Human rights activists said early Tuesday that at least 35 people have been killed in nationwide protests across Iran that began last month, as authorities intensify a crackdown on demonstrations driven by economic frustration.
The Human Rights Activists News Agency, a U.S.-based group that relies on a network of activists inside Iran, said more than 1,200 people have been arrested. Protests have taken place at about 250 locations across 27 of Iran’s 31 provinces, the group said.
Protests in Iran
(Video: Iran International)
According to the organization, the dead include 29 protesters, four children and two members of the security forces. The Associated Press has previously reported that the group has accurately documented casualties in past Iranian protests. Iran’s Fars news agency, which is close to the Revolutionary Guard, reported Monday that 250 police officers and 45 members of the Basij militia—a paramilitary force often deployed to suppress protests—were wounded.
The increase in reported deaths follows a warning by U.S. President Donald Trump, who wrote Friday on Truth Social that if Iran “shoots and violently kills peaceful protesters,” the United States would come to their aid and was “locked and loaded and ready to go.” Ali Larijani, an adviser to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, warned that U.S. intervention would “sow chaos throughout the region” and harm American interests.
Anti-regime protest in Mashhad, Iran
The protests were sparked by anger over Iran’s economic crisis and the sharp fall in the value of the national currency. They are the first major unrest since the recent 12-day conflict with Israel and the largest since the 2022 protests that followed the death of Mahsa Amini after her detention for allegedly violating hijab rules, though the current demonstrations have not yet reached the same scale.
State media coverage has been limited, with most reports coming from opposition-linked outlets and social media videos showing clashes and gunfire by security forces. Supreme Leader Khamenei said Saturday that “the rioters must be put in their place.”
President Masoud Pezeshkian ordered the Interior Ministry to form a special team to investigate events in Ilam province, about 320 miles southwest of Tehran, where activists say protesters were killed and videos appear to show security forces firing on crowds. He also acknowledged an “incident” at a hospital in Ilam, where activists say security forces raided the facility to arrest wounded protesters. Fars has claimed, without evidence, that protesters there were armed.
The U.S. State Department condemned the hospital raid, saying in a post in Persian on X that breaking into wards, beating medical staff and attacking the wounded with tear gas and ammunition was “a clear crime against humanity.”
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A billboard at Tehran’s Palestine Square showing coffins draped with US and Israeli flags and the words, in Hebrew and English, 'Watch out for your soldiers'
(Photo: Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via REUTERS)
Judiciary chief Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei said authorities would show “no tolerance for rioters,” ordering prosecutors to act decisively, while insisting the state distinguishes between protesters and those it labels rioters. The judiciary’s Mizan website reported that police seized weapons and materials for making improvised explosive devices from an alleged hideout.
Conservative newspapers Javan and Kayhan accused Israel and the United States of financing the unrest. Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei said Israel "was seeking to exploit the protests to sow division," amid Iranian fears that Israel could use the unrest as a pretext to strike Iran again.