On the eve of the anniversary of the November 2019 uprising, the Iranian regime killed another innocent girl under the pretext of violating the compulsory hijab. The girl was 17-year-old Armita Geravand, who suffered a brain injury on October 1 when a “hijab-ban” officer attacked her in the Tehran subway. She died on October 28 after being in a state of coma under extreme security measures and censorship. Her innocent and pale face during her hospitalization and her death is a depiction of the history of Iranian teenagers and youth, especially girls, living in the hell created by the mullahs.
A common line in the repression of women and girls
The mullahs’ regime killed the oppressed Armita while before him had deprived many women and girls of their lives on the same pretext. The hand that hit Armita as she entered the subway was the same hand that landed the horrific blow on Gina (Mahsa) Amini‘s temple. This dark hand is the same hand that pushes Iranian women and girls to hit their heads on the edge of sidewalks. We have seen how the same hands beat batons on their temples and shot them in the eyes during the 2022 uprising. This is the same hand that killed Mahsa Amini, Nika Shakarami, Ghazaleh Chalabi, Hananeh Kia, Mahsa Mugui, Hadis Najafi, Shirin Alizadeh, Asra Panahi, Arnika Ghaem Maghami, Fereshteh Ahmadi, Yalda Aghafazli, Aylar Haghi, Aida Rostami, and other innocent Iranian women and girls.
It is the same hand that killed Nikta Esfandani in 2019 and Neda Agha Soltan in 2009.
It is the same hand that hanged thousands of PMOI girls in the black summer of 1988 and shot the women and girls of PMOI in the stormy days after June 20, 1981.
Crime Concealment
This time, Iran’s supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, knew that Armita, like Gina, might be the trigger of a social explosion like the 2022 uprising. All the measures they took were aimed at preventing a social explosion. These measures are now familiar to the Iranian people:
1 – Preventing journalists from entering the site and even arresting a journalist who tried to figure out how it happened.
2 – Removing the original news and spreading fake news to whitewash the regime’s crime.
3 – Pressuring Armita’s family to say that the incident to their daughter was caused by “low blood pressure, losing her balance and hitting her head to the edge of a subway car.”
4 – Controlling the scene of the accident and releasing doctored footage to dismiss the real issue. In this regard, the CCTV camera footage released was carefully selected to serve the regime’s scenario.
5 – Not giving clear answers to UN representatives and officials and human rights organizations who wanted to know the details of this crime.
6 – Forcing Armita’s classmates to make interviews that were in line with the regime’s narrative.
7 – Taking Armita to a military hospital, putting her under control and preventing news leaks to social media.
8 – Engineering the news regarding Armita’s brain death to reduce social sensitivity.
9 – Announcing Armita’s death amid the regime’s propaganda projects about the war in Gaza. This was specifically done to prevent social outrage.
10 – Not allowing Armita’s family to bury her body in her hometown.
The blood that rises
These measures may temporarily save the misogynistic religious fascism from an immediate outpouring of popular anger, but they will not ensure the regime’s survival. Now everyone knows that Armita’s death was not an accident, or a mistake, or a single manifestation. She is neither the first victim of this regime nor the last of them. As long as this regime is in power, its first victims are innocent Iranian women and girls. The uproar of the war in Gaza cannot cover the main problem: the Iranian people’s relentless efforts against this brutal and bloody regime.
The people of Iran are not deceived by the crocodile tears of the regime’s officials for the children of Gaza. A government that denies the children of its land the right to life under false pretexts also uses the tragedies taking place in Gaza as fuel for its warmongering projects.
Like any other unjustly spilled blood on execution poles and Iran’s streets, Armita’s blood will rise in the popular rage to overthrow the mullahs’ regime.
