peace Prize laureate and jailed rights activist Narges Mohammadi wrote in a message from Tehran's Evin prison and published by her supporters on social media.

In one video filmed close to the Tajrish metro station in northern Tehran, a woman collapses on the ground after being apprehended by the police, telling bystanders who then seek to revive her that her phone was confiscated.

Another includes what appears to be the sound of police using electric shock against women who had been rounded up and put into a van, AFP said.

"Amid increasing dissent at home and international attention focused on regional tensions, the Islamic republic is grabbing the opportunity to intensify its campaign of repression against dissent," said the director of the New York-based Center for Human Rights in Iran, Hadi Ghaemi.

"Without a firm international response, the Islamic Republic will be emboldened to intensify its violence against women and its egregious violations of human rights," said Ghaemi.

Hundreds were killed, according to rights groups, and thousands arrested, according to the United Nations, in the crackdown on the 2022 protests that represented one of the biggest challenges to the Islamic republic.

Among those arrested in recent days was Aida Shahkarami, the sister of Nika Shahkarami, 16, who died during the 2022 crackdown, her mother Nasrin wrote on social media.

Aida was detained "for not wearing the mandatory hijab," Nasrin Shahkarami wrote on social media.

Nika Shahkarami was found dead during the protests, with some family members accusing the security forces of killing her.

Dina Ghalibaf, a journalist and student at Tehran's Shahid Beheshti University, was arrested after accusing security forces on social media of putting her in handcuffs and sexually assaulting her during a previous arrest at a metro station, according to the Norway-based Hengaw rights group.

Executions, which activists say are used by Tehran as a means to instil fear into society, have also continued apace, with at least 110 people executed this year alone according to the Norway-based Iran Human Rights (IHR) group.

Among those executed in recent days were a married couple, Esmail Hassaniani, 29, and his wife Marjan Hajizadeh, 19, who were sentenced to death for drug-related charges in a joint case and hanged in Zanjan central prison on 11 April, according to IHR.

"The regime will without any doubt use this opportunity to tighten the grip inside the country," said IHR director Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam.

"They still haven't managed to take the control that they had before September 2022. They may have the opportunity to do so now, if all the international attention goes to the escalating tension with Israel."



Netanyahu Says he Believes Trump Can Help Seal Ceasefire Deal

FILE PHOTO: Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gives a statement in the central city of Rehovot, Israel June 20, 2025. JACK GUEZ/Pool via REUTERS/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gives a statement in the central city of Rehovot, Israel June 20, 2025. JACK GUEZ/Pool via REUTERS/File Photo
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Netanyahu Says he Believes Trump Can Help Seal Ceasefire Deal

FILE PHOTO: Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gives a statement in the central city of Rehovot, Israel June 20, 2025. JACK GUEZ/Pool via REUTERS/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gives a statement in the central city of Rehovot, Israel June 20, 2025. JACK GUEZ/Pool via REUTERS/File Photo

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he believed his discussions with US President Donald Trump on Monday would help advance talks on a Gaza hostage release and ceasefire deal that Israeli negotiators resumed in Qatar on Sunday.

Israeli negotiators taking part in the ceasefire talks have clear instructions to achieve a ceasefire agreement under conditions that Israel has accepted, Netanyahu said on Sunday before boarding his flight to Washington.

"I believe the discussion with President Trump can certainly help advance these results," he said, adding that he was determined to ensure the return of hostages held in Gaza and to remove the threat of Hamas to Israel.

It will be Netanyahu's third visit to the White House since Trump returned to power nearly six months ago.

Public pressure is mounting on Netanyahu to secure a permanent ceasefire and end the war in Gaza, a move opposed by some hardline members of his right-wing coalition. Others, including Foreign Minister Gideon Saar, have expressed support.

Palestinian group Hamas said on Friday it had responded to a US-backed Gaza ceasefire proposal in a "positive spirit", a few days after Trump said Israel had agreed "to the necessary conditions to finalize" a 60-day truce.

But in a sign of the potential challenges still facing the two sides, a Palestinian official from a militant group allied with Hamas said concerns remained over humanitarian aid, passage through the Rafah crossing in southern Israel to Egypt and clarity over a timetable for Israeli troop withdrawals.

Netanyahu's office said in a statement that changes sought by Hamas to the ceasefire proposal were "not acceptable to Israel". However, his office said the delegation would still fly to Qatar to "continue efforts to secure the return of our hostages based on the Qatari proposal that Israel agreed to".

Netanyahu has repeatedly said Hamas must be disarmed, a demand the militant group has so far refused to discuss.

Netanyahu said he believed he and Trump would also build on the outcome of the 12-day air war with Iran last month and seek to further ensure that Tehran never has a nuclear weapon. He said recent Middle East developments had created an opportunity to widen the circle of peace.

On Saturday evening, crowds gathered at a public square in Tel Aviv near the defense ministry headquarters to call for a ceasefire deal and the return of around 50 hostages still held in Gaza. The demonstrators waved Israeli flags, chanted and carried posters with photos of the hostages.

The latest bloodshed in the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict was triggered on October 7, 2023, when Hamas attacked southern Israel, killing around 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.

Gaza's health ministry says Israel's retaliatory military assault on the enclave has killed over 57,000 Palestinians. It has also caused a hunger crisis, displaced the population, mostly within Gaza, and left the territory in ruins.

Around 20 of the remaining hostages are believed to be still alive. A majority of the original hostages have been freed through diplomatic negotiations, though the Israeli military has also recovered some.