In a surprising diplomatic move, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has issued a direct statement to the people of Iran, bypassing the country's leadership to address its citizens. The statement, released today, marks a significant shift in Israel's communication strategy towards Iran.

"I speak a lot about the leaders of Iran. Yet at this pivotal moment, I want to address you – the people of Iran," Netanyahu began, setting the tone for a message that sought to distinguish between the Iranian government and its populace.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the people of Iran:

people of Iran should know - Israel stands with you.

pic.twitter.com/hCSGnPQWjk

— AP (@AP_from_NY) September 30, 2024

The Israeli leader didn't mince words when criticizing the current Iranian regime. "Every day, you see a regime that subjugates you, make fiery speeches about defending Lebanon, defending Gaza. Yet every day, that regime plunges our region deeper into darkness and deeper into war," he stated. Netanyahu also asserted Israel's military capabilities, warning, "Every day, their puppets are eliminated. Ask Mohammed Deif. Ask Nasrallah. There is nowhere in the Middle East Israel cannot reach. There is nowhere we will not go to protect our people and protect our country."

A significant portion of Netanyahu's message focused on economic issues, accusing the Iranian government of mismanaging resources at the expense of its citizens. "The vast majority of Iranians know their regime doesn't care a whit about them. If it cared about you, it would stop wasting billions of dollars on futile wars across the Middle East. It would start improving your lives," he argued. The prime minister painted a picture of what Iran could achieve if these resources were redirected toward education, healthcare, and infrastructure.

Looking to the future, Netanyahu envisioned a prosperous Iran free from its current leadership. "When Iran is finally free and that moment will come a lot sooner than people think – everything will be different," he predicted. He described a future where Israel and Iran could be at peace, benefiting from global investment, tourism, and technological innovation.

In a direct appeal to Iranian citizens, Netanyahu stated, "From Qom to Esfahan, from Shiraz to Tabriz, there are tens of millions of good and decent people with thousands of years of history behind them and a brilliant future ahead of them. Don't let a small group of fanatic theocrats crush your hopes and your dreams. You deserve better. Your children deserve better. The entire world deserves better. I know you don't support the rapists and murderers of Hamas and Hezbollah, but your leaders do." He concluded with a message of solidarity: "The people of Iran should know – Israel stands with you."

The effectiveness and reach of this message within Iran remain to be seen, given the Iranian government's tight control over media within the country. It will be crucial to monitor both the Iranian government's response and any potential reaction from the Iranian public.

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An armed guard at a bank in northern Iran calmly walked up behind a senior Shiite cleric and shot and killed the ayatollah on Wednesday, according to surveillance footage from the site, the most-senior clergyman slain during months of unrest that has shaken the Islamic Republic.

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The killing of Ayatollah Abbas Ali Soleimani stunned both bystanders who witnessed the shooting and the wider public. The cleric had served on the country's Assembly of Experts that selects and oversees the Islamic Republic's supreme leader.  Authorities offered no immediate motive for the attack in Babolsar in Iran's Mazandaran province, just north of the capital, Tehran. Initially, state television described a man overpowering a guard and shooting the cleric.

But later surveillance footage shared widely by Iranian media showed the shooter inside the bank, openly carrying a firearm and milling around briefly before he walked up to Soleimani and shot him. The Interior Ministry announced it would launch a special investigation into the slaying. Soleimani believed to be 77, served on the Assembly of Experts, an 88-seat panel overseeing the post of Iran's supreme leader. He also once served as the personal representative of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to Iran's restive southeastern provinces of Sistan and Baluchestan.

Shiite clergy have long held an important role in Iran, one that only grew more powerful after the 1979 Islamic Revolution. Discontent has increased in recent years, however, particularly amid waves of nationwide protests over economic, political, and civil rights issues in Iran.

Some have criticized the subsidies granted to clerics, though fewer than 10% of Iran's 200,000 clerics have official posts in the government and many seminary students work as laborers or taxi drivers to make ends meet.

