Tehran medic: 'Direct shots to the heads of young people'

Death toll in Iran protest crackdown said to pass 115; Trump reportedly considering strike

Staff at hospitals overwhelmed: ‘Bodies stacked in prayer rooms’; US president given military options; internet cut for over 60 hours; foreigner detained, accused of spying for Israel

Nationwide protests challenging Iran’s theocracy reached the two-week mark Sunday, as the death toll in the brutal crackdown rose to at least 116 people killed, activists said. Some Iranian opposition groups said the death toll appeared to be much higher.

With the internet down in Iran and phone lines cut off, gauging the demonstrations from abroad has grown more difficult.

Monitor NetBlocks said there has been virtually no connectivity since Thursday, over 60 hours earlier. Images and footage from Saturday appeared to show that street lighting was switched off in some areas where protesters gathered.

But the death toll in the deadly crackdown has grown to at least 116 and over 2,600 others detained, according to the US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency. The agency has been accurate in multiple rounds of previous unrest in Iran.

Anti-regime outlet Iran International said “estimates indicate” that 2,000 people were killed in a 48-hour period. The toll was significantly higher than those reported by other groups, but other accounts also indicated that lethal force was being used against protesters at alarming rates as officials indicated they would escalate efforts to crack down on the demonstrations.

Staff at three hospitals in Iran told the BBC that their medical facilities were overwhelmed with people killed or wounded during the protests.

A medic at a Tehran hospital told the British broadcaster there were “direct shots to the heads of the young people, to their hearts as well.”

A hospital worker in Tehran said the number of protesters killed was so high that the hospitals were struggling to cope, often unable to even give CPR to the mainly young victims.

“The number was so large that there wasn’t enough space in the morgue; the bodies were placed on top of one another,” she told the BBC. “After the morgue became full, they stacked them on top of one another in the prayer room.”

Iranian state TV reported on security force casualties while portraying control over the nation, without discussing dead demonstrators, whom it increasingly refers to as “terrorists.”

However, it also acknowledged protests went on into Sunday morning, with demonstrations in Tehran and in the holy city of Mashhad to the northeast.

Crowds gathered again on Saturday in the north of the Iranian capital, setting off fireworks and banging pots as they shouted slogans in support of the ousted monarchy, according to video verified by AFP.

Other videos, that AFP could not immediately verify, showed demonstrations in other parts of the capital where protesters shouted anti-government slogans.

Other images disseminated on social media and by Persian-language television channels outside Iran showed similarly large protests elsewhere in the capital, as well as in the eastern city of Mashhad, Tabriz in the north and the holy city of Qom.

In the western city of Hamedan, a man was shown waving a shah-era Iranian flag featuring the lion and the sun.

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has signaled a coming clampdown, despite US warnings.

Tehran escalated its threats Saturday, with the Iran’s attorney general, Mohammad Movahedi Azad, warning that anyone taking part in protests will be considered an “enemy of God,” a death-penalty charge. The statement carried by Iranian state television said even those who “helped rioters” would face the charge.

Meanwhile, US President Donald Trump offered support for the protesters, saying on social media that “Iran is looking at FREEDOM, perhaps like never before. The USA stands ready to help!!!”

The New York Times and Wall Street Journal, citing anonymous US officials, said on Saturday night that Trump had been given military options for a strike on Iran, but hadn’t made a final decision.

The Times said Trump was “seriously considering” authorizing a strike on Iran, and that a range of options has been presented to the US president, including strikes on non-military targets in Tehran.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke on the phone Saturday morning with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, The New York Times reported, citing three unnamed sources.

The State Department separately warned: “Do not play games with President Trump. When he says he’ll do something, he means it.”

Foreigner accused of spying for Israel

The semiofficial Tasnim news agency, close to the Revolutionary Guard, claimed authorities detained nearly 200 people belonging to what it described as “operational terrorist teams.”

It alleged those arrested had weapons including firearms, grenades and gasoline bombs.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards’ intelligence wing said it had arrested a foreigner suspected of spying for Israel, the semi-official Tasnim news agency reported on Saturday.

Iranian authorities accuse the US and Israel of fomenting the unrest and frequently arrest people and accuse them of spying without providing evidence.

Meanwhile, concern is growing that the internet shutdown will allow Iran’s security forces to go on an even more bloody crackdown, as they have in other rounds of demonstrations.

Ali Rahmani, the son of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Narges Mohammadi who is imprisoned in Iran, noted that security forces killed hundreds in a 2019 protest “so we can only fear the worst.”

“They are fighting, and losing their lives, against a dictatorial regime,” Rahmani said.