“We are horrified by the political executions of at least 41 people in Iran since 28 February,” including 16 protesters from the January 2026 uprising, posted Amnesty Iran on June 2;. “Scores of protesters, dissidents and others remain under sentence of death and at grave risk of execution in Iran. They were convicted following grossly unfair trials, including before Revolutionary Courts of overly broad and vague charges… Since the 28 February US/Israeli unlawful attacks on Iran, senior Iranian officials have called for expedited trials and harsh punishments, including executions, amid Iranian authorities’ horrific assault on the right to life.”

“We don't forgive and we don't forget”, Burn The Cage posted on May 27 with this image of these precious political prisoners torn from all struggling for a whole different future. Burn The Cage also quoted a report by the Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA), that in the same approximate three months, the IRI has arrested over 4,000 people, a significant number on “war-related” charges, including alleged “communication or cooperation with foreign media”.

“I will not allow my name—as a female political prisoner—to be used as a pretext by Trump”

At the same time, the fascist Trump regime and its genocidal Israeli attack-dog continue to point to the atrocities by the IRI to cynically “justify” their attacks and threats against Iran. 

On May 27, Trump’s Truth Social account reposted a Jerusalem Post article of April 26 titled “Sexual abuse in Iranian prisons surges during ceasefire”, with the photos of three prominent female political prisoners, Pakhshan Azizi, Sharifeh Mohammadi and Varisheh Moradi, implying that the three had been sexually abused. The lawyers for the three women issued a denial that they had been sexually abused. 

Most importantly, Sharifeh Mohammadi published a searing response:

“It seems that once again, the condition of women is being used as a pretext for imperialist intervention… I will not allow my name —as a female political prisoner— to be used as a pretext by Trump, or by other perpetrators of violence against children such as Netanyahu, to justify acts of aggression.”

Certainly, there have been many verified/credible reports of sexual abuse and sexual threats against both women and men detainees in Iran’s hellhole prisons as a component of torture and humiliation, and this should be exposed and opposed. However, this “report” is more than just extreme, crude hypocrisy. It is war propaganda from the sexual predator Trump and his Zionist flunkies to tie this specifically to the ceasefire period — implicitly calling for a renewal of U.S.-Israeli bombs — at a moment when horrific exposures of the systematic rape of Palestinian prisoners by Israeli armed forces, backed by the U.S., has shocked the world, to say nothing of rampant sexual abuse in U.S. detention centers like Northwest ICE Processing Center.

A number of Iranian progressive voices and former political prisoners have added their voices to those who insist that people in Iran and the world can and must oppose both imperialist war and the fascist theocratic regime in Iran — but this must spread and be fought for much more fiercely.

An especially eloquent expression of political prisoners’ role in this struggle was written by Sahar Delijani, author of Children of the Jacaranda Tree, in the online magazine Equator. In “Hope Against Hope: Generations of organizers and dissidents have kept the Iranian struggle alive”, she relates how her mother gave birth to her while imprisoned in Evin Prison and how she was cared for and protected by many other prisoners. She wrote:

Evin is not only a notorious site of repression but also, above all, a place of resilience, where a language of resistance is articulated and passed down from one generation to the next. 

Today, that legacy persists, though under the harshest conditions. Evin was first bombed in June 2025, during the Twelve Day War, when Israeli missiles killed not only staff and guards but also prisoners, visiting relatives, social workers and a five-year-old child. It was hit again during the 2026 US-Israeli attacks, when nearby blasts tore through its wards. Meanwhile, the Islamic Republic has launched its own war on prisoners. Conditions inside Evin, like in many jails across the country, are catastrophic: overcrowded, filthy, and infested with insects. Food and water are scarce, electricity and hot water are frequently shut off, and medical care is denied….

In the last three months alone, thousands have been arrested under the pretext of national security. Sham trials are held behind closed doors. Detainees are charged without evidence or independent legal counsel, and then prosecuted almost entirely on the basis of coerced confessions. They are paraded on national television, bruises still visible on their faces, to “confess” to “collaborating with the enemy” and “waging war against God”. Nearly every day brings news of another protester or dissident sent to the gallows. In a familiar pattern, Kurds, Baloch, Azeris, Lurs, Gilaks and other ethnic minorities have been disproportionately targeted…

The US-Israeli attacks, ostensibly undertaken in the name of “freeing” the Iranian people, have only exposed them to deeper repression, intensified fear and surveillance – and set back decades of collective struggle.

Not to be Outdone by Trump, Iran Pushes its Own War Propaganda

Since the U.S.-Israeli unprovoked attack on Iran in February, many people on social media have likely seen those highly popular pro-IRI, semi-official, cutesy Lego videos. These often AI generated, real time videos are watched by billions around the world, due to their captivating content that claims Iran is getting “one vengeance for all”—from graphics of Hiroshima to Malcolm X to Native Americans—and often ends with the phrase “sacred defense”. How can any decent person in the world who knows the long history of U.S. atrocities not like such takedowns of the U.S. and maybe learn some history. However, these graphics designed to appeal to youth also push Islamic fundamentalist calls for revenge in war. Many reduce U.S. imperialist aggression to Trump’s attempts to distract from the Epstein files and push false narratives that Netanyahu is the one yanking the U.S.’s chain rather than the other way around; some even include fascist anti-Semitic depictions such as Jews drinking blood. 

There are billions worldwide who have come to hate and at least distrust America now for good reason, whether they know the history or just the recent crimes in the Middle East and South America who are susceptible to the nonsensical, anti-scientific method of thinking that “the enemy of my enemy is my friend”. This includes online voices such as a British sociologist, Islamophobia-expert (Professor David Miller) who posted a video claiming Iran is waging a fight for humanity and “only Iran can save world civilization”. As an academic with access to Google and research ability, he is surely not ignorant of the extreme misogynistic brutality of Iran’s Sharia law and capitalist economics based society, nor about Iran’s many political prisoners or executions. No. While he may be one of the most vocal, he is part of so-called “leftists”, especially in “the West” who defend the fundamentalist fascists in Iran and browbeat their opposition, abandoning the people of Iran to the regime (and U.S. lies) that all Iranian dissidents are working for or at least supportive of Israel or the U.S.

To be clear, we encourage open and principled debate with all those honestly but mistakenly support the IRI in opposition to U.S. imperialism/Israeli Zionism. We stand against any suppression of airing these differences over alternatives to picking one or another bad versus worse choice.

As we go to press (June 6), there are semi-official reports that Iran’s new Supreme Leader has pardoned 2,000 prisoners, excluding those charged with “national or public security” crimes. Stay tuned for confirmation and details in coming weeks. Meanwhile, the IEC will continue to emphasize the courage and struggle by Iran’s political prisoners as to the battle for the future of Iran with implications for the larger region and world. 

All of Iran's political prisoners must be unconditionally and immediately released. The governments of the U.S. and Iran act from their national interests. And, in this instance, we the people of the U.S. and Iran, along with the people of the world, have OUR shared interests, as part of getting to a better world: to unite to defend the political prisoners of Iran. In the U.S., we have a special responsibility to unite very broadly against this vile repression by the IRI, and to actively oppose any war moves by the U.S. government that would bring even more unbearable suffering to the people of Iran.. We demand of the Islamic Republic of Iran: FREE ALL POLITICAL PRISONERS NOW! We say to the U.S government: NO THREATS OR WAR MOVES AGAINST IRAN, LIFT U.S. SANCTIONS!