The Iranian government’s admission on Saturday that it shot down a Ukrainian commercial airliner triggered widespread protests nationwide attended by hundreds chanting slogans against the regime and the former head of its foreign terrorist organization, Qasem Soleimani.
An American airstrike eliminated Soleimani, officially the head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Quds Force, in Baghdad this month. The IRGC is a U.S.-designated foreign terrorist organization; Soleimani led Iran’s terrorism operations abroad and was particularly active in Iraq and Syria against American soldiers.
Iranian officials claimed that the strike against Soleimani resulted in an unknown Iranian soldier shooting down Ukraine International Airlines (UIA) Flight 752 early Wednesday as Tehran shot over a dozen ballistic missiles at U.S. targets in Iraq, a move meant as a response to Soleimani’s demise. Iran had previously claimed a mechanical error had doomed the flight, where all 176 people on board died, and accused the United States of spreading the “false” rumor that the Iranian military shot a Russian Tor missile at it shortly after takeoff to “manipulate stock markets.”
Fars News Agency, an Iranian regime propaganda outlet, has not retracted an article making that claim on its English-language website at press time despite Iranian military officials admitting they shot the plane.
Fars reported on Monday that hundreds of Iranians – a crowd of up to 1,000 in Tehran – responded to the news with protests. The Iranian people entered Saturday already mourning the death of over 50 people in a stampede at a mandatory funeral for Soleimani. NBC News identified at least five other major urban centers – Isfahan, Hamadan, Sari, Rasht, and Babol – as also experiencing protests. Many congregated around university campuses.
The crowds, images of which appeared on social media Saturday, chanted slogans against the regime, urging Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to step down and tearing up photos of Soleimani. Videos reportedly showed “death to the Islamic Republic” and “death to the dictator” among the chants.
Another round of #IranProtests ; in front of Tehran polytechnic university; “Death to the Islamic republic, down with @Khamenei_fa “ pic.twitter.com/9XUvLmZfbU
— Ali Hamedani (@BBCHamedani) January 11, 2020
تجمع اعتراضی مردم #دانشگاه_امیرکبیر pic.twitter.com/mmQyvRgW7w
— حسین رزاق (@hoseinrazzagh) January 11, 2020
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Tehran, 01/11/2020, People chant "Death to the dictator"#IranPlaneShootdown #IranProtests pic.twitter.com/tqwbykdZIK
— Saeed Ghasseminejad (@SGhasseminejad) January 11, 2020
Al-Arabiya, a Saudi outlet, posted several videos of the protests online in which crowds appear to chant “Soleimani is a murderer,” “don’t be afraid,” and “we’re all together” in Farsi. At least one video also appeared to show the dissemination of tear gas to disperse the crowds.