Iran: A War Stolen From View

Why Iranians are standing alone — and why the world refuses to hear their call for freedom

I wrote this because nothing feels normal anymore.
Because once again, the headlines are filled with names of places that aren’t ours, and with analyses that don’t see us.
Because once again, in the name of peace, we’re being told to stay silent.

But I saw it.
I saw my brothers and sisters killed in 2022 — one by one.
On the streets. In prison. At home.
Just like in 2019. Just like in 2020, when Iran shot down a civilian Ukrainian plane.
Just like all the years before, as generation after generation, freedom in Iran has been quietly executed — by bullets, by poverty, by censorship.
And still, no one calls it a war.

But Iran is at war.
Not a war like Ukraine. Not a war like Gaza.
This war did not begin with tanks or bombs — it began with compulsory veils, with humiliation, with fear.
It began in school. At university. With a strand of hair. With a quiet “no.”
And it peaked in the streets, with the blood of unarmed youth.

But the world didn’t see it.
The world still refuses to see it.

The Iranian regime came to power in 1979, promising freedom and independence.
What it built was a theocratic military dictatorship:
A lifelong Supreme Leader. Rigged elections. Journalists in jail. Torture. Rape. Public hangings. Forced confessions.
And behind it all: silence — a silence bought with oil and diplomacy.

But the people of Iran are not that regime.
They are young, educated, cultured, critical — and more awake than ever.
And despite decades of oppression, they rose again.
In 2022, after the killing of Mahsa Amini, they returned to the streets.
Thousands were killed. Thousands imprisoned. Eyes were shot out. Voices crushed.
And not a single Western government, not one global institution, acknowledged the quiet genocide.

The regime claims to be the defender of Palestine and the voice of resistance.
But this is not solidarity — it is strategy.
A tool to deflect from its crimes, to buy legitimacy, to justify violence.
For years, Iranians have chanted: “Not Gaza, not Lebanon — my life for Iran.”
Not out of cruelty — out of suffocation.
Because every time Iranians protest, the regime silences them in the name of Palestine.
Every time we suffer hunger, inflation, poverty, they say it’s the price of supporting “the oppressed.”
But Palestinians are not our enemies. Neither are the Lebanese. Nor the Israelis.
Our enemy is a regime that uses the pain of others to justify killing its own.

The West — America, France, Germany — claim to stand for human rights.
But history shows otherwise.
It was the U.S. that facilitated Khomeini’s rise.
It was France that gave him exile and a platform.
And for decades, Europe has traded with Iran — out of fear of a power vacuum.
Biden, Macron, Scholz — none of them spoke out about the massacres of 2022.
Even when 15,000 protesters were arrested, the world stayed silent.

The West does not care about freedom. It cares about stability.
It does not care about people. It cares about oil.
Any regime that is “manageable” is deemed “acceptable” — even if it kills.

The UN? The Islamic Republic sits on its Human Rights Council.
The Hague? No case against Khamenei, Raisi, or the Revolutionary Guards.
UNESCO? Defends the hijab as “cultural heritage.”

These are not institutions. They are stage props.
Today’s global order is not built on justice, but on force and lobbying.
It’s a jungle — dressed in a suit.

We do not hate Palestinians. We are just tired of lies.
We are not afraid of Israel. We are afraid of censorship.
We are not colonizers, not occupiers, not extremists.
We just want to live.

We are not traitors. We are a people robbed of their country.
We are not rootless. We are not voiceless. Our voice has simply been silenced.

If Iran is still alive today, it is because a generation —
without weapons, without leadership, without global support —
stood up to bullets with nothing but a cry for freedom.

And this generation will not forget.