In Tehran
lrb.co.uk
lrb.co.uk
The information and sources are there for you to search, and it's up to you to determine who you find credible and why.
The same intelligence community bragging that they're embedded among the protestors and engaging in covert-action (oxymoronic as it sounds) to bring about regime change?
https://archive.is/20251230221603/https://www.jpost.com/midd...
https://x.com/mikepompeo/status/2007180411638620659 https://x.com/mikepompeo/status/2007180411638620659
But if it's 5-10-20 or even more k, how much difference does it make? The crime of mass killing and collective punishment is still as gruesome either way
https://archive.ph/2026.01.25-142822/https://time.com/735763...
I am very skeptical tbh seeing all this unfold. The propaganda push from media over this is off the charts on this.
A counter-perspective on these figures and their sources :
https://x.com/TheGrayzoneNews/status/2017089536686211440#m https://xcancel.com/TheGrayzoneNews/status/20170895366862114...
> The 30,000 figure is also far beyond tallies being compiled by activists methodically assigning names to the dead.
The official government estimate is still 3,117 btw.
The truth is we'll likely never know for sure the real number and any outlet reporting anything else without qualifications is being dishonest.
Iran official figures put it around ~3k actually.
That said it's been pointed out to me that my link is statements by anonymous government officials, which is not the same thing as "official Iranian government numbers".
Gazan health authorities were releasing the names of their dead, and this was met with great skepticism and qualification in Israel and the West (until this week when Israel just accepted at least tens of thousands died).
Random, inflated numbers from anonymous sources pop up on Iran and they're instantly quoted as fact.
Also - some of the rebels have guns and have been using them, so some of these dead are from shootouts.
Time Magazine is reporting[0] that local Iranian health officials have given that number.
[0]: https://time.com/7357635/more-than-30000-killed-in-iran-say-...
This here is the same death toll in two days.
The same is true for the Russia-Ukraine war, btw. There have been 1300 victims per day for over 3 years. Russia is not trying to minimize casualties.
Why is it surprising that it results in an extreme difference in death toll? Or at least, in the rate of killing.
Or as another point of comparison (according to Wikipedia) : The bombing of Dresden went over three days and cost 25.000 lives. The bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki actually resulted in 100.000 immediate deaths.
All those locations - the Donbas, Gaza, Dresden, Hiroshima and Nagasaki were complete wastelands afterwards.
This makes it hard to believe for me. That being said, 3000 would still be absolutely gruesome.
Iranian Islamic guard was slaughtering people in dense crowds in the middle of skyscrapers. That certainly makes those numbers realistic to me.
Do you mean in person?
We know: We know: a government whose sole purpose is to protect its people has committed the mass murder of unarmed civilians. has committed the mass murder of unarmed civilians.
That’s all there is to know to make a judgement about what has happened.
I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a statement.
What is it exactly you’re confused about?
Which boss is perfect? Which dad is? Nothing and no one is.
But there are shades. Some are way closer to the bar than others.
I can list hundreds of governments that have not reacted to mass protests by killing unarmed civilians (their own people) by the thousand.
That's a long way from asserting that it is, in fact, the sole purpose of government, which was what I objected to.
Even if you drop the word “sole” entirely, the basic expectation is still that a government does not kill unarmed civilians.
At that point, it is fair to wonder whether the objection adds any clarity, or just pulls attention away from the judgment itself.
Figures thrown around like 12k/20k/30k in 2 days - frankly beggar belief. Compare it to the recent (and ongoing) massacre of Gaza. which at its peak we were talking 1000-2000 deaths per day. The Israelis were dropping 2000-pound bombs and shelling non-stop until the entire strip into rubble. Reaching similar numbers against armed protestors without resorting to heavy weapons doesn't seem plausible. On top of it, 100s of thousands of injured (claimed along with the deaths). Again in 2 days. Even in a country of 90 million, can you imagine the utter pandemonium in every hospital. Mass graves. The blood and bodies at the squares. It would be visible from space. It would impossible to conceal. You have to go to Babi Yar in WW2 to get similar figures.
Beyond that its hard for me to tell. I dont trust any of this, given the interests and parties involved and the sources pushing these narratives . The legacy media is in full-blown propaganda offensive. The accounts and claims seem to come from a constellation of anti-regime NGOs, activists, Israeli lobbyists, neocons and intelligence agencies. Statements and actions of western and Israeli leaders make it abundantly clear this is an armed regime-change operation backed by numerous US, Israeli and western-backed proxy groups. US carrier strike groups have finally arrived in Gulf of Oman and suddenly the news stories pick up again. A month ago the same CSG was off the coast of Venezuela while the nobel prize was being awarded to an opponent of the Venezuelan government. Now that same nobel-laureate is meeting up with Reza Pahlavi and opponents of the Iranian government while Trump is sabre-rattling again. It all feels like deja-vu all over again. Netanyahu and the Israelis really want their Iran war and they need the Americans to carry it home for them.
https://www.presstv.ir/Detail/2026/02/01/763331/Iran-officia...
