The demonstrations sweeping Iran have entered their third week, marking one of the broadest waves of protest in the history of the Islamic Republic. Millions have taken to the streets despite repression and the use of live ammunition against them, demanding “freedom and the overthrow of the regime” in more than 185 cities across all provinces. Iranian activists view this movement as having opened the widest door yet for change.
As the popular uprising continues and expands to include social groups and cities with no prior history of protest, despite the authorities’ use of live fire to disperse demonstrators and the complete shutdown of communications, US President Donald Trump said that the United States is “ready to help.” At the same time, the late shah’s son, Reza Pahlavi, renewed his call to continue protesting until control of city centers is achieved. In response, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei said the country would show no leniency toward “saboteurs” working for foreign entities and tasked the Revolutionary Guard with taking charge of the situation.
The protests, which began at the end of 2025 in Tehran’s main bazaars, led in particular by traders protesting the economic situation and the collapse of the Iranian currency, quickly transformed within days into a broad and comprehensive movement encompassing all segments of society. Unprecedented groups joined the demonstrations, including in cities long known for their loyalty to the regime.
The protests have crossed major social, geographic, and symbolic thresholds, reaching regime strongholds and the wealthiest urban neighborhoods, and spreading to universities and traditional commercial centers. This expansion has occurred despite demonstrators facing all forms of repression, including live ammunition, according to human rights organizations, leading to the killing and injury of hundreds and the arrest of thousands.
Ali Seddighi, a Kurdish activist from the city of Ilam, says: “We are now standing at a decisive crossroads. So far, the security forces have been unable to stop the demonstrations and sit-ins that have spread to the country’s major cities, but we do not know how long they can continue under such repression.”
Speaking by phone from Ilam, he adds: “We will know within days. The fate of this wave may be determined by the regime’s response and the stance of influential external actors. Nothing can be stated with certainty.”
The protests, which began in Tehran’s Grand Bazaar on December 28, 2025, with economic demands driven by worsening living conditions, quickly spread to the streets and universities. Within days, scattered gatherings turned into large demonstrations, and economic demands evolved into political and structural ones.
The authorities responded to the new protest movement, active in the evenings, alongside widespread morning strikes and the closure of shops across the country, with mass arrest campaigns, restrictions on communications, repeated shutdowns of the internet and phone lines, and even threats against protesters with serious charges carrying penalties up to the death sentence.
The Supreme Leader and Trump
As the momentum of demonstrations and sit-ins intensified on Thursday, January 8, reaching the point where entire cities slipped out of the regime’s control for hours during the evening and night, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei said in a speech on Friday that the Islamic Republic would not retreat. He accused foreign-backed forces of fueling the unrest and warned that Donald Trump “will be brought down.”
Khamenei said: “There are some agitators who seek to please the US president by destroying public property. The unified Iranian people will defeat all enemies. I urgently call on Trump to focus on his own country’s problems.”
In the speech broadcast on state television, the Supreme Leader stressed that Iran would show no leniency toward those he described as “saboteurs” and “rioters” working for foreign entities, who, he said, “engaged in vandalism solely to please Trump.” He emphasized that the Iranian people “reject subservience and agents” and must “maintain their unity to bring down their enemies,” reaffirming that “Iran will not tolerate mercenaries working for foreigners.”
Trump responded by saying, “Iran is in big trouble. It seems to me that some groups are controlling cities, something no one expected just a few weeks ago. We are watching the situation very closely.” He added: “I have stated very clearly that if they start killing people as they have in the past, we will intervene and deliver a strong blow.”
In his latest statement on Iran, Trump posted on his platform that the United States is ready to help the Iranian people, without providing further details. He also shared a message of solidarity with those standing up to the Iranian regime, saying: “Iran is looking toward freedom, perhaps more than ever before, and the United States stands ready to assist.”
Meanwhile, there are reports that Israel is on alert for any developments should the United States intervene.
The British newspaper The Telegraph reported that Khamenei has placed security forces on the highest level of alert and ordered the Revolutionary Guard to take charge of suppressing the protesters. It added that Iranian officials say the level of readiness is higher than it was during the Twelve-Day War, and that underground “missile cities” have been activated to confront external threats.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio responded in a post on the platform X on January 10, saying that the United States supports the Iranian people amid the anti-government protests sweeping the country, fueled by dire economic conditions. He wrote that “the United States stands with the brave Iranian people.”
Meanwhile, Reza Pahlavi, the son of Iran’s last shah, extended his call for Iranians at large to continue protesting for regime change through Sunday.