In Iran's latest turmoil, protesters have also targeted clerics, with some online videos showing young protesters running up behind clerics on the street and knocking off their turbans, a sign of their status.

However, Soleimani is the most-senior cleric to be killed in recent years. In April 2022, an Uzbek national stabbed two clerics to death in Mashhad at the Imam Reza shrine.

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Iran said on Tuesday its security forces had arrested a network of agents working for Israel and had seized a cache of weapons it said were planned for use during recent unrest sparked by water shortages in the Islamic Republic, state media reported.

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Iran often accuses its enemies or rivals abroad, such as Israel, the United States and Saudi Arabia, of trying to destabilize the country by stoking protests and violence.

Tuesday's announcement came after nearly two weeks of protests over water shortages, mostly in southwest Iran, which have turned political and spread to other areas.

Authorities have accused armed dissidents of provoking clashes during the street protests. Human rights groups say security forces have opened fire on protesters.

"Mossad operatives intended to use the equipment in urban riots and assassinations," an Intelligence Ministry official said, according to state media, referring to Israel's intelligence agency. The official did not give details.

The seized weapons included pistols, grenades, assault rifles and ammunition, the unnamed official said, adding: "Some of these are used to provoke clashes during protests."

There was no immediate comment from Israeli officials.

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In Iran, the urgency of getting vaccinated against COVID-19 is growing by the day.

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A crush of new cases fueled by the fast-spreading delta variant has threatened to overwhelm Iranian hospitals with breathless patients too numerous to handle. But as deaths mount, and the sense swells that protection for most citizens remains far-off, thousands of desperate Iranians are taking matters into their own hands: They're flocking to neighboring Armenia.

In the ex-Soviet Caucasus nation, where vaccine uptake has remained sluggish amid widespread vaccine hesitancy, authorities have been doling out free doses to foreign visitors – a boon for Iranians afraid for their lives and sick of waiting.

"I just want her to get the jab as soon as possible," said Ahmad Reza Bagheri, a 23-year-old jeweler at a bus stop in Tehran, gesturing to his diabetic mother who he was joining on the winding 20-hour road trip to Armenia's capital, Yerevan.

Bagheri's uncle had already received his first dose in the city and would soon get his second. Such stories have dominated Iranian social media in recent weeks, as hordes of Iranians head to Armenia by bus and plane. Acting Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said last week that foreigners, including residents, have accounted for up to half of about 110,000 people who were vaccinated in the country. Armenia administers AstraZeneca, Russia's Sputnik V and China's CoronaVac vaccines.

In Iran, which has the highest COVID-19 death toll in the Middle East, less than 2% of the country's 84 million people have received both doses, according to the scientific publication Our World in Data.

Although the sanctions-hit country has imported some Russian and Chinese vaccines, joined the UN-supported COVAX program for vaccine sharing and developed three of its own vaccines, doses remain scarce. Authorities have yet to inoculate nonmedical workers and those under age 60, promising that mass vaccinations will start in September.

"I can't wait such a long time for vaccination," said Ali Saeedi, a 39-year-old garment trader also waiting to embark on the journey at a Tehran bus station. "Officials have delayed their plans for public vaccination many times. I'm going to Armenia to make it happen."

Others, like 27-year-old secretary Bahareh Khanai, see the trip as an act of national service, easing the daunting inoculation task facing Iranian authorities.

It remains unclear just how many Iranians have made the trip to get vaccinated, as Armenia also remains a popular summer getaway spot. But each day, dozens of buses, taxis and flights ferry an estimated 500 Iranians across the border. Airlines have added three weekly flights from Iran to Yerevan. The cost of bus tours has doubled as thousands devise plans. Travel agents who watched the pandemic ravage their industry have seen an unprecedented surge in business.

"The number of our customers for the Armenia tour has tripled in recent weeks," said Ahmad, the manager of a tour agency in Tehran who declined to give his last name for fear of reprisals.

