There is growing evidence that the regime feels threatened by its own people. The regime has been unpopular for a long time, but the Iranian people have since 2017 been protesting on the streets about the regime’s policies.
Much of this is to do with the fact that the living conditions for ordinary citizens have been getting worse and worse but instead of the regime trying to solve the matter, it has invested resources in its terrorist activities instead.
Each time the regime fails to address the people’s grievances the protests grow bigger. By the end of January 18th, Iranians across 150 urban areas were chanting such slogans as “Death to the dictator.’’
#Iran‘s interior minister downsizes the massacre of November 2019 uprising protestshttps://t.co/q4BRN8hEnk
— People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK) (@Mojahedineng) June 1, 2020
By November 2019 protests were taking place in 200 localities. Unfortunately. these protests didn’t take place without casualties. In the 2018 protest alone numerous participants were shot and killed by security forces, some were tortured while thousands of others were arrested and imprisoned and some have not even been properly sentenced. In order to intimidate the Iranian public the regime is threatening to execute those who have been held in prison since 2018.
Social media users are mounting a campaign to stop any executions and there is a Farsi hashtag being circulated which when translated means “do not execute.” This has been used12 million times.
Amnesty International voiced its opinion about the death toll of 1500 in the protest last November. It said that supreme leader Ali Khamenei had issued an order that the IGRC should do whatever it could to quell the uprising including the phrase “shooting to kill.” Despite the killing, there were further protests in January of this year.
#Iran Regime’s Interior Minister Admits to Killing Protesters During #IranProtests, International Community Must Intervene.
Abdolreza Rahmani Fazli, on Saturday, announced , between 200 and 255 people lost their lives during the nationwide Iran protests.https://t.co/S5itxU8C69— NCRI-FAC (@iran_policy) June 1, 2020
More recently there have been announcements from the state-run media that more protests are likely to take place even to the point that the overthrow of the mullahs may happen sooner rather than later.
Khamenei has admitted that the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI / MEK). MEK has been the most instrumental in fighting for a regime change. Most Iranians know the sacrifices the MEK members have made since the 1979 revolution, and as the decades have flown past more and more people are backing the MEK and its struggle for a free and democratic Iran.
The pandemic unleashed people’s dislike for the regime more than ever. It took several weeks before the regime decided to release ‘’one billion dollars from the country’s Sovereign Wealth Fund, to help combat the disease.‘’
As the MEK has constantly said, Khamenei has almost total control of hundreds of ‘’billions of dollars in assets through state-linked institutions and “charitable foundations.” Much of this, the country’s wealth, has been used to back up terrorist activities and mobilize forces to counter the protests that have been taking place in recent years.
When those authorities fail to heed the advice, they will surely respond to renewed unrest with extreme violence. This, too, seems unavoidable. But in view of how little of a long-term impact that violence has had on Iranian activism so far, regime change is on the horizon for Iran.
