A week of protests has swept Iran, reaching scores of cities and more than half of its provinces. The images are both stirring and moving: a mother, defiantly unveiling beside young daughters; hijab-wearers standing with those consigning their scarves to the flames; women taking to the streets despite facing brutal beatings, teargas and armed police. The unrest erupted over the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini after her arrest by the morality police, who accused her of “inappropriate hijab”. Her family have hotly contested official claims that she died from a heart attack due to underlying conditions. Those who have previously been detained – or whose daughters, aunts or friends have been held – saw not a terrible anomaly but a systemic issue.
Protests on this scale centring women’s rights are extraordinary. Men too are joining the female-led movement. Those involved are more demographically diverse than in recent unrest. The primary demand is not an end to the hijab, but to its imposition. Iran has a long history of ruling on what women can wear: in the 1930s, prohibiting the hijab; after 1979’s revolution, making it mandatory. The details and enforcement of the compulsory dress code have varied over the years; under President Ebrahim Raisi, a hardliner, policing has become harsher. Yet protesters’ cries of “women, life, freedom” go beyond the initial complaint to other concerns about liberty and rights, and a broader sense of injustice – US sanctions have ravaged the economy and, as everywhere, when poverty hits, women have suffered most.
