As the deadline for an appeal of the death sentence of rebel rapper Toomaj Salehi looms,^[1] Iran’s Islamic Republic (IRI) continues a surge in executions with a reported 40 prisoners being executed by hanging in just the first 10 days of May. The World Coalition against the Death Penalty estimates there are 5,000 prisoners “currently under the death sentence” for various offenses under Iran’s draconian Sharia law. Weeks before the execution order for Toomaj, Amnesty International alerted:

‍The number of executions in 2023… marks a 48% increase from 2022 and a 172% increase from 2021. Iran’s killing spree is continuing into 2024.... Execution numbers recorded by Amnesty International are minimum figures and the organization believes the real number is higher.^[2]

Many of the executions are for “drug-related” charges which are supposedly prohibited by international legal standards as these disproportionately consist of the poor and ethnic minorities, e.g., in Iran, the Baluch are about 5% of the population but are 20-30% of those executed in recent years.^[3]

Yet the evidence indicates that the IRI is using executions as revenge against political dissidents including targeting the most beloved and defiant voices such as outstanding rap artist Toomaj. He is a representative and example of the uncompromising Woman, Life, Freedom uprising of and for women. The executions surge coincides with other ultra-repressive measures, such as the recent “Noor Plan” using police/vigilante violence, even using drones and facial recognition tools to demonize, brutalize and terrorize Iran’s women and their supporters.^[4]

The historic Woman, Life, Freedom uprising (2022-2023) had won the support of millions around the world as it rocked all of society in Iran and set the misogynistic mullah regime back on its heels. The ever-intensifying repression since then serves to bolster the regime’s damaged legitimacy, to reassert social control and as warning against further resistance, especially among women and youth rebels. If the IRI gets away with an unopposed murder of Toomaj, it can open the floodgates to kill off many more (e.g., those lesser known). His execution order is in itself an outrage but also a live threat to all political prisoners there. A commensurate response to this is needed by the world’s lovers of justice, art and Iran’s heroic “best of the best” resisters who refuse to be victims and model prisoners.

Rising Resistance Faces Off with Execution Surge

There are many posts on social media of widespread graffiti by youth and others across Iran against the execution of Toomaj and against forced hijab. There are many forces, including political prisoners, issuing statements and protests by the Iranian Diaspora as we reported on last week.

‍

In several of Iran’s prisons, the courageous “no to executions” Black Tuesday weekly hunger strike is now into its 15^th week. There have been protests of various sizes against execution, including one in Lordegan where a doctor held up a sign against executions of political prisoners and was jailed. Many took the opportunity of the widespread actions and concern about Toomaj to hold posters and spread information about him, but also other less well-known political prisoners on death row.

More than 100 figures from the worlds of music, culture and human rights activism—including Coldplay, Sting and Margaret Atwood—have signed an Index on Censorship statement calling for Toomaj’s immediate, unconditional release.

This has been echoed by many artists, activists and revolutionaries around the world, including on May Day 2024 and in viral posts of thousands on social media. Quemar La Jaula held a “Day of Culture for the Life of Rebel Rapper Toomaj Salehi” in Medellín, Colombia on May 11. They have been subtitling music videos in Spanish to bring Toomaj’s searing lyrics to the Spanish speaking audience.

All this is heightening the stakes for the IRI which has responded by doubling down on repression and executions. Last week, the IRI even confirmed the sentence of world-renowned film director Mohammad Rasoulof to 8 years in prison and flogging (whipping!) after he refused to withdraw his latest film from the 2024 Cannes Film Festival. It also arrested other rappers, Danial Moghaddam and Wafa Ahmadpour, holding them in solitary for posting a protest video “Be Ready.” The attacks on artists are part of suppressing a whole society’s ability to dream.

U.S. and Iran Are Both Gangsters but the U.S. Is the O.G.

