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How supporters of 'Woman Life Freedom' in Iran rejected Israel's assault
The protests that followed the death in custody of Kurdish woman Mahsa Jina Amini in 2022 were arguably the most significant to rock Iran in decades.
Tens of thousands took to the streets, enraged by the apparent killing of a woman arrested by morality police over how she wore her hijab, which exposed a range of other grievances that exploded into public view.
The slogan "Woman Life Freedom", which has its roots in the pro-Kurdish groups associated with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), was taken up as the mantra of the movement and quickly spread among reformists and opponents of the Islamic Republic.
When Israeli and US attacks began raining down on Iran on 13 June, some critics of the ruling establishment, particularly westerners and Iranians in the diaspora, began talking up the assault as an opportunity for regime change.
That rhetoric was echoed by Israeli officials and even Donald Trump.
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But despite their animosity towards the Islamic Republic, few activists and critics in Iran see a change of governance being born from Israel or the US, or would welcome such a process.
The East Kurdistan Free Women's Society (KJAR) is one of the most prominent Iranian groups associated with the Woman Life Freedom movement.
Letter from death row
Politically followers of PKK co-founder Abdullah Ocalan, the group is no stranger to repression in Iran. One of their members, Verisheh Moradi, who fought against the Islamic State group in Syria, is facing a death sentence for "armed rebellion" over her support for the 2022 protests.
Speaking to Middle East Eye, Deniz Derya - a member of the group's coordination council - said Moradi was currently suffering from serious health issues, including a "cervical disc rupture and spinal canal stenosis".
She also highlighted the deteriorating conditions facing their comrade Zeynab Jalalian, who has endured "years of severe torture" since being first arrested in 2008.
Pakhshan Azizi, another KJAR member, was also sentenced to death in July 2024 over her involvement in the Mahsa Amini protests.
Despite the hardships faced their activists at the hand of the state, however, KJAR has refused to back calls for the US or Israel to overthrow the Islamic Republic by force.
Derya said a project is underway by "global powers" to "reshape the region" through Israel.
'Both the Israeli and Iranian states are fully aware of the transformative power of women'
- Deniz Derya, KJAR
"Wars between nation states have brought nothing but massacres, displacement, poverty and exile to the Middle East and beyond, because such conflicts are driven by state interests, not the interests of the people," she said.
In spite of a ceasefire between Israel and Iran commencing on Tuesday under US pressure, few believe the conflict between the two countries is over, even if it has died down for the moment.
Last week, Moradi joined fellow prisoners Golrokh Ebrahimi Iraee, Sakineh Parvaneh and Reyhaneh Ansarinejad to issue a letter, published by the pro-Kurdish Firat News Agency, from the notorious Evin prison in Tehran.
They accused Israel of committing genocide in Gaza and said its goal was to create a "weak and submissive" Middle East. Israel then bombed the prison.
Derya said there was no real understanding of the implications or desires of the Woman Life Freedom movement by those still wedded to patriarchal ideologies.
"Both the Israeli and Iranian states are fully aware of the transformative power of women. One seeks to co-opt it; the other, to crush it," she said.
"However, the revolutionary uprising [of 2022] showed that, by relying on their own will, the people can bring about profound changes."
Co-opt or crush
The most prominent figure in the Iranian opposition to throw his weight behind the Israeli assault has been Reza Pahlavi, son of the former ruler of Iran whose ouster in 1979 led to the rise of the Islamic Republic.
He expressed a desire to take power in Iran in the wake of the collapse of the current regime, and has praised Israeli and US strikes on the country.
At a speech on Monday hours before the beginning of Trump's ceasefire announcement, Pahlavi gave a news conference in which he mentioned speaking to a woman whose brother was killed during the Woman Life Freedom protests in September 2022.
Deniz Derya, member of the Coordination Council of the Free Women's Community of Eastern Kurdistan (supplied)
"When security forces raided her home, she cried out: 'Oh God, where shall we go? Where shall we go to flee from your tyranny?'" he said.
