Tehran, Iran – First, Iranian authorities disbanded demonstrations calling for stricter implementation of the country’s dress code rules.
Police dispersed dozens of people who had been camping in front of Parliament for weeks after the QUDS Day rally ended on Friday evening, a national organisation supporting the Palestinian cause.
The protesters were primarily women covered in black chadors, and were there for nearly 50 days to condemn what they consider to be the loose enforcement of forced hijabs.
Iranian women and men are bound by laws passed shortly after the 1979 revolution and adhere to strict dress codes, including hair veils for women, for prison pain, whiplash, or financial penalties.
Why the battle over the hijab?
For decades, Iranian authorities have forced hijabs through patrols by police and security forces.
The country’s so-called “moral police,” known as “Gasht-e Ershad,” or Islamic leadership patrol, closes people on the streets to “defacing public decency,” and are either “reeducated” at designated centres or punished through courts.
That happened to Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old Kurdish woman, in September 2022. He was arrested in Tehran on suspicion of violating the Hijab Act while out with his family.
She died in police custody, and her death sparked nationwide protests for months. Hundreds of protesters and dozens of security forces have been killed in anxiety, and authorities say the US, Israel and other rivals are behind the “riots.”
Hijab has since become more and more hot button topics.
Iranian authorities announced that they would halt the moral police in late 2022, but the white van of the Force quickly revived in the streets of Tehran and other major cities.
More women and men have been arrested or filed lawsuits against them for dress code-related crimes. This ranged from the average Iranian on the streets to journalists and veteran actresses published in public places, as well as businesses and taxi drivers whose clients are deemed to be in violation of the law.
The controversy over the hijab building
In the face of an increase in hijab-related “crimes”, especially in Tehran, where many women go out without a scarf, it is seeking to implement new laws that will increase the power of Iranian authorities to crack down on criminals.
A new Hijab bill defining intense punishments, particularly strengthened fiscal punishments, was passed by Iran’s conservative and dominant parliament in September 2023 under the administration of the late President Ebrahim Raisi.
It was subsequently discussed many times in the Top State, but was ultimately supported by the Guardian Council in September 2024.
However, President Masuud Pezeschkian, who has pledged to pursue essential hijabs through non-traditional methods such as “education,” said his government cannot implement “practical” bills.
After much speculation, Conservative Party Chairman and former military commander Mohammad Bugger Gallibahu confirmed in March that the Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) had finally stopped implementing the bill.
The council agreed that the bill “may cause tensions in today’s society” in the aftermath of the 2022-23 protests, Gallibach told state media, adding that the government and Congress are working to find ways to implement it in the future.
In the meantime, when authorities fight budget crunches under sanctions pressure from President Donald Trump, they launched new efforts to crack down on hijab crime.
They set up cameras in public spaces to identify and punish women found, allowing people to report others and their vehicles for hijab crimes without providing evidence, and levied heavy fines and violated businesses.
Why confront the voices of Prohijab?
Dozens, sometimes hundreds of women, demonstrating in front of Congress, have been making headlines for weeks.
Some local media have been called “ultra revolutionaries” because of their religious enthusiasm and have garnered praise and support from ultra-conservative factions within Iran’s facilities.
They, along with some hard-line lawmakers in Congress, have denounced the Chief of Congress and the complacent president for enforcing the Hijab bill.
They described the doctrine and essential hijabs of Iranian theocratic institutions that the “enemies” wanted to trample.
However, Tehran Governor Hossein Hosz Egbar on Saturday said the demonstrations were “illegal” and warned that police would disband more protests without permission.
He did not state why the demonstrations were tolerated for weeks, comment on the claims made by conservative MP Javad Nikbin, or stated that the demonstrators were paid to be there and were on the bus.
Police confirmed that many women traveled from the urban city of the sacred Shia city, about 150 km (90 miles) south of Tehran.
They also broadcast short videos through national media, showing that police officers are about to reason with screaming protesters, and explaining why they must be disbanded by law before taking action.
In the viral video, filmed by one of the protesters and circulated online, the women behind the camera can be heard screaming and 400 male and female officers descend on them and putting them in vans and dropping them into different parts of Tehran to disperse them.
The woman showed another Chador-covered woman lying on the ground with a bloody face, claiming that the protesters had been beaten.
The state-run Fars News Agency reported that police used “physical means” to end the protests and left demonstrators in the city’s suburbs in the middle of the night.
Police said the video was “staged” in an attempt to influence public sentiment, and the wounds were self-harm.
Politicians with Paydari (Stabufasti) Front, a super-conservative faction whose presidential candidate Saeed Jalili was defeated in last year’s election, have denounced the decision.
Hamid Rasaye, a top Hardline MP for the faction, said anyone who decided to disband the protesters did it “from stupidity or for infiltration.”
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