In the context of the extremely fraught and dangerous situation in the Middle East, where the genocidal assault on Gaza escalates with Israel’s invasion of Rafah, a yet relatively small but growing number of voices inside Iran and in the Iranian Diaspora are fighting to link their struggle against the executions of Iran’s oppressive theocratic regime with the struggle to stop the U.S./Israeli genocide in Gaza. A statement from a group in the Iranian Diaspora @NoToExecutionCampaign, posted a call for Iranians broadly to stand against Israel’s genocide in Palestine, and for

…all liberators … to combine the protests of ‘no to execution’ and ‘no to Islamic Republic’ with ‘no to war’ so that both sides do not commit crimes against humanity, i.e., neither the Islamic Republic and its proxy groups in the region nor the Israeli criminal regime should take advantage of this strategic situation. (excerpted and translated by IEC volunteers)

Immediately upon learning of Toomaj’s execution order, our campaign jumped into the fray with our statement to Defend the life of Toomaj with its clarifying political demands.

Many of the IEC’s Emergency Appeal signers (e.g., Noam Chomsky, Raymond Lotta, etc.) are well versed in the original genocidal history of the U.S. and why the IEC demands are on point. Now, as the U.S. imperialists and IRI traffic in pointing fingers at each other’s crimes to score political points, it is at the expense of real lives of the people in Iran, Gaza and around the world as to who is the supposed “liberator.” The IEC statement makes clear that we—the people of the world—are the ones we must mobilize in our own interests to act now and not look to or rely on these oppressive regimes and their institutions or mouthpieces.

Over 100 people have signed on to the IEC statement on defending the life of Toomaj. This includes people or groups from Canada, Bangladesh, Germany, Italy, Belgium, Great Britain, Australia, South Africa, Malaysia, Colombia, Iceland, Ireland, and France. It includes individuals from organizations (for identification by individual signers only) like Veterans for Peace, MAWO-Mobilization Against War and Occupation (Canada), an Amnesty International chapter member in the U.S., Zanan Group of Northern California, The Dogdoge Collective (Bangladesh), Bangladesh Students Federation and Bangladesh Students Front. Some notable renowned voices of conscience include author/playwright Ariel Dorfman, Mothers of Khavaran’s Mansoureh Behkish and poets Farnaz Fatemi, Rafael J. Gonzalez and D.L. Lang, as well as Ron Jacobs (Counterpunch), Jamileh Davoudi (Journalist, and Zanan Group of Northern California), Jennifer Moore (University of New Mexico Law School), and Gregory "Joey" Johnson (flag burner and Revcom Corps).

We call on everyone to continue sharing our statement and urging others to sign it as part of advancing the struggle to defend Toomaj’s life in the coming tense days and to free ALL Iran’s political prisoners.

_______________

FOOTNOTES:

1. For details on the development of Toomaj’s case, see IEC’s #FreeToomaj Resource page.

2. Iran executes 853 people in eight-year high amid relentless repression and renewed ‘war on drugs’, Amnesty.org, April 4, 2024.  

3. Ibid.

4. Iran’s Theocrats Launch New Offensive in a War on Hijab-free Women amid Escalating War with Zionist Israel, FreeIransPoliticalPrisonersNow.org, April 24, 2024.

____________________________________________________________

 “Execute Us Instead of Toomaj,” say 500+ Veterans & Their Families in Iran

On May 1, 2024, a letter to Iran's regime was posted by hundreds of veterans of the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war. The signers included family members of soldiers who died in that war. The horrific suffering from this U.S.-funded war^[5] is repeatedly cited by the Islamic Republic as a reason the population should sacrifice to support it—which makes this statement all the more damaging to them. Below is an excerpt translated by IEC volunteers of the Telegram post which continues to collect signatures, up to about 500 as of May 9 (translator additions in brackets, emphasis added).

“A government that is responsible for poverty and inequality, corruption, inefficiency, unemployment, inflation, water and resource management crisis, air and soil pollution, brain drain and loss of human capital, and tens of crises and super-crises, sends the armed forces to the streets every day to intimidate and terrorize. Instead of the trial of the corrupt and the land-grabbers, we witness the disgraceful death sentence for a young protesting artist.
O rulers, come and execute us instead of Toomaj…..Empty the pepper spray on our faces, as we have a long history of inhaling mustard gas. Aim the bullets at us, as we have [experienced] Saddam’s shrapnel and arrows. Arrest us for keeping silent on all these atrocities and the desecration of our youth and girls. Finally, we warn you before it is too late to stop threatening and intimidating the youth and disturbing the public’s mind every day, do not lead the country to collapse.”