"One by one, her neighbours began to respond to her: 'We're not going anywhere! They, the regime, are the ones who've got to go!' These words echo in my heart - and should echo in every corridor of power around the world."
Yet many in the opposition, particularly inside Iran, are less than thrilled by the prospect of a Pahlavi returning to power - not least the Kurdish groups who remember the repression meted out against them by his father.
'The regime cannot be done in from the sky. It must be on the ground'
- member of Kurdish Iranian party
They have balked at the use of the "Woman Life Freedom" slogan in social media by Pahlavi, or by his wife Yasmine, or by Benjamin Netanyahu.
A member of a Kurdish independence party - who did not want to be identified - said that Iran's non-Persian population looked on Pahlavi being promoted by foreign media and politicians with dread.
"The non-Persian nations are afraid that he will massacre and oppress them like their fathers and grandfathers," she said.
She added that the dominance of the Persian majority in Iran meant there was little prospect of a popular uprising in the country any time soon and that an "external army" was needed to "liberate" Iranians of other backgrounds.
"The regime cannot be done in from the sky. It must be on the ground," she said.
'Civil society of Iran'
Some supporters of the Woman Life Freedom movement, however, have been somewhat more nuanced in their attitude to the most recent developments.
While refusing to back the attacks on Iran, there are some Iranians who squarely lay the blame for the destruction on the Islamic Republic.
Kawsar Fattahi, a senior member of the left-wing Komala party, said Iran had spent more than 40 years playing up the prospect of war with Israel and the current situation was the result.
'Stop seeing Israel and instead hear the voice of opposition groups'
- Kawsar Fattahi, Komala
"Despite widespread opposition from the 'Woman, Life, Freedom' movement, many hold the belief that this conflict might potentially undermine the government even further," she told MEE.
"But the Iranian people should put an end to the regime."
She said that Komala had no desire for outside forces to overthrow the Islamic Republic - just for the international community to stop "compromising" with it.
Fattahi, who also previously fought the Islamic State group in Iraq as a Peshmerga commander, said the Iranian people began to shatter the Islamic Republic's "gender apartheid" in 2022 with the Mahsa Amini protests
The Israeli co-opting of the "Woman Life Freedom" slogan, she added, was irrelevant in this context.
"Stop seeing them and instead hear the voice of opposition groups," she said.
"Woman Life Freedom is the soul of the civil society of Iran. The movement that can lead Iran to democracy and peace."
What now?
Both Israel and Iran launched missiles on Tuesday after the supposed beginning of Trump's ceasefire.
However, the US president has responded forcefully to Israel, warning Netanyahu against further attacks.
The assault seems to have hardened some views towards outside intervention.
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Narges Mohammedi, a Nobel Prize-winning women's rights campaigner and former political prisoner, who was under house arrest, advocated an end to Iran's nuclear ambitions and the "resignation of the current leaders" of the country during the strikes.
In the wake of the attacks on Tehran, which forced her to flee the capital, she became much more forcefully critical of the strikes, warning like many others that "democracy cannot come through war".
While few believe this marks the end of conflict between Iran and Israel, the pause is likely to lead to recriminations domestically in both countries.
Iranian authorities are already thought to have arrested scores of alleged Israeli spies since Israel launched its attacks on 13 June.
Fattahi said that she was concerned that in the coming days - assuming no more Israeli or US strikes were forthcoming - the Iranian state would come down on suspected collaboraters and opposition groups like a tonne of bricks.
"For the time being, it is unclear what the outcome of this conflict will be, but if it does not destabilise the Iranian government completely, it will lead to even more repression of its own people, particularly Kurdish groups," she said.
"For the simple reason that they are so terrified of a popular rebellion that they are willing to resort to extreme measures like mass imprisonment and executions of inmates to prove that they are still in control."
