The weeks-long turmoil in Iran is now being felt here in the Mid-South.
About 200 protesters gathered in Germantown Saturday afternoon to stand in solidarity with the many Iranians speaking out against the country’s fundamentalist government.
The demonstration’s organizers said they are joining other major cities around the country and the world in supporting the protests in Iran. Those protests came after a 22-year-old was killed by the state’s morality police in mid-September for not following the country’s dress code.
The protestors lined the corner of Poplar Avenue and Germantown Road, waving Iranian flags and chanting for freedom.
“We are standing in solidarity with all the people of Iran, not only women now, for the overthrow of the current government,” co-organizer Nick Nikroo said.
Nikroo said he was born in Iran and, until recently, traveled back regularly. After watching the protests unfold over the last month, he and many other Iranian-Americans felt the need to take action.
“Right now the oppression and suppression is so bad in Iran that even if I reveal my face, my family back in Iran would be locked up and I would be under a lot of pressure to go back and turn myself in,” he said.
Other protestors felt the same way. One man, who preferred to be identified only as Sam, said although many of the protesters are American citizens, Iran will always be their home.
“We want our country back,” he said. “This is the least we can do in solidarity with the people in Iran who are being brutally murdered by the regime.”
Ghazal Sadat-Shafai, an Iranian-American medical physicist who took part in the protest said she wanted to show support for those in Iran’s medical field, who have been forced to give up the names of injured protesters being treated in their hospitals.
When doctors spoke up, she said, they were attacked.
“They were attacked by real bullets, and one surgeon unfortunately died,” she said. “This is a war crime.”
Sadat-Shafai said she hopes the people passing by will look deeper into the situation in Iran and the drivers honking and waving out their windows as they drove by were an encouraging sign.
“People are showing their support,” she said. “It means a lot.”
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