Iran: Children Among Dead in Latest Protests

Image copyright: AFP [via Al Arabiya News]

The Facts

  • More than a dozen people, including at least two children, have been killed during the latest surge of protests across Iran, as three days of demonstrations and strikes began on Tuesday to mark the anniversary of protests in November 2019.

  • Though Iranian state media reported that gunmen on motorcycles killed seven people in a "terrorist attack" in Izeh on Wednesday, sources close to the families of 9-year-old Kian Pirfalak and 14-year-old Sepehr Maghsoudi told the BBC that they were shot dead by security forces.


The Spin

Anti-Iran narrative

Tehran's theocratic regime has reached a new low in its crackdown against freedom-loving demonstrators, with Khamenei's security forces committing the heinous crime of murdering children. It's clear that anti-regime protests sparked by the death of Mahsa Amini have turned into a revolution against Khamenei's dictatorship.

Pro-Iran narrative

The US and its allies have been instigating violent riots across Iran — they are deeply committed to obstructing the progress and development of the country, even at the cost of the lives of Iranian youths and security officers. After exploiting the natural death of Mahsa Amini, the enemies of Iran are now trying to turn the deaths of children killed in a terrorist attack into a pretext for their attempt to divide the nation.


Metaculus Prediction


Establishment split

CRITICAL

PRO