On Thursday 8 January, Iran went dark. In the midst of massive national protests, the government shut down the internet, phone calls, and almost all communication out of the country. That evening a violent crackdown began. In some cities, government forces opened fire on crowds, killing thousands – according to some estimates, possibly tens of thousands – in two days of bloodshed. The internet blackout has meant that a clearer picture of what happened – drawn from witness reports, videos, photographs and testimony from hospitals – has taken time to assemble.
When the violence began, there were demonstrations taking place in more than 200 cities, according to human rights groups. This is the story of what unfolded in one of them.
Thursday 8 January
5pm
At the moment the Iranian authorities shut down the internet, Ali*, 36, and his friends were already marching toward Shariati Street, which runs along the edge of the grand bazaar in Rasht, central Iran. By the time they reached the road, thousands of people were already there, chanting freedom slogans.
The protests had been building since Tuesday, with people from smaller surrounding cities making their way to Rasht to join them. They flocked to the city’s grand bazaar: a vibrant, historic marketplace, sprawling across a hive of interconnected streets. The market’s location near the Haj Mojtahed mosque and at the intersection of arterial city streets made it the heart of Rasht’s bustling life – and a natural hub for the demonstrators. That evening, its narrow streets were packed. “I would estimate there were more than 20,000 people surrounding the alleys and the boulevards near the bazaar,” says Ali.
People of every age were there, he says. “My friend brought along his wife and his two daughters, one nine and the other 12. We were all so happy and felt united to be together for freedom.” Even when they realised that the internet had been cut off, he wasn’t worried. “It didn’t matter if there was no internet or no calls. We were all in this together and didn’t feel any danger.”
About a kilometre north-west of Shariati Street was Siamak*, 40. He had been cautious about joining the demonstrations, saying that the atmosphere had felt heavy as crowds swelled across the city. But he understood why they were there.
“People were pushed to their limits. We couldn’t afford the basics,” Siamak says. He had been at the bazaar earlier that week, buying 2kg (4.4lb) of tangerines. They cost him 580,000 tomans, or about £3.40 – more than a day’s pay for Iranians on the minimum wage. “Everything just felt unaffordable. People just stood there, unable to buy food. That triggered the anger,” he says.
As he drove through the city, Siamak saw old people, children, entire families joining the march. Groups of teenagers jumped out of cars and headed to the market. “I lowered the window of my car and told them, ‘May god protect you, I hope you are safe.’” But as the day wore on, he felt reassured that the people were strong in numbers. “By Thursday afternoon, the conversations changed,” he says. “People felt ashamed for staying home. Parents spoke about their children and still said, ‘Why shouldn’t we go?’ It was no longer about money. It was about dignity.” He, too, joined the thronging crowds.
8pm
As night fell over the bazaar and surrounding streets, no one was going home. Making your way through the crowds took time. From Moallem Boulevard, about 15 minutes’ walk from the bazaar, Siamak had slowly wound his way through sidestreets to Rasht’s Municipality Square, which lies on the same block as the market. He climbed up to a rooftop to get a view. “The crowd was massive,” he says. Every street was packed.
Over on Shariati Street, Ali and his friends chanted slogans as they got closer to the alleys near the bazaar. The atmosphere felt jubilant, Ali says – when suddenly, he felt something shift. “The feeling of victory turned to fear,” he says, “I can’t explain the seconds before the catastrophe. I can’t explain how that felt. Our hearts were racing. We were being surrounded by security forces and plainclothes officers with masks.” He saw a set of white Toyota Hilux vehicles with machine guns making their way into the crowds. Even at this point, he says, he and his friends were not really afraid – they could not imagine what was to come next.
From just outside the market, Siamak recognised the sounds of shooting.
“I heard explosions and nonstop gunfire coming from the direction of the bazaar. People started running out toward the surrounding streets. Some were screaming. Some were bleeding. From them, we learned what was happening inside,” he says.
Soon, he smelled smoke and saw a red light in the sky. A fire was engulfing the market.
8.30pm
Ali thinks it was probably about 8.30pm when he spotted that the market was burning. It is not clear exactly where, when and how the flames started, but “the fire spread rapidly”, he says. “People inside were in a dilemma, whether to run towards us or to save those in the fire. As soon as the smoke started to spread, and we were trying to make space, we saw huge crowds fleeing the fire and running towards the street.” Then, the security forces began to shoot.
