The fierce uprising of the Iranian people is continuing, now for the eighth straight week. Hundreds of thousands of Iranians, from different regions, different social strata, and with differing politics, are continuing to protest and wage very sharp struggle against the reactionary Islamic Republic—even as the regime resorts to ever more depraved violence, repression, and demagoguery to maintain its barbaric rule.  

In important ways, Friday, November 4, illustrated this complex and escalating battle, which involves different forces inside—and outside—Iran.  

This date marks the 43rd anniversary of the 1979 seizure of the U.S. embassy in Tehran by Iranian student supporters of Ayatollah Khomeini and the Islamic Republic he founded and led.²

This past Friday, the leaders of the Islamic Republic used the anniversary to mobilize their social base (reportedly in some 100 cities), to posture as an “anti-imperialist” force in an effort to recohere its legitimacy, and to denounce the uprising as a foreign plot.

The night before at a U.S. campaign rally, President Biden told a group of Iranian-Americans “Don't worry, we're gonna free Iran.” The U.S. imperialists—including Biden—have inflicted massive suffering on the people of Iran and the Middle East, as the special revcom.us Resource Page on Iran documents. Now these global predators are seeking to use the uprising in Iran to advance their own imperialist aims, not to “free” the Iranian people or anyone else.

Nonetheless, on Friday, Iran’s President Raisi seized on Biden’s remark to spew more demagogic rhetoric, declaring, “Iran was liberated 43 years ago, and it's determined not to become your captive again.”³

This reactionary pro-regime mobilization took place against an escalation of state violence and repression against the uprising. The regime is now more frequently firing directly into protests, even funeral commemorations. Doctors have been threatened, one even killed, for speaking out or treating the wounded. The regime announced charges against over 1,000 protesters, including many students and even children, with some of the charges carrying the death penalty. It’s swept up and detained artists, journalists, lawyers, human rights activists, athletes, and other people of conscience. Two prominent rappers have been arrested and one could face death.⁴ (See accompanying post on rapper Toomaj Salehi.)

All told over 300 protesters have been killed so far and over 14,000 imprisoned, and the bloodshed is far from over. One of the regime’s thugs was recorded in a video threatening, “We will give our blood, we swear by God that if we have to we will even behead our own wives and children,” to crush the uprising.

Defiance in the Face of Wanton Murder

Hundreds of thousands of Iranians are remaining defiant in the face of this crackdown and many are even more determined to see the fall of the hated Islamic theocracy. Protests continued in different forms in different places in the days following the Revolutionary Guard threats and leading into the November 4 anniversary.

One front of the struggle—people gathering to mourn those killed in September and October and to vent their rage at the regime on the 40th day after the killing of protesters by security forces. Such protests took place in at least 10 cities on Thursday, November 3.⁵

On November 4, as the regime mobilized its supporters, there were large antigovernment protests in cities across the southeastern provinces of Sistan and Baluchistan as well as in other cities across the country with protesters often clashing with security forces. The protests against the regime continued into the night, in over a dozen cities, even as protesters were being murdered in the street by the regime.⁶

Battle Rages at Tehran’s Shahrak Ekbatan Apartments: “Losing their fear of the authorities with nothing to lose”

The week’s long back-and-forth battle at Tehran’s Shahrak Ekbatan apartment complex, home to some 50,000 people, gives a sense of the breadth and determination of the rebellion and the regime’s inability—so far—to stamp it out. Protests have been taking place there every night for the past six weeks. Young men and women gather in the common areas outside chanting “Freedom, freedom” and “The end is here, dictator,” while “thousands of other residents chant slogans against the authorities from their apartment windows.”

Security forces have responded with raids, shooting at windows, and throwing stun grenades into the complex, leaving broken doors, shattered glass, debris, and bloodstained tiles. Dozens of Shahrak Ekbatan’s residents, mostly young men and women who were out protesting, have been beaten, shot, stuffed into vans headed for detention centers. A regime raid on Sunday, October 30, represented a new level of violence against even those who were at home and hadn’t been part of protests, including the elderly, infirm, and even children.

“Many young Iranians say they have lost their fear of the authorities and have nothing to lose. In some instances protesters have fought back, charging after security forces with rocks, hurling Molotov cocktails, burning police motorcycles and beating officers.”⁷

Women, Students, Youth and Oppressed Nationalities: Driving Forces of the Uprising

Fierce clashes are continuing in the northwest province of Kurdistan and the southeast province of Sistan and Baluchistan. And across Iran, university students have been a driving force maintaining the momentum of protest. More than 130 universities have been the site of nationwide protests and some 400 university students have been arrested. With street protests ebbing and flowing in the face of state repression, university students have done much to maintain the movement’s momentum.⁸

In response, the Islamic Republic is increasingly targeting students, professors and staff at Iran’s universities. Students have been arrested, beaten, shot and killed. Student protesters have been expelled, and teachers are pressured to rat out student demonstrators. The regime has sent in undercover operatives to spy on and target demonstrators.

But the protests have continued. On Tuesday, November 1, students at universities across Iran went on strike and organized sit-ins. Online videos showed young men and women together inside schools, in courtyards, and in roads on or near campuses in the capital Tehran and other cities.

Students are risking expulsion, assault and/or arrest to eat lunch and congregate together—directly attacking gender segregation which is one of the patriarchal pillars of Islamic fundamentalist rule—sometimes literally tearing down walls or barriers to do so. When authorities have closed campus cafeterias students have congregated outside for protest picnics.

The thinking and feelings of these students have been radically changed in beginning ways by the uprising. “As long as I remember, I always wanted, and I couldn't do anything [about the regime and its policies] because I was alone. Now I feel we are united,” one young woman said.

“I guess we're kind of hopeful, too, because, before these protests started, a lot of students my age were planning on emigrating,” another said. “And I guess—at least I'm speaking for myself—that I'm kind of hopeful that I can stay here. We are fighting so we don't have to leave our country behind, we don't have to leave our family behind. And we're fighting so we could build our lives here. A world without Islamic Republic is a better world for everyone.”⁹

There is great potential in such sentiments, but the situation in Iran is very complex and fluid—politically and ideologically. Different political forces are fighting to lead and direct this courageous rebellion toward their own aims. This includes forces in the Iranian diaspora who are demanding the U.S. and other imperialist powers step up their pressure on the Islamic Republic and even intervene. This includes people like Reza Pahlavi, the son of the late pro-U.S. butcher the Shah who was overthrown in 1979 and replaced by the Islamist regime. Pahlavi, who has a mass base of thousands of supporters, has called on the U.S. and other powers to back regime change in Tehran, though without military intervention.

This again underscores the great urgency of spreading the leadership and analysis for a real revolution and a liberating future for Iran and the world being provided by the Communist Party of Iran (Marxist-Leninist-Maoist).