At the end of Part 1, the Islamic Republic had taken charge of Iran, and despite — or because of — their resistance, the Kurds were suffering especially harsh oppression.
Mass protest and mass oppression
Iran under the mullahs has seen several waves of mass protest, each put down with extreme violence. People protest against the lack of freedoms and also against poor economic conditions and lack of vital services.
In 2019, anti-government uprisings took place in more than two-thirds of Iranian provinces when the government unleashed their security forces, leaving 1500 people dead.
Between then and the 2022 protests triggered by the government killing of Jîna Amini for a misarranged headscarf, there were mass strikes by groups struggling to survive on starvation wages and pensions, protests by farmers unable to get the water needed for their crops, and protests for women’s rights.
There have been more protests about the lack of clean water recently.
The Jîna revolution
The Iranian regime demands the total subservience of women, and it also takes every opportunity to oppress its Kurdish minority. Of the many communities that make up the population of Iran, Kurds have been left with the least to lose, and, despite strongly patriarchal tribal traditions, many Iranian Kurds have also been exposed to the Kurdish Freedom Movement and its focus on women’s freedom.
The 2022 protests, which developed into an uprising, were especially strong in Kurdish areas; and also among the Baluch minority at the other end of the country.
The Kurdish movement’s slogan of “Jin Jiyan Azadi” (“Women, Life, Freedom”) became the call of the resistance, alongside anti-regime slogans such as “Death to the Dictator”.
People rose up in resistance in every province, and there was tremendous support among students, but outside the Kurdish regions the uprising failed to achieve the mass mobilisation of workers needed to stop the functioning of the economy and bring down the government.
The tight grip of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps on every aspect of life has made this much harder to achieve than it was in 1979, and reports of brave and inspiring resistance began to be overtaken by accounts of brutal and sadistic state violence.
Last September, two years on from the uprising, Amnesty International reported that “people in Iran continue to endure the devastating consequences of the authorities’ brutal crackdown” and that “the authorities have also further escalated their assault on human rights, waging a ‘war on women and girls’.” Hengaw Organisation for Human Rights reported that 143 Kurds lost their lives in the uprising.
Although the Iranian Kurdish parties outlawed in Iraq did not intervene practically, they were attacked by Iranian missiles and drones, and under Iranian pressure Iraq has forced them to disarm and relocate away from the border. This has not impacted PJAK, whose guerrilla bases are hidden in the mountains.
Israel remakes the Middle East
There have been seismic changes in the political balance in the Middle East this past year, with Israel, armed and backed by the United States and its Western friends, gaining hegemonic power over an increasing area at the expense of Iran — and Russia.
Besides its genocidal attack on Gaza and the Iranian-backed Hamas, Israel crippled Hezbollah. This seriously weakened the Iranian presence in Syria, and, with Russia — President Assad’s other backer — distracted by its war in Ukraine, Ahmed al-Sharaa and his Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) was able to take control in Damascus.
There is evidence that Britain and the US supported this takeover, and they have been quick to rebrand al-Sharaa from “terrorist” to welcomed head of state.
Israel took advantage of the change of regime in Syria to bomb the country’s military bases and ensure that they will never again be able to challenge Israeli dominance.
For many years Israel has carried out limited attacks against Iran, including assassinations and sabotage, often targeting their nuclear program. Now, with Iran’s regional allies — Hamas, Hezbollah and Assad — weakened or vanquished, the Zionist state is determined to consolidate its dominance.
Israel launched its well-prepared attack on Iran on June 13, which included the assassination of 30 generals and 9 nuclear scientists as well as attacks on nuclear facilities and military resources.
This was framed as preventing the imminent development of an Iranian nuclear bomb, but Israel has been making the same claim that Iran is on the threshold of achieving a bomb for more than a decade.
At the time the attack took place, the US was attempting to negotiate a new deal that would restrict and monitor Iran’s nuclear developments in exchange for lifting sanctions.
As Israel had planned, the US stopped its negotiations and followed Israel with an attack of its own, employing weapons that could penetrate Iran’s underground facilities, which Israel didn’t have the means to do.
It is thought that Israel hoped to draw the US into a full regime-change war, but the US made clear that their intervention was a one off — at least for the time being.
The Kurds
For the Iranian Kurds, this 12-day war brought brief hope that they might be able to use the chaos to build democratic autonomy — as in Syria — alongside fears that, like other attempts at regime change from outside, this would end in years of violence and instability.
PJAK explained that what was happening was “a war of power and conflicting interests, not a war of liberation for peoples and nations”.
More immediate concerns that the Iranian regime would take out their anger on their own minorities and political opponents proved well-founded.
A month after the ceasefire, Hengaw reported that since the beginning of the war at least 1800 people had been arrested, 500 of them Kurds, and that most had been accused of espionage for Israel. While Israel clearly has many spies in Iran, there is no reason to believe that these are the people being arrested, as this is used as a convenient charge for destroying government opponents.
Six people (including three Kurds) have already been executed for espionage. At least 29 civilians were killed by government forces during checkpoint raids, and there has been increased pressure on political prisoners, heavy sentences — including death — for political activists, and an increasing use of the death penalty more generally.
What next?
Israel’s attack was the result of years of planning and demonstrated how deeply Mossad had infiltrated into Iran. However, it is unclear how much damage has been done to Iran’s ability to produce a nuclear weapon, and it can be argued that they now have a much stronger incentive to do so.
Israel was shocked by the extent of the Iranian response and the real damage they managed to inflict in Tel Aviv.
But even after agreeing to a ceasefire, Israel made clear that, as in Lebanon, they have no intention of abiding by this and will cut Iran down to size whenever they want. Their defence minister stated: “I’ve instructed the IDF to prepare an enforcement plan against Iran that includes maintaining Israel’s air superiority, preventing nuclear advancement and missile production, and responding to Iran’s support for terrorist activity against Israel.”
Trump stated at the end of July that if Iran rebuilds their nuclear facilities "we'll wipe it out faster than you can wave your finger at it. We'll have to do that. We will do that openly and gladly.”
Meanwhile plans for the “Zangezur Corridor” could further destabilise the region. This corridor links (pro-Israel) Azerbaijan to Azerbaijan’s Nakhichevan exclave — and hence Turkey — through a slice of Armenian territory along the border with Iran. Under a new agreement, this vital link will be developed and managed by the US, which has been granted a 99-year lease.
The renamed “Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity” will provide a foothold on the Iranian border for the US to continue to exercise imperial control; and what is seen as an east-west link by Azerbaijan and Turkey is regarded as a barrier to north-south trade by Iran and Russia.
There is no end in sight for future fighting — across Iran’s borders and internally.
An Iranian drone killed a PJAK fighter in Iraq on July 19. PJAK retaliated by killing three members of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps.
Meanwhile, alongside the continuing crackdown, Kurds in Iran mourned the deaths of three environmental activists who died fighting wildfires because the Iranian government has no interest in stopping fires that are destroying Kurdish lands.
[Sarah Glynn is a writer and activist. Visit her website and follow her on X or bluesky.]