Today authorities in Iran said 2,000 people have been killed in nationwide protests that have been met with brutal force, the first time the regime has offered a death toll. The regime also blamed the United States and Israel for inciting the protests that have spread throughout the country and mark the most significant threat to the government in several years. “I hope it’s the end of this brutality, this regime and these things that are happening to my people,” says Dr. Shahram Aazam, a former major in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps who fled to Canada more than twenty years ago. In 2003, the regime arrested Canadian photojournalist Zahra Kazemi who was covering a protest outside of a prison in Tehran. Days later, Aazam says Kazemi was brought to his hospital with extensive injuries. “That was the first time I was seeing a tortured body,” he recalled, noting her injuries included missing fingernails, a broken nose and fractured skull. He says a female nurse told him there was obvious signs of rape. Kazemi later died. “There wasn’t any chance it happens by accident,” Aazam says of the 55-year-old’s death. “At the least, she was beaten if not tortured.” In the two decades since he fled Iran, Aazam has watched protests unfold in his home country, all of them met with brutal force. But he says these protests, which are happening in both big cities and small towns, feel different. “I hope it’s the end of this brutality, this regime and these things happening to my people.” It remains difficult to gauge the extent of the protests and subsequent crackdowns in Iran as internet remains cut off. Phone service has recently been restored, though demonstrators at a Toronto rally on Tuesday say calls with loved ones in Iran were short. Thousands gathered outside the U.S. consulate in Toronto, holding signs that read “Make Iran Great Again,” in reference to U.S. president Donald’s Trump promise to protestors in Iran that “help is on the way.” When pressed by reporters today about what that help might look like Trump declined to clarify. “You’re going to have to figure that out, I’m sorry,” he said. The U.S. administration has previously said they want to find a diplomatic solution, but today on social media, Trump vowed to intervene militarily on behalf of the protesters, encouraging them to keep demonstrating. The U.S. president also said meetings with Iranian officials have been cancelled.
