Total Repression And Air Strikes Bring Unrelenting Dread For Iranians

Fergal KeaneSpecial correspondent


A lady bases on a roof listening to the sounds of the city listed below. There is only the dull hum of traffic tonight. But she knows how quickly that can alter. It is usually the pet dogs who observe the sound first and begin to bark intensely. The sound of aircraft. Then the threatening percussion of surges. A ball of orange rising from an airstrike in a familiar neighbourhood.


The BBC has actually acquired footage and from Tehran which evoke a city of strained nerves, of consistent waiting for the next blast and unrelenting worry of the state security apparatus.


Baran - not her genuine name - is a businesswoman in her thirties. She is now too scared to go to work. "With the start of the drone attacks, nobody attempts to go outside. If I open my door and march, it resembles betting with my life."


She lives alone but is in constant communication with her good friends. "My buddies and I message each other continuously asking where everybody is ... and even when there is no noise the silence itself is scary. I am doing everything I can to survive and witness whatever lies ahead."


Like so numerous young Iranians, Baran saw her hopes of change ravaged in recent months. Thousands of individuals were killed in a crackdown by program forces in January after prevalent demonstrations demanding modification.


"I can not even remember how I used to live in the past without being reminded of the enjoyed one I lost throughout the protests," she says. "I fear tomorrow. I fear the person I will be tomorrow. Today, I endure somehow, but how will I get through tomorrow? That is the real concern. Will I even endure tomorrow?"


Now repression is total. Open dissent is impossible as the state's watchers are everywhere. Footage we obtained shows regime advocates driving through the city in the evening, flags flying from their vehicles - a message to any who might be lured to protest.


The main story is the just one allowed. State television broadcasts video of demonstrations and funerals. Interviews with pro-regime authorities and protestors provide repeated denunciations of America and Israel. In federal government propaganda the Iranian individuals are proclaimed as going to suffer martyrdom.


Independent reporters still try to collect statement that uses a reliable alternative view, however they run the threat of arrest, torture and potentially worse. As one of them informed me: "In wartime conditions you actually don't understand what they can doing."