^[5] In 1980, as part of a strategic approach to weakening the IRI, the U.S. gave Iraq’s Saddam Hussein a green light to invade Iran, and then worked to turn the Iran-Iraq War into an eight-year bloodbath. U.S. allies supplied Iraq with billions in weapons and material that Hussein turned into chemical weapons, which he used on Iranians as well as Iraqi Kurds. The U.S. also supplied Iran and played both sides against each other to prevent either from winning. When the war ended, an estimated one million Iraqis and Iranians had been killed. Larry Everest, Oil, Power & Empire: Iraq and the U.S. Global Agenda, Chapter 4—“Arming Iraq, Double-Dealing Death in the Gulf”  

Here is the battlefield, whatever color you are. Come. Something is missing without you…. Don’t call us [just] rebels. We came for revolution.…We come into the streets like ghosts and become a nightmare for government, We see the light after this hell. Neither suppression, nor laws nor gallows can stop us.—Lyrics from Mehdoone Jange (Battlefield), by Toomaj Salehi^[1]

Actions to defend the life of Iran’s rebel rapper Toomaj Salehi have erupted around the world since April 24, when Iran’s theocrats sentenced the beloved rebel rapper to execution by hanging. From numerous courageous actions in Iran, to marches in cities worldwide that drew many thousands from the Iranian Diaspora, to artists and arts organizations in many countries publicly issuing statements and calling for action against his execution, people have responded to this threat to Toomaj’s life. Some rappers and other musicians among the youth of many countries, including the U.S., have begun to see Toomaj as their own, with some dedicating performances to Toomaj.

That tens of thousands have mobilized in just a week is testimony to how much Toomaj is loved, and what he represents—and importantly, to the urgency to do much more in the coming days. Prison authorities have prohibited all contact with Toomaj from lawyers or family, even confiscating the phone cards of his wardmates. This is happening as Iran’s Islamic Republic has ratcheted up its execution machine, hanging 63 in the last two weeks of April—one every five hours. And it is only days until the May 13 deadline for filing an appeal of the verdict, after which the IRI could expedite execution.

The videos and accounts below give an initial and partial glimpse of the unfolding fight to Free Toomaj. The videos and links below can also be viewed on the IEC website’s FreeToomaj page.

Broad and Brave Actions Inside Iran

In Iran, where merely distributing flyers or spraying graffiti can bring long prison terms or brutality at the hands of police and paramilitary forces, a wave of resistance—especially among the youth—has taken shape. Many posts on social media show youth walking through traffic with posters of Toomaj held high, or graffiti appearing on walls in many cities, or leaflets passing from hand to hand and put on car windshields. At social gatherings and protests, people took up chants to “free Toomaj,” including the crowd at a soccer game and retirees at a pension protest in the ethnic-Arab city of Ahwaz. A student organization in Isfahan posts on Instagram videos of nightly chants at a set hour that echo from building to building. Two university students were reportedly arrested for sitting in at the music hall.

People from across sections of society have issued collective demands and statements. “We consider it our moral and human duty to continue our strike and protest to remove the noose from the necks of Toomaj and all the nameless prisoners who do not have Toomaj’s fame, but like him have been sentenced to death in violation of their fundamental rights,” reads part of a statement from ten prisoners in Ghezal Hezar Prison who organized a weekly Tuesday hunger strike against executions. Fourteen political prisoners signed a statement from Tehran’s notorious Evin prison. Statements of condemnation came from a wide cross section of society: 460 Iran-Iraq war veterans and their families; 70 Kurdish families, the parents of Jina Mahsa Amini, and other family members of protesters executed or killed, including the Mothers of Laleh Park (Mourning Mothers), organizations of musicians, teachers, writers and others.

Outrage on the International Stage

News about Toomaj’s sentence got out very widely in the U.S. entertainment industry, with a statement from the Grammy Recording Academy, articles in Rolling Stone, Variety, XXL, Deadline, IMDB, and a few hip hop podcasts and shows. Hip hop artist/activist Meek Mill tweeted to his 11 million followers, and hip hop entrepreneur Kevin Liles posted on Instagram, “Hip-hop isn’t just under attack in America. The criminalization of our music and culture is global, and we need to stand up together.”

Author-playwright Ariel Dorfman joined many others in signing the IEC’s call to “Defend the Life of Rebel Rapper Toomaj Salehi,” and sent the IEC a verse for Toomaj that said in part,

To the Court that has condemned Toomaj to death, I say:
Think deeply about what you are doing and reverse your sentence.
I say: think deeply about how you believe you are killing his songs and
giving them more light, more eternity, and reverse your sentence.

