Through the eyes of Iranian protesters, glimpses of disorder, disarray and death

BEIRUT (AP) — This time felt different.

The 25-year-old Iranian fashion designer hoped that mass protests nearly four years ago would improve civil rights in the Islamic Republic.

Not much changed, though. Being on those streets, she felt, may have been for nothing.

But in early January, she protested again. The sea of people across Tehran’s streets lifted her spirits. This time, the spark was inflation and the plummeting value of the Iranian rial — though chants soon targeted the country’s theocratic leaders.

The crowd was larger, more diverse, she said, and the momentum felt unprecedented.

The response by security forces would be, too.

Activists estimate that over 6,000 people, mostly protesters, were killed in the bloodiest crackdown on dissent since the Islamic Republic was created in 1979. They worry the number will increase as information trickles out.

The Associated Press spoke with six Iranians, each on condition of anonymity through secure channels as security forces continued to crack down on dissenters after the protests. They said they demonstrated and witnessed state violence against protesters. Four of them took risks to circumvent an internet shutdown to share what they saw, while two spoke from abroad.

They described a rare sense of hope among protesters. The younger, more defiant generation was there, they said, but so were older residents, people from well-to-do families, even some children. All said they expected the state to respond aggressively but were horrified by the crackdown’s extent.

“When we went out, I couldn’t say I wasn’t stressed, but there was no way I could stay at home,” the designer said. “I felt that if I stayed home — if anyone stayed home — out of fear, nothing would move forward.”

No group of interviews — no matter how illuminating — can reflect the experiences of an entire population or even a segment of it. They’re not representative of the large country of over 85 million people and its diverse ethnic and religious makeup. But these Iranians offer a rare glimpse of life in the Islamic Republic at a pivotal moment in its history.

Iran was battered by Israeli and U.S. jets during a 12-day war in June and has been under the grip of Western-led sanctions, compounding economic problems. People say the government has not responded to their concerns of economic mismanagement and interference in their personal lives. They want rights, they say. Dignity.

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has said several thousand have been killed — a rare admission that indicates the scale of the movement and the government’s response. Officials and state media repeatedly refer to demonstrators as “terrorists,” showing images of buildings and state property they say protesters have burned or damaged. Iran’s mission to the United Nations didn’t respond to questions from AP about these witnesses’ recollections. Iran’s U.N. ambassador, Amir Saeid Iravani, has previously said security forces “firmly and responsibly” confronted protesters, whom he called “violent separatists.”

The fashion designer: ‘Everyone was afraid’

During the peak of the protests, the designer said, people poured into Tehran’s streets. She described the events of Jan. 8.

“When I was outside in the evening, the city was still and empty,” she said. Then came a call to protest from exiled crown prince Reza Pahlavi. By 8 p.m., she said, she was in a sea of thousands.

“Everyone was afraid,” she said, but “they kept saying, ‘No, don’t leave. This time, we can’t.” She and two friends spoke to AP using a Starlink satellite dish because of the internet blackout, devices now being seized by authorities there.

They marched up a commercial road, but shops were closed. The three said they sprayed graffiti and yelled anti-government chants.

They described teenagers and elderly people joining regular dissenting voices. Some chants called for the death of Khamenei — a cry that can bring the death penalty.

Anti-riot police and members of the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard’s all-volunteer Basij force arrived, the friends said, blocking the road and lobbing tear gas and firing pellet guns. Protesters panicked and scrambled.

The group told AP that many pushed forward, throwing rocks at security forces. Protest veterans donned scarves or masks to protect themselves and hide their identities.

The protesters built momentum. Some security forces that arrived on motorcycles appeared to have retreated. But, the designer said, the forces returned, charging at protesters. She and her friends dashed into alleys and side streets.

Tear gas canisters fell into the alley. The designer remembered lessons from other protests: “I thought I’d kick it back,” she said, to protect the wounded.

As she did, she said, security forces fired paintballs and pellets. She described being pierced in the hand and leg.

Fortunately, she said, her mask softened the blow of the paintball that hit her face.

The doctor: ‘This had never happened before at this scale’

When protests reached her part of Iran, the doctor said, she wasn’t surprised. But the extent was a different story.

“This had never happened before at this scale,” said the doctor in Mashhad, Iran’s second-largest city. She spoke to AP while visiting family abroad.

Days before a hospital night shift, she said, she attended protests, hearing gunfire from a distance and feeling tear gas burn her eyes. She saw graffiti on walls, buildings afire.

Once she clocked in at the hospital, security forces had escalated their response.

“I was not afraid for myself,” the doctor said. “I was afraid for others.”

She didn’t work in the emergency room but tried to see what was going on as ambulances and protesters delivered bodies. Colleagues told her 150 bodies were brought in that night.

Security agents took over the command of the emergency room, the doctor said.

Doctors protested, she said, based on her colleagues’ account. But they were told to stop speaking.

Momentum ebbed, and Iran remains isolated

Crackdowns continued. Momentum ebbed. Iran remains cut off from the world. For some, rage and grief over the violence have grown.

“What I fear is that these events will be treated as something ordinary by the world, that people will simply move on,” the doctor said.

She hopes the world pays attention.

“No matter how many times I explain, I truly can’t really convey the extent of the horrible situation,” she said. “No one would believe that a government of a country can so easily kill its own people.”