The surge of Iranians has inundated Armenia's coronavirus testing centers, leaving scores stranded in the buffer zone, Iranian semiofficial ILNA news agency reported, with several fainting from the heat. Roughly 160 kilometers (100 miles) away in Yerevan, hundreds of Iranians lined up to get a vaccine shot, with some sleeping on the streets to secure a place.

Hope sustains them through the long lines under an unforgiving sun. In the streets of the Armenian capital, Iranians cavort to Farsi music outside vaccine centers, clapping as they receive doses, videos show.

"We couldn't expect that our humanitarian act would become popular and spread so much and that we would have a big flow of foreigners," Armenian Health Minister Anahit Avanesyan told reporters. "Our citizens are our priority, but I repeat again that the pandemic doesn't recognize citizenship."

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But even as Armenian authorities encourage vaccination tourism, the sheer number of Iranians flooding vaccination centers has pushed Armenia to tighten the rules.

At first, Iranian vaccine-seekers headed for clinics in the southern border town of Meghri. A local doctor, speaking to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to speak to the media, reported seeing at least 100 Iranians vaccinated there over the past few weeks.

But last week the government decreed that foreign visitors can only receive a jab at five designated AstraZeneca mobile clinics in Yerevan, and, in an apparent bid to boost the country's tourist sector that took effect Thursday, must spend at least 10 days in Armenia before getting vaccinated.

After the new rule entered force, the crowds of Iranians waiting in the streets of Yerevan to get the shot in Yerevan dispersed but medical workers said that many have booked vaccinations for the following days in compliance with the 10-day minimal stay requirement.

Now, the profile of Iranian visitors is changing, as cross-border bus jaunts become extended vacations, with some flights routed through Qatar. The surge in interest has also pushed up the price, putting the journey out of reach for all but the wealthy.

Ethicists, who said they otherwise wouldn't take issue with needy foreigners securing excess shots shunned by citizens, say the price hike and new 10-day requirement exacerbates the stark inequalities in the pandemic.

"It increases the money and time required ... and so the inequity of who is going to be able to participate," said Alison Bateman-House, an assistant professor of medical ethics at New York University.

More broadly, she added, vaccination vacations, like all travel in a time of contagious virus variants, carries "unintended consequences" and increases "the possibility of disease transmission." A fairer alternative, she noted, would be for Armenia to transfer its surplus doses to the international COVX initiative.

But for many in Iran, where scores are dying daily in an outbreak that has exhausted the health system and economy, the cost of waiting has grown too high.

Mohammad Seifpour, a 48-year-old Tehran resident, grimly surveyed the crowds of Iranians at the Yerevan vaccine clinic.

"This is just because of the horrible situation we are facing," he said.

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Iran's President Hassan Rouhani said on Thursday that the result of the US election was not important and that his people would ultimately triumph over America.

''The White House brutally imposed sanctions and economic war even during the spread of coronavirus. They did not adhere to any human principles and principles of human rights and international laws and regulations. But I am confident that the Iranian people will ultimately win,'' Rouhani said in a televised cabinet meeting.

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"Regardless of who will be the next US president... the US government will surrender to the Iranian nation," he added.

Democratic challenger Joe Biden has promised to rejoin Iran's 2015 nuclear deal with six powers if Iran returns to compliance with it.

Video: Reuters

US President Donald Trump abandoned the deal in 2018 and re-imposed sanctions that have crippled Iran's economy. In retaliation, Iran has gradually reduced compliance with the deal's terms.

Trump has said he wants to strike a new deal with Tehran that would address Iran's missile program and support for regional proxies in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Yemen.

Iran has ruled out any negotiations unless Washington first returns to the accord.

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Using official state health data leaked by an anonymous source, the BBC found that some 42,000 Iranians suffering symptoms of COVID-19 had died as of July 20, compared to the 14,405 cases the Iranian Health Ministry reported for the same period.

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The BBC probe also found that the number of confirmed carriers (451,024) was much larger than the officially-reported 278,827. A second wave hit Iran hard, and in the past few weeks, the nation has seen a sharp rise in the number of confirmed COVID cases within its borders.

