A retrospective on this week's anniversary:
The July 9, 1999 Tehran student rebellion was the single most important movement against the Islamic Republic government. The student movement had steadily got more and more furious against the useless Islamic government who had failed to bring about any changes, even under the name of Khatami’s ‘reformist government’.The students were ready to rebel against the fundamentalist dictatorship. This regime had taken away every beautiful thing from their life.
The July 9 rebellion was triggered by a series of events, including the closing down of the popular reformist newspaper “Salam”. A number of students were key figures in starting the protests however all student groups and movements united together quicker than anyone had thought of, resulting in the sudden attack of the police and the security forces, as well as repeated attacks by the Ansar-e Hezbollah militia who came, killed, and handed what was rest of the freedom loving students of Tehran to take to torture camps at the notorious Evin prison.
The streets near the Tehran University campus were filled by riot police, burnt cars, and Ansar-e Hezbollah thugs who came on motorbikes in series of attacks - they used whatever weapon they had (mainly chains, but also with batons, guns), and did whatever they wanted. The riot police stood back and watched as the huge number of students came in human waves and scared the revolutionary guards away.
The protest in the end was crushed. Will the next round of protest meet a similar fate?
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