03/02/2026
From December 28 to January 10, my country was on fire. Protests started across Iran because people could not take the corruption, poverty, and repression anymore. City after city rose up.
January 9 and 10 were the worst. Security forces cracked down hard. My family described chaos, gunfire, fear, and people disappearing. Unofficial reports from inside Iran say more than 100,000 people were killed during those weeks. I know numbers are debated, but this is what families there are saying. The regime shut down the internet to hide the truth.
I am an Iranian American. My family is still in Iran. I live with survivor guilt every day. I am safe here while they are not. I watched from far away, feeling helpless, waiting for messages to know they were alive.
Even after January 9 and 10, the protests did not stop. Nothing stopped. People kept going. They kept demanding freedom. They kept risking everything.
Now if you show me a picture and say, “Look, Israel killed 100 students,” understand why I question it. Most Iranians I know believe it was a Sepah missile that malfunctioned and hit the school. This is not new for us. They did it in Bandar Abbas. They did it at the Grand Bazaar. We have seen this pattern before.
In January, the regime went into hospitals and killed injured protesters who were there to remove bullets. They were shot in the head on their hospital beds. Some were put in body bags with IV lines still attached. I did not just hear stories. I saw the pictures. If you search the Iran massacre hashtag on Instagram, many of them are still there.
I have seen women tortured in detention so brutally that they did not survive. I have seen teenagers thrown off buildings for protesting for freedom.
So do not lecture me about what is good for my country and what is bad. You do not live this. My family does. For many of us, this feels like our last resort.
Yesterday felt like the best day of our lives in 47 years.