According to the medical data obtained by the BBC, the first recorded coronavirus death in Iran occurred on Jan. 22, but it took 28 before any deaths from the virus were reported, in which time the death toll in Iran rose to 52.

Since the start of the coronavirus epidemic in Iran, many people have expressed doubt about the morbidity and mortality figures put out by the regime. In April, a report from Iran's parliament said the national death toll was likely nearly double the officially reported figures. Given insufficient testing, the report said the number of people infected at the time was probably "eight to 10 times" higher than the reported figures.

Discrepancies have been found between what the national government reported and the numbers supplied by local or district authorities. The information reported by the BBC indicated that the Iranian authorities were intentionally downplaying the country's true COVID death toll, even though its health care system has exact figures on the number of ill, dead, and recovered.

According to the leaked Iranian data, Tehran has seen the most deaths from coronavirus in Iran: 8,120. The city of Qom, the initial epicenter of the COVID outbreak in the country, has seen 1,149 deaths from the virus, or one out of every 1,000 residents.

The data also noted that 1,916 of the COVID deaths in Iran were foreign citizens.

The source told the BBC that he or she had leaked the data in an attempt to "shed light on truth" and put a stop to the epidemic being used for "political games."

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The death of Expediency Council member Mohammad Mirmohammadi came as Iran announced the virus had killed 66 people among 1,501 confirmed cases in the country.

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Iran has the highest death toll in the world after China, the epicenter of the outbreak.

Mirmohammadi died at a north Tehran hospital of the virus, state radio said. He was 71.

The council advises Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, as well as settles disputes between the top cleric and parliament.

His death comes as other top officials have contracted the virus in Iran.

Those sick include Vice President Masoumeh Ebtekar, better known as "Sister Mary," the English-speaking spokeswoman for the students who seized the US Embassy in Tehran in 1979 and sparked the 444-day hostage crisis, state media reported. Also sick is Iraj Harirchi, the head of an Iranian government task force on the coronavirus who tried to downplay the virus before falling ill.

Iran has reported 978 confirmed cases of the new virus with 54 deaths from the illness it causes, called COVID-19. Across the wider Mideast, there are over 1,150 cases of the new coronavirus, the majority of which are linked back to Iran.

Experts worry Iran's percentage of deaths to infections, around 5.5%, is much higher than other countries, suggesting the number of infections in Iran may be much higher than current figures show.

Iranian government spokesman Ali Rabiei, himself addressing journalists by teleconference over concerns about the virus, acknowledged the challenges remaining for the Islamic Republic.

"We will have two difficult weeks ahead," he said.

Trying to stem the outbreak of the new coronavirus, Iran also on Monday held an online-only briefing by its Foreign Ministry. China as well has held similar teleconference briefings.

"Hoarding sanitizing items is playing with people's lives and it is not ignorable," Raisi said.

While Iran has closed schools and universities to stop the spread of the virus, major Shiite shrines have remained open despite civilian authorities calling for them to be closed. The holy cities of Mashhad and Qom in particular, both home to shrines, have been hard-hit by the virus. Shiites often touch and kiss shrines as a sign of their faith. Authorities have been cleaning the shrines with disinfectants.

Police have arrested one man who posted a video showing himself licking the metal enclosing the Imam Reza shrine in Mashhad, the most-important Shiite saint buried in the country, according to reports by semiofficial news agencies. In the video, the man said he licked the metal to "allow others to visit the shrine with peace of mind."

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Speaking to supporters at a rally in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Trump cited video that has circulated online purportedly showing Iranian protesters walking around a large US flag on the ground that they were apparently supposed to step on.

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Video: Reuters

Trump used a profanity when describing the slain commander of Iran's Quds Force, Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani, and said he had warned Iran's leader not to harm protesters.

Protests broke out in Iran after the government acknowledged that an Iranian missile had downed a Ukrainian airliner, killing 176 people.

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Wednesday's shooting down of Ukraine International Airlines flight 752, killing all 176 people aboard, has led to one of the biggest public challenges to the Islamic Republic's clerical rulers since they took power four decades ago.