A Major Shift After Ten Days
January 7 marked a turning point in the nature and pace of the protests, according to political activists, in terms of their spread, scale, and the demands being raised. Scattered gatherings turned into large demonstrations across major cities such as Tehran, Tabriz, Mashhad, Shiraz, Isfahan, and Qom. The protests also spread to provinces with Kurdish majorities, including Kurdistan and West Azerbaijan, as well as Ilam and Kermanshah, which had been participating since the first week. Protests continued as well in smaller towns. In response, security forces were placed on high alert to confront demonstrators and resorted to lethal force, with numerous incidents of live fire recorded.
Hossein Alizadeh says: “The escalating severity of repression against protesters reveals the state’s fears more than it demonstrates its strength or control over the situation.” He adds: “With mass arrests and the direct targeting of demonstrators with live ammunition, the authorities appear more like a fragile force on the brink of collapse. This may be more evident in cities with Kurdish majorities than elsewhere, where opposition is viewed as a longstanding existential threat.”
The last time Iran experienced nationwide unrest on a similar scale was around four years ago, when the death of (Mahsa/Jina) Amini, a young woman detained by the morality police, sparked one of the largest anti-government protest movements since the founding of the Islamic Republic in 1979.
Those demonstrations, which erupted in mid-September 2022, shook the pillars of the state and resonated widely beyond Iran’s borders, particularly as their core demands centered on “freedoms.” The protests later became known as the “Mahsa Amini movement” and “Woman, Life, Freedom,” but they were ultimately crushed by force following widespread mass arrests.
Shocking Scenes
Social media pages in Iran are flooded with videos documenting the protest movement. These include footage of large nighttime demonstrations involving thousands, scenes of police stations surrounded by protesters, and images of portraits of Iranian leaders being burned. Among the most widely circulated videos is one showing flames erupting near part of the Al-Rasoul Mosque in Tehran, as dozens of protesters chant, “Iran… Iran.”
Another scene that spread on Wednesday, January 7, shows a protester in Tehran changing the name of a street to Trump’s name, following the US president’s threat to intervene if Iranian authorities kill protesters.
Another video that circulated very widely on social media shows thousands gathering in the city of Abdanan in the Kurdish province of Ilam on Tuesday evening, January 6. Protesters were tearing open bags of rice and scattering the grains into the air, signaling that their problem is not merely daily subsistence, but the regime as a whole.
Activists in the city said that protesters stormed a store belonging to Ofogh Kourosh, a company affiliated with the Iranian army, took bags of rice, and then ripped them open in that manner.
The protests initially began in Tehran’s Grand Bazaar, where traders were among the first groups to protest openly. They closed their shops following the collapse of the Iranian currency and took to the streets demanding government intervention to stabilize the markets. This move was rare and striking, given their close ties to the authorities, and crowds there chanted slogans against Iran’s leadership.
Kurdish activist Rebin Rahmani believes the government is facing “a crisis of legitimacy” and has lost the illusory influence it once exercised through its proxy forces in the region. He argues that it should submit to the will of the people instead of continuing its harsh repression, which “may only add a few days to its lifespan.”
On the nature of violations in Kurdish cities, and the scale and intensity of repression there compared to other parts of Iran, Rebin says: “Repression in Kurdish areas is deeply rooted in the regime’s security mindset. All political, social, and even cultural issues in these regions are treated through a military and security lens.”
He points to a report published by Mai Sato, the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in Iran, in March of last year, which notes that between 2010 and 2023, at least 154 prisoners were executed for political reasons, around 49% of them Kurds. “This statistic clearly indicates structural discrimination and double repression in these areas,” he says.
Civil activist Issa Baziyar, speaking from Oslo, says: “The protests are broader and more inclusive, and there is a greater sense of hope despite the loss of life, along with a positive feeling of solidarity among people.”
He adds: “Serious human rights violations have occurred during the current protests. A few nights ago, authorities raided a hospital in Ilam to abduct wounded protesters, which constitutes a violation of the Geneva Conventions, their Additional Protocols, and the Rome Statute.”
He continues: “Children’s rights have also been gravely violated. Children were abducted from their homes, and five children were arrested in Dehloran. In addition, the use of military weapons without following proper protocol represents another violation of the Geneva Conventions.”
He concludes by pointing to violations of the rights of political and civilian detainees under the ‘Mandela Rules’: “Many detainees were subjected to severe torture during their detention, particularly Sattar Zeidi and Bijan Kerimian, two civilian protesters arrested during these demonstrations, who were beaten and tortured.”
The Iranian State’s Position
The official Iranian stance, issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on January 8, implicitly acknowledged the occurrence of widespread demonstrations, while authorities sought in their statements to frame the protests primarily as economic in nature and a result of sanctions, emphasizing as well alleged US support for them.
