What Is the Protest Movement in Iran Doing During the War

The immediate catalyst for the December 2025 uprising was sharp depreciation of the Iranian rial, rising inflation, and widespread shortages. International sanctions have severely constrained Iran’s ability to earn foreign currency, while domestic policies have failed to stabilize the economy or provide job opportunities, particularly for young people. The combination of external pressure and internal mismanagement created conditions where basic goods became expensive and scarce—a situation that directly affects survival and living standards rather than abstract political principles.

What distinguishes this movement from purely political revolutions is its foundation in material hardship that affects every family. Comparison between other Middle Eastern uprisings shows that movements rooted in both economic desperation and political grievance tend to be more durable than those driven by ideology alone. However, this also means the movement is vulnerable to temporary economic relief: if the government were to genuinely address inflation or shortages, some protest momentum could dissipate even if underlying political problems remain unresolved.

What Is the Scale of Government Crackdown and Violence?

Ali Khamenei reportedly ordered the use of live fire against protesters, resulting in what observers have described as “the largest massacres in modern Iranian history.” Thousands of deaths—the exact number remains uncertain due to communication blackouts—represent a level of violence that suggests the government views the movement as an existential threat rather than a temporary disturbance requiring crowd control. This scale of lethal force is a warning about the movement’s power: governments typically resort to mass killing only when they perceive they are genuinely at risk of losing control.

The warning for observers and protesters themselves is that this level of violence typically escalates further if the movement appears to be approaching success or if it becomes perceived as gaining international support or coordination with foreign powers. Khamenei’s death in late February 2026 created succession uncertainty, yet the government’s response was intensified crackdown rather than conciliation, suggesting that security forces and remaining leadership believe further repression is their only option.

Who Are the Core Participants and How Are They Organizing?

Generation Z makes up a visible core of the movement, reflecting the fact that young Iranians have spent most or all of their lives under international sanctions and understand the current system as the only Iran they know. Rather than organizing through formal political parties or established opposition groups, the movement operates through neighborhood networks, family connections, and social communication that is harder to infiltrate than formal organizations.

This makes the movement harder to decapitate—removing individual leaders does not collapse the structure—but also means it has limited ability to formulate detailed alternative policies or negotiate coherent demands. The role of women in these protests has been particularly notable, with women prominent in rooftop chants and street gatherings, continuing the tradition of female activism established during the 2022 protests over Mahsa Amini’s death.

What Does the Movement’s Continuation After Khamenei’s Death Suggest?

When Ali Khamenei was killed on February 28, 2026, some analysts expected protests might pause while the country processed succession and potential further military escalation. Instead, protests continued and the government responded with renewed security operations and internet shutdowns.

This response suggests that Iran’s new leadership fears the movement as much as the previous government did—perhaps more, given the uncertainty of their own legitimacy during succession. The continued willingness of Iranians to protest despite active warfare and demonstrated lethal force indicates that the economic and political crisis has become so severe that the risk of participating in protests is acceptable to many people relative to the certainty of deteriorating conditions if nothing changes. Looking forward, the intersection of succession uncertainty, continued military conflict, and economic deterioration creates an unpredictable situation where the movement’s next phase remains unclear—but its persistence through multiple escalations suggests it has become a defining feature of Iranian politics regardless of who holds power.

Conclusion

Iran’s protest movement is doing what civilian populations often do when they believe their government has become untethered from their basic needs and interests: it is refusing to participate in the government’s preferred narrative and is instead insisting on its own priorities. The movement’s continuation during the 2026 war, despite thousands of deaths and repeated internet shutdowns, demonstrates that for many Iranians, economic survival and government accountability matter more than national mobilization for external conflicts.

The movement’s decentralized nature, generational composition, and rooting in material hardship make it resilient, but also limit its ability to negotiate concrete outcomes or articulate detailed alternatives. What happens next depends on whether Iran’s leadership can address the underlying economic and political crises that triggered the uprising, or whether continued repression and external military engagement will deepen the legitimacy crisis the government faces. The movement itself will likely continue in some form as long as the conditions that created it—economic collapse, political exclusion, and government prioritization of foreign conflicts over domestic welfare—remain unaddressed.

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