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46611046
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46605598
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46596836
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46611065
SyrianGirl and others in the same space on X (way way more that's just the first off the top of my head). Lots in comments on BlueSky labeling it all a zionist plot. Lots in comments Reddit labeling it all a zionist plot.
Discussion in major media about the phenomenom https://www.abc.net.au/religion/milad-haghani-iran-palestine...
Example from a recent pro-Palestinian event: https://kagi.com/search?q=Pro-Khamenei+banners++London+Jan+3...
Example from a recent protest: https://kagi.com/search?q=Pro-Khamenei+banners++London+Jan+3...
Taken from my above links: sporkxrocket 26 days ago | parent | context | on: Iran Protest Map
I understand the Middle East and know that Iran is our ally in the fight against Zionism. I also understand that these "protests" are inorganic and have failed in their attempt to inflict damage on Iran."
I changed the search to Google since you couldn't.
https://www.google.com/search?q=Pro-Khamenei+banners+London+...
First search I did pulled up this recent Palestinian march with support for the Iranian regime. I guess that's also not being supportive of the Iranian regime in your mind?
I refer back to my 'people asking for this here don't seem to be in good faith'. I'm assuming you are just a troll at this point and I'm moving on.
I think those spread Russian propaganda. I can see why the Russian dictatorship would want people rising up against dictators shot but it's not representative of general support for palestinians.
(Wikipedia on SyrianGirl https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maram_Susli)
I feel I gave plenty of examples, from actual support at actual protests up to a major western newspaper talking about how people react, to specific people doing exactly what I said here. If that isn't enough you are intentionally being blind to it.
When people imagine mass casualty events, they imagine something like Verdun or Hiroshima, where tens of thousands are killed within a relatively concentrated geographic radius. But more often than not, they actually occur across a wider area in numerous but smaller casualty increments which add up to something much bigger. And when considering how deadly even a single well-positioned gunman with an automatic rifle can be against a crowd of unarmed and tightly packed civilians, it's really not surprising to see how easily casualties could have mounted, especially when you multiple that over 400+ cities.
A familiar tactic to many governments around the world.
> Iran is operating in at a scale so far beyond anything ever seen in the US that it's completely dishonest to compare the two.
The person you're responding to didn't mention the US, but it's telling that that's where your mind goes to.
No, that's the regime's excuse. Most electricity in the country is used by the regime to mine crypto (!).
This is incorrect. For example, the deal with Iran did not allow for surprise inspections.
Imagine negotiating with Hitler to give up his V2 missiles and nuclear plans while the Holocaust was taking place. History will judge us for negotiating (and therefore, legitimizing) with the islamic regime that's occupied Iran for 47 years.
"Genocidal" is not an order of magnitude; it's a description of purpose. What's going on in Iran is an atrocity, but it's not "genocidal."
>History will judge us for negotiating
We're not the world police.
Oh, well that's alright then. Hey fellers, we got off on a grammatical technicality.
> We're not the world police.
It's your mess, now clean it up.
>It's your mess, now clean it up.
The US is under no obligation to the people of Iran whatsoever. If we take action in Iran, it will be solely to our benefit, and it may or may not improve those peoples' lives. In all likelihood, it will be another Libya or Afghanistan situation in which we take what we want and leave a power vacuum in our wake.
10,000 dead in 2 days.
> The US is under no obligation to the people of Iran whatsoever
Nobody can make you do anything, but the moral obligation is there. People say things like "we're not the world police", as if overthrowing the elected government of a country is nothing. It cuts both ways.
Again, "genocide" doesn't have to do with the scale of the killing. It's a specific word with its own meaning.
>Nobody can make you do anything, but the moral obligation is there. People say things like "we're not the world police", as if overthrowing the elected government of a country is nothing. It cuts both ways.
Governments don't have "morals". They do whatever is most expedient. We have never done something because it's the moral thing to do, and we never will. That's just not how hegemonic powers like the US work.
Yes sir.
On a second thought - who the fuck are you to tell the country with the biggest dick what to do. We'll be putting 100% tariffs on you.
we share a planet
That has been the bargain since WWII though. Pax Americana meant the US owned and enforced a global order, in return international trade and finance ran on its platform. Most Americans can't fathom how bad the alternative is to not being the world police.
Well, not anymore after that speech from the Canadian Prime Minister!
Then why did you overthrow their elected government in 1953? Which also set the country firmly on the path to the current regime.