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In a step that will increase diplomatic pressure, Britain, France and Germany launched a dispute mechanism to challenge Iran for breaching limits on its nuclear program under an agreement which Washington abandoned in 2018.

Since the United States killed Iran's most powerful military commander in a drone strike on Jan. 3, Tehran has faced escalating confrontation with the West and unrest at home, both reaching levels with little precedent in its modern history.

Iran shot down the airliner on Wednesday when its military was on high alert, hours after it had fired missiles at US targets in Iraq. After days of denying a role in the air crash, it admitted it on Saturday, calling it a tragic mistake.

Protesters, many of them students, have held daily demonstrations since then, chanting "Clerics get lost!" and calling for the removal of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in power for more than 30 years.

Police have responded to some protests with a violent crackdown, video posts on social media showed. Footage showed police beating protesters with batons, wounded people being carried, pools of blood on the streets and the sound of gunfire.

Iran's police denied firing at protesters. The judiciary said 30 people had been detained in the unrest but said the authorities would show tolerance towards "legal protests."

Video posts on Tuesday showed scores gathered peacefully at two Tehran universities. "Where is justice?" one group chanted.

The extent of the unrest is difficult to assess because of limits on independent reporting. Demonstrations tend to gather momentum later in the day and clashes have been at night.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani promised a thorough investigation into the "unforgivable error" of shooting down the plane. He spoke in a television address on Tuesday, the latest in a series of apologies from a leadership that rarely admits mistakes.

Judiciary spokesman Gholamhossein Esmaili said some of those accused of having a role in the plane disaster had been arrested, although he did not say how many or identify them.

Most of those on board the flight were Iranians or dual nationals. Canada, Ukraine, Britain and other nations who had citizens on the plane have scheduled a meeting on Thursday in London to consider legal action against Tehran.

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That order, confirmed by three sources close to the supreme leader's inner circle and a fourth official, set in motion the bloodiest crackdown on protesters since the Islamic Revolution in 1979.

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About 1,500 people were killed during less than two weeks of unrest that started on Nov. 15. The toll, provided to Reuters by three Iranian interior ministry officials, included at least 17 teenagers and about 400 women as well as some members of the security forces and police.

The toll of 1,500 is significantly higher than figures from international human rights groups and the United States. A Dec. 16 report by Amnesty International said the death toll was at least 304. The US State Department, in a statement to Reuters, said it estimates that many hundreds of Iranians were killed, and has seen reports that number could be over 1,000.

The figures provided to Reuters, said two of the Iranian officials who provided them, are based on information gathered from security forces, morgues, hospitals and coroner's offices.

The government spokesman's office declined to comment on whether the orders came from Khamenei and on the Nov. 17 meeting. Iran's mission to the United Nations did not respond to a request for comment for this story.

What began as scattered protests over a surprise increase in gasoline prices quickly spread into one of the biggest challenges to Iran's clerical rulers since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

By Nov. 17, the second day, the unrest had reached the capital Tehran, with people calling for an end to the Islamic Republic and the downfall of its leaders. Protesters burned pictures of Khamenei and called for the return of Reza Pahlavi, the exiled son of the toppled Shah of Iran, according to videos posted on social media and eye witnesses.

That evening at his official residence in a fortified compound in central Tehran, Khamenei met with senior officials, including security aides, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani and members of his cabinet.

At the meeting, described to Reuters by the three sources close to his inner circle, the 80-year-old leader, who has final say over all state matters in the country, raised his voice and expressed criticism of the handling of the unrest. He was also angered by the burning of his image and the destruction of a statue of the republic's late founder, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

"The Islamic Republic is in danger. Do whatever it takes to end it. You have my order," the supreme leader told the group, one of the sources said.

Khamenei said he would hold the assembled officials responsible for the consequences of the protests if they didn't immediately stop them. Those who attended the meeting agreed the protesters aimed to bring down the regime.

"The enemies wanted to topple the Islamic Republic and immediate reaction was needed," one of the sources said.