The Foreign Ministry stated that “Iran recognizes peaceful protests and is making every effort to meet the legitimate demands of the people within the framework of the law.” Meanwhile, Iran’s Judiciary Chief Gholam-Hossein Mohseni-Ejei said during a meeting of the Supreme Council of the Judiciary: “We are listening to the voices of protesters and critics who are rightly concerned about their livelihoods and the economic situation. We will confront those who seek to exploit the current circumstances to spread chaos and undermine the security of the country and its people.”
Mohseni-Ejei recently described some protesters as “saboteurs,” stressing that he would no longer remain silent toward them. He said: “The United States and Israel have officially and openly expressed their support for the protesters, and therefore we will no longer tolerate the saboteurs.”
According to Iran’s semi-official Tasnim News Agency, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Intelligence Organization announced on January 10 the arrest of a foreign national on charges of “collecting information on behalf of Israel.” It claimed that “the foreign national deliberately entered the country in disguise, sent by the intelligence service of the Zionist entity. He was arrested by IRGC intelligence while gathering information and assessing the operational conditions of terrorist acts carried out by his partners. During a search of his belongings and hideout, conclusive documents proving his espionage were found.”
The statement provided no further details, including the identity of the detainee, the time of arrest, or the place of detention.
What Distinguishes These Protests from the Mahsa Amini Movement of 2022?
Many observers view the current demonstrations as an extension of the Mahsa Amini protests of 2022, even though they have not yet reached the same scale domestically or garnered comparable international sympathy. However, there are key differences. The current protests began in the capital, Tehran, from within the bazaar, which has traditionally supported the Iranian authorities, whereas the Amini protests began in the small Kurdish city of Saqqez, where the young woman was born.
Researcher Dastan Jasim, an associate fellow at the German Institute for Global and Area Studies, comments that today’s protests are undoubtedly an extension of what happened in 2022. “While many point to the different economic conditions this time,” she says, “the most important factor is that we are living in a post–October 7 world and under Trump’s second presidency. We therefore have a completely different geopolitical situation, and Iran is much weaker.”
Regarding the position of the Iranian opposition, the Paris-based researcher notes that “the situation is more volatile.” While Iranian Kurdish parties managed to organize themselves and hold an important conference in Germany in September 2025, where they agreed on key points, divisions persist among other Iranian forces. This, she argues, is due to the reluctance of monarchist supporters, including the Pahlavi family and advocates of restoring the monarchy, to coordinate with others, as well as a widespread unwillingness to seriously address minority rights.
She believes that the centralized nature of the protest movement is a key factor in its continuity, but stresses that matters are far more complex when it comes to regime change. “We now see that Trump, in the case of Venezuela, prefers to work with existing Venezuelan institutions to achieve his goals, rather than pursuing full regime change as in Iraq.”
Jasim adds: “When it comes to Iran, I believe he will do the same. It is true that the Twelve-Day War weakened Iran, but Trump did not go to the extremes, nor did Israel. This is not because they prefer the current system, but because they do not favor replacing it with an unstable alternative. So far, the Iranian opposition, particularly the political diaspora, remains extremely weak, making it difficult to imagine its ability to take the reins of power under the Islamic Republic.”
Drivers of the Protests and Western Preferences
Iranian activist and writer Bejar Maleki, speaking from Germany, says: “One of the reasons people have taken to the streets is the economy, because the regime is no longer able to meet citizens’ demands, in addition to the political dimension.” Commenting on the spread of protests across Iran, including in areas that had not previously seen demonstrations, he adds: “After what happened in the city of Abdanan, where massive protests took place, the barrier of fear was broken. What happened there became an example for everyone, prompting tens of thousands to take to the streets.”
On the role of Reza Pahlavi, the son of Iran’s last shah, who called on Iranians to protest for regime change, Maleki comments: “The impact of Reza Pahlavi’s calls cannot be denied, but he is not the main driver. He tried to ride the wave once he sensed people’s readiness and desire to mobilize. Kurdish parties also played a major role when they issued a unified statement calling for a general strike and participation in the protests.”
On the motivations behind the protests, he says: “Alongside the demands of minorities such as Arabs, Kurds, and Baloch, the Persian majority in Tehran and in conservative and religious cities like Qom, Mashhad, and Shiraz also raised demands related to the economy and the overall situation resulting from the regime’s failure. All of this mobilized the protesters.” He continues: “Iranians today want to keep pace with the world, but the Iranian governing system is backward and traditional. That is why cities with Persian majorities have also taken to the streets.”
He concludes: “We can see signs of the collapse of the Islamic system and its authority; this is a strong possibility. However, Western states prefer reform in Iran rather than a complete change of power. This option is less costly for them. They fear that the collapse of the regime could lead to prolonged internal conflicts that would spiral out of control and fail to serve their interests.”