I imagine you saying this in 1940, to a german jew refugee. Would you do it? Would you say this to a jewish person in WWII, to justify non-action?
I find it surprising that you're troubled. The West helped Israel with its genocide in Gaza; why did you expect that the West would intervene in what's happening the Iran, which by death count is significantly smaller?
In 48 hours, the islamic regime in Iran massacred more than 40,000 protestors (and left tens of thousands of people blinded/wounded, often "finishing them off" by raiding hospitals...). Some figures even show more than 40,000, but even assuming the low-park, that's 833 people per hour, or 13 people per minute who got killed.
Whatever Israel did (to defend itself) was by no means even near those numbers.
Now that's a record fast jump between "it never happened" and "they deserved it".
Also funny the wording "whatever they did", as if it's a mystery.
> Whatever Israel did (to defend itself) was by no means even near those numbers.
Israel killed about 300,000 people in the first month. Sure, it's a lower count per day, what a low bar.
From now on, every time anyone says anything about Iran, I'll be pushing the narrative that "whatever Iran did, it was to defend itself".
Edit to add: Also, Israel was actually attacked, and civilians were raped, kidnapped, and murdered. Did any of the protestors in Iran kill, rape, or murder any of members of the regime who subsequently slaughtered them?
Just to be clear. You're arguing that if a country is attacked, it's ok to kill civilians that are unrelated to the attack? Or are you arguing that those 300,000 were somehow involved in the killing of the 3,000 Israelis that died in the Hamas attack?
How on earth did you get that from my comment? Can you think of a more charitable way to interpret what I said?
So you're not saying that what Israel is doing is less bad due to the fact that it was attacked? So what are you saying then?
I guess that no, I can't find a more charitable way to interpret what you said.
> Israel was actually attacked
I was responding to your claim that Iran was defending itself... Whether or not Israel responded disproportionately to October 7 (it did), I don't think it's fair to say Iran's actions are "self-defense" in the same way that Israel's war was self-defense.
Disproportionate would be if they caught the October 7 terrorists and their collaborators, and instead of arresting them killed them. If that was what happened, I wouldn't be morally against it.
If a country is attacked, and defends itself, are you saying it should stop any form of defense because a civilian can die?
If this is the logic, then what would prevent armies from using human shields?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_and_gender-based_violen...
Hannibal directive: https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2024-07-07/ty-article-ma...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hannibal_Directive#Claimed_use...
That’s the fake UN number - in contradiction with Gaza Health Ministry.
> The British historian Martin Gilbert believes that "many non-Jews resented the round-up", his opinion being supported by German witness Dr. Arthur Flehinger who recalls seeing "people crying while watching from behind their curtains". Rolf Dessauer recalls how a neighbor came forward and restored a portrait of Paul Ehrlich that had been "slashed to ribbons" by the Sturmabteilung. "He wanted it to be known that not all Germans supported Kristallnacht."
This passage is particulary eerie IMHO, since I've been reading "I don't condone this" of current world events over and over.
> In 1938, just after Kristallnacht, the psychologist Michael Müller-Claudius interviewed 41 randomly selected Nazi Party members on their attitudes towards racial persecution. Of the interviewed party members, 63% expressed extreme indignation against it, 5% expressed approval, and the remaining 32% were noncommittal.
Also particurlarly eerie to me. Yet the regime went on.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kristallnacht [2] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/D%C3%BCsseldorfer_Abkommen_(19...
But it was asked what else the West could do beyond what it’s already doing.
It might be possible to do a targetted kidnapping/assassination without provoking a war. Or it might not be. Such actions become unpredictable fast.
You know that you are only speaking about diaspora Iranians. There are many many especially rural, especially conservative Iranians and veterans who would not welcome a war
The current realpolitik geopolitical fate for Iran is to be suppressed and relegated, regional players don't want to redistribute power / influence to accommodate Iran. Bluntly Iran is too big allow to flourish, but not so big it cannot be suppressed. That's Iran's fate under current dynamics, no one wants to save Iran, they want to neutralize Iran, naive to pretend otherwise. Iran is no longer in the minority of potential strategic intervention successes, its in the bucket of dozens of countries US intervention fucked over because that's the strategic end goal is for these countries to remain weak. If Iran wants bigger lightcone, it needs to fight for one.
Basically anyone anywhere in the planet other than the US would find your statement outrageous.
Israel has been doing it right, taking out the proxies and top commanders is what weakens the regime.
Most action from the West is likely to make things worse. Can you give a scenario where that's not the case?
WWII did not happen because of the Holocaust and nations around the world being outraged at that. In truth, the US and many other countries rejected Jewish refugees from Germany
Trump told them to stop and has sent quite a lot of military stuff to the area. It remains to be seen how that works out.