“The security forces began shooting at the fleeing crowds,” he says. “I saw people being shot directly in the head, with AK47, G3 and also Dushka guns. It was as if you could see how hell burns. I still can’t explain to you what I saw.” One group of guards started firing in his direction, and Ali and his friends ran for cover.
As crowds poured out of the market and into surrounding streets, Siamak asked those fleeing what was happening. “They said the municipal market and bazaar had been set on fire. Firefighters were not allowed to enter. The bazaar’s narrow alleys trapped people. When the fire spread, people were forced to choose: stay inside and burn, or come out.
“When they came out, they were shot.”
Iran’s state media says the bazaar and one of its mosques were “burned down by foreign-backed rioters”. Outside the market, Ali says he was witnessing a massacre first-hand.
“I can’t, I really can’t find the words to tell you what I saw. People were trying to stop the fire, but there was a group of plainclothes people who attacked crowds trying to put out the fire and the same group stopped the firefighters from entering the bazaar. They had completely trapped people and also shot those who fled.”
Ali says the bazaar was already on fire when he saw the Haj Mojtahed mosque engulfed by flames.
“I still can’t analyse in my head what happened in front of my eyes. I saw kids being shot, women, old people … I can’t tell you. I saw lots of them shot in their head and blood pouring out on the streets,” he says. Security forces and armed, plainclothes men “went behind those fleeing, shot them – it was like they chased the ashes and burned the ashes down too”.
“I will never recover from what I witnessed. Never again, do I want to see this in my life.”
9pm-midnight
For Siamak, the aftermath was as catastrophic as the initial chaos. “I saw people collapsing on the streets leading away from the bazaar,” he says. “Shooting came from multiple directions. There were loud explosions, what people called sound bombs. White Toyota Hilux vehicles filled with masked forces were positioned under bridges and at exits.”
Word spread that those who survived the first shots inside the bazaar were being “finished off” by men with guns if they got out. “They didn’t let the wounded live,” he says, overcome with emotion.
A number of human rights groups have reported that authorities did not allow fire engines to access the bazaar to put out the flames until after midnight. As the shops and houses burned, Ali and Siamak retreated from the chaos, but returned later that night to see what remained.
2am
In the early hours of the morning, Ali and his friends went back to check on the streets surrounding the bazaar. It looked like about 500 shops had been burned and patches of flames were still burning, he says. “It looked like the city was burning to ashes. It was like a bad dream.” Some bodies had been carried from the ruins and lay on the streets, burned beyond recognition.
“I don’t think there’s any way [families could identify their loved ones], other than a DNA test,” he says.
At the city’s hospitals and clinics, the injured were flooding in. According to a doctor [not named due to fear of reprisals] who compiled reports from emergency department doctors in Rasht, the hospitals received “hundreds of burn victims from the Rasht bazaar area, including bodies recovered with partial charring and patients with extensive third- and fourth-degree burns who died in subsequent days”. They also reported “hundreds of patients presenting with combined gunshot and burn injuries, consistent with individuals being shot while fleeing the burning area”.
The pattern of injuries and fatalities documented by medics, the doctor says, “resembles what might be expected in urban combat scenarios rather than conventional crowd-control”.
Dawn
When Ali went back to look again at about 5am, the bodies on the streets had been removed.
What happened in Rasht “leaves no doubt about the authorities’ intentions,” says Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam, director of Norway-based NGO Iran Human Rights. “The city was turned into a killing field; people were hunted in alleys, shot in the streets, burned out of hiding places, and executed when wounded. This was a clear example of a crime against humanity under international law.”
For Siamak, who has since fled the country, the memory of what happened – and what families faced in the following days – is agonising. “Families were forced to pay large sums to retrieve bodies,” he says. “Those who couldn’t pay lost them.” Some families hid bodies in cars overnight. Others buried loved ones secretly – sometimes in gardens, sometimes in unmarked graves.
“After the massacre, the city felt destroyed,” he says. “No internet. No communication. Everywhere I went, I heard that someone else had died. It felt like prison – total isolation.”
*Names have been changed to protect identities
