Total Repression And Air Strikes Bring Unrelenting Dread For Iranians

Fergal KeaneSpecial correspondent


A female bases on a roof listening to the sounds of the city below. There is just the dull hum of traffic tonight. But she knows how easily that can alter. It is normally the dogs who notice the noise very first and begin to bark furiously. The noise of airplane. Then the threatening percussion of explosions. A ball of orange rising from an airstrike in a familiar neighbourhood.


The BBC has actually obtained video and interviews from Tehran which evoke a city of strained nerves, of constant waiting on the next blast and unrelenting fear of the state security device.


Baran - not her genuine name - is a businesswoman in her thirties. She is now too afraid to go to work. "With the start of the drone attacks, no one attempts to go outside. If I open my door and march, it resembles betting with my life."


She lives alone but remains in continuous interaction with her pals. "My friends and I message each other continuously asking where everyone is ... and even when there is no sound the silence itself is scary. I am doing whatever I can to survive and witness whatever lies ahead."


Thus lots of young Iranians, Baran saw her hopes of modification ravaged in recent months. Thousands of people were eliminated in a crackdown by routine forces in January after extensive demonstrations demanding change.


"I can not even keep in mind how I utilized to live in the past without being reminded of the loved one I lost during the demonstrations," she states. "I fear tomorrow. I fear the person I will be tomorrow. Today, I endure in some way, however how will I get through tomorrow? That is the genuine concern. Will I even live through tomorrow?"


Now repression is overall. Open dissent is difficult as the state's watchers are all over. Footage we acquired shows routine advocates driving through the city during the night, flags flying from their cars and trucks - a message to any who may be lured to protest.


The main narrative is the just one allowed. State tv broadcasts video footage of demonstrations and funerals. Interviews with pro-regime officials and protestors offer duplicated denunciations of and Israel. In government propaganda the Iranian individuals are proclaimed as prepared to suffer martyrdom.


Independent journalists still attempt to collect statement that provides a credible alternative view, but they risk of arrest, torture and perhaps worse. As one of them informed me: "In wartime conditions you truly don't understand what they can doing."