48 prominent artists and intellectuals initiated a collective Op-Ed in France’s newspaper of record, LeMonde, demanding that France’s president Macron act to stop Toomaj’s execution. The op-ed included Academy Award winning illustrator Marjane Sartrapi and actresses Catherine DeNeuve and Golshifteh Farahani. Scores more quickly signed on. Dozens of other prominent figures are speaking out on social media, or in collective statements, such as signers of the IEC’s Emergency Appeal Cornel West and Shirin Ebadi (Nobel Peace Prize laureate). Cornel West issued an urgent statement on Instagram that read: “I strongly condemned the death sentence for my brother Toomaj Salehi—a hip hop artist telling the truth about the repression in Iran! We must be morally consistent in our prophetic witness!”

A growing number of musicians are bringing Toomaj to their audiences across borders, including Italian singers-songwriters Tananai and Ermal Meta, Afghan musician Shekib Mosadeq, and Miles Solay from the band Outernational. Others are issuing Toomaj tribute videos and pulling together multi-artist performances.

International Marches and Actions

Demonstrations to protest Toomaj’s execution called by Iranians in the Diaspora, were held in many cities worldwide the weekend of April 27-28. Toomaj contingents also joined May 1 marches in many cities. Thousands marched in Toronto, Canada and Paris, France; hundreds in San Francisco and Los Angeles, California and in several cities in Germany, Italy and Australia. There were also many smaller marches or rallies in other countries.

Especially inspiring were the actions taken by activists and revolutionaries of Quemar La Jaula in Colombia, South America. People plastered posters on walls in the city of Cali, passed out flyers and held conversations with people on the street about the importance of defending an artist who speaks a different language and lives halfway across the planet.

A contingent of Quemar La Jaula supporters joined the May 1 revolutionary marches called by @Comrevco in several cities, including Bogotá and Cartagena.

In a message to the IEC from activists and revolutionaries in Colombia, they wrote:

Toomaj and the Iranian fighters are our people. The voice of Toomaj is our voice against the reactionaries, against the brutal system. The world needs to know about the courageous fighters in Iran, USA and Colombia and so on. We need a real different new world, and for that, we must defend the people who fight against this capitalist-imperialist system in every corner of the world.

Imperialists & Flunkies Cry Crocodile Tears

The U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan was quick to condemn the IRI’s execution verdict… as if that would make people forget the constant scenes of U.S. police beating and arresting university students who were peacefully protesting a U.S.-sponsored and financed Zionist genocide in Gaza. Meanwhile, pro-U.S./Israel reactionaries like “Prince” Reza Pahlavi, son of the deposed U.S. puppet Shah of Iran, and U.S. mouthpieces like Masih Alinejad were also in permanent tweet mode about Toomaj—working to exploit the situation for their U.S. imperialist masters. This is while Iran’s theocrats are working to exploit the campus protests in the U.S. for themselves—running numerous official news articles in support of “freedom of expression” of the students even as they plan to execute a world-class rapper for the same! All this highlights why we say both Iran’s regime and the U.S. imperialist are reactionaries. There is continuing importance to popularizing the IEC’s demands on freeing ALL of Iran’s political prisoners with urgency: We demand of the Islamic Republic of Iran: FREE ALL POLITICAL PRISONERS NOW! We say to the U.S government: NO THREATS OR WAR MOVES AGAINST IRAN, LIFT U.S. SANCTIONS!

Continue to sign and share our statement for Toomaj. In addition to issuing and signing statements, some suggestions for what you can do now may include:

*Get Toomaj’s songs played on the radio and at pro-Palestine encampments. (See Toomaj’s videos with English subtitles on the IEC website.)

*Make a group video to post (cc to the IEC) with your colleagues modeled after https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/lifestyle/lifestyle-news/iran-protest-executions-stopexecutionsiniran-hollywood-movement-1235292024/

*For those with the reach, social stature, and resources, consider organizing a global, online emergency town hall, panel, and concert with prominent artists and activists.

‍

FOOTNOTES

^[1] Watch our playlist with this and other Toomaj music videos subtitled in English on www.FreeIransPoliticalPrisonersNow.org/featured/free-toomaj