WhatsappFor almost a year, Iran has been struggling with a massive scale revolution across the entire country that has hit the regime’s capital, Tehran and the oil-rich South-western Khuzestan province.
The anti-regime protests have been ongoing since May 6 th 2022. They began as protests against the soaring cost of living and quickly developed into anti-regime slogans and calls for toppling the Ayatollah. [1]
Impoverished, oppressed and with no hope for the future, the people of Iran have been risking their own lives revolting against the regime with little or no attention from the world and close to zero media coverage. The demonstrations intensified in May 2022. They have become so threatening to the regime that Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Khamenei
addressed the nation in a televised speech and said “The enemies of the Islamic republic are using public demonstrations to hit it”. [2]
The regime has come down against the demonstrations with a heavy hand including massive arrests and death sentences for protesters, to no avail. The protests continue. Recently, to defuse the angry Iranian public; it overturned death sentences for some protesters [3] and began indicting some mid-level officials for corruption charges. [4]
The demonstrations have been very consistent. Even when they stop at one town they pop up somewhere else. They also serve as a constant reminder to the Mullahs’ regime that their biggest threat is their people, especially since demonstrations are all over the regime’s very own capital.
The second hottest spot for anti-regime demonstrations is the Khuzestan Province, Better known as Ahwaz by its natives. At 24,732 square miles of area, the Khuzestan is a little bigger than West Virginia and immensely rich in oil and mineral. Ahwaz was officially rendered by colonial Britain to Iran in 1920. Nonetheless, the majority of Ahwaz natives are Arabs who are tribally connected to the Arabs of Iraq. Many of them consider themselves Iraqis and hold huge resentment toward Iran whom they see as an occupier of their country.
Since the second half of 2021, five million Arabs of Ahwaz have been mobilizing massive peaceful protests against the Iranian regime.
The Iranian regime’s crackdown on Ahwaz Arabs protests has not succeeded in ending those. The Ahwazi opposition to the Iranian regime has become militarized. Armed struggle by Ahwazi fighters has been carrying out effective surgical attacks against the Iranian regime targets since the beginning of this year. The Ahwazi military resistance has been carrying out
surgical attacks against the Iranian regime in Ahwaz. Formidably, they have not been targeting civilians, a sign of ideological maturity and a big problem for the Iranian regime.
Ahwazi leader Hameed Mutasher told me: “Our fighters attack only the military installations and personnel of the Iranian regime, we have already attacked many of their facilities, our instructions to the fighters are clear; don’t attack Iranian civilians, don’t attack those who are not involved with the Iranian regime, we are mature and fair, we are God fearing Muslims; we won’t repeat the mistakes the Palestinians do when they attack Israeli restaurants and
buses”.
An examination of recent events shows the claims made by Mutasher check out: On the 2 nd of September 2022, A powerful explosion rocked the Abadan refinery in Iran, with no casualties [5] Mutasher and other Ahwazi leaders in exile claimed the Ahwazi resistance responsibility for the attack. Iran’s largest refiner, the Abadan facility is located near the coast of the Arabian Gulf, the refinery is one of the main points of Iranian oil exports.
This is not the only explosion of its kind the Ahwazi resistance announces responsibility for. There have been several since January 2022. Despite the lack of evidence supporting the Ahwazis claims, one thing cannot be disputed, the Ahwazi people have been engaged in nonstop demonstrations against the Iran regime, bringing the entire Khuzestan province to a
halt and, to an extent, disrupting the Iranian government’s mining operations.[6]
The Ahwazi resistance has been putting extreme pressure on the Iranian regime and pressing its resources.
The ongoing demonstrations sweeping Iran and the militarized Ahwazi resistance against the Iranian regime are growing stronger with no sign of waning.
Challenged at home by an angry population, the Iranian regime has never been this fragile and should never be allowed a lifeline through a new lousy Iran deal by the Biden administration.
[1] HRW: Arrests in Iran attempt to suppress growing social movements
[2] Iran demonstrations: Khamenei accuses the West of plotting to overthrow the Islamic Republic [3] Overthrowing the death sentence against
[3] protesters in Iran… Has the pressure paid off
[4] Corruption suspicions.. Iran arrests a prominent official in the government of a prime
minister
[5] A powerful explosion rocks the Abadan refinery in Iran..no casualties
[6] Demonstrations spread across the cities of the province of Ahwaz, and the Iranian authorities cut off the Internet from the region