The fourth official, who was briefed on the Nov. 17 meeting, added that Khamenei made clear the demonstrations required a forceful response.

"Our Imam," said the official, referring to Khamenei, "only answers to God. He cares about people and the Revolution. He was very firm and said those rioters should be crushed."

Tehran's clerical rulers have blamed "thugs" linked to the regime's opponents in exile and the country's main foreign foes, namely the United States, Israel and Saudi Arabia, for stirring up unrest. Khamenei has described the unrest as the work of a "very dangerous conspiracy."

A Dec. 3 report on Iran's state television confirmed that security forces had fatally shot citizens, saying "some rioters were killed in clashes." Iran has given no official death toll and has rejected figures as "speculative."

"The aim of our enemies was to endanger the existence of the Islamic Republic by igniting riots in Iran," said the commander-in-chief of the elite Revolutionary Guards Corps, Hossein Salami, last month, according to Iranian media.

The Revolutionary Guards declined to comment for this report.

Iran's interior minister said on Nov. 27 more than 140 government sites had been set on fire along with hundreds of banks and dozens of petrol stations, while 50 bases used by security forces were also attacked, according to remarks reported by Iran's state news agency IRNA. The minister said up to 200,000 people took part in the unrest nationwide.

'Smell of gunfire and smoke'

For decades, Islamic Iran has tried to expand its influence across the Middle East, from Syria to Iraq and Lebanon, by investing Tehran's political and economic capital and backing militias. But now it faces pressure at home and abroad.

In recent months, from the streets of Baghdad to Beirut, protesters have been voicing anger at Tehran, burning its flag and chanting anti-Iranian regime slogans. At home, the daily struggle to make ends meet has worsened since the United States reimposed sanctions after withdrawing last year from the nuclear deal that Iran negotiated with world powers in 2015.

The protests erupted after a Nov. 15 announcement on state media that gas prices would rise by as much as 200% and the revenue would be used to help needy families.

Within hours, hundreds of people poured into the streets in places including the northeastern city of Mashhad, the southeastern province of Kerman and the southwestern province of Khuzestan bordering Iraq, according to state media. That night, a resident of the city Ahvaz in Khuzestan described the scene by telephone to Reuters.

"Riot police are out in force and blocking main streets," the source said. "I heard shooting." Videos later emerged on social media and state television showing footage of clashes in Ahvaz and elsewhere between citizens and security forces.

The protests reached more than 100 cities and towns and turned political. Young and working-class demonstrators demanded clerical leaders step down. In many cities, a similar chant rang out: "They live like kings, people get poorer," according to videos on social media and witnesses.

By Nov. 18 in Tehran, riot police appeared to be randomly shooting at protesters in the street "with the smell of gunfire and smoke everywhere," said a female Tehran resident reached by telephone. People were falling down and shouting, she added, while others sought refuge in houses and shops.

The mother of a 16-year-old boy described holding his body, drenched in blood, after he was shot during protests in a western Iranian town on Nov. 19. Speaking on condition of anonymity, she described the scene in a telephone interview.

"I heard people saying: 'He is shot, he is shot,'" said the mother. "I ran toward the crowd and saw my son, but half of his head was shot off." She said she urged her son, whose first name was Amirhossein, not to join the protests, but he didn't listen.

Iranian authorities deployed lethal force at a far quicker pace from the start than in other protests in recent years, according to activists and details revealed by authorities. In 2009, when millions protested against the disputed re-election of hardline then-President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, an estimated 72 people were killed. And when Iran faced waves of protests over economic hardships in 2017 and 2018, the death toll was about 20 people, officials said.

Khamenei, who has ruled Iran for three decades, turned to his elite forces to put down the recent unrest – the Revolutionary Guards and its affiliated Basij religious militia.

A senior member of the Revolutionary Guards in western Kermanshah province said the provincial governor handed down instructions at a late-night emergency meeting at his office on Nov. 18.

"We had orders from top officials in Tehran to end the protests, the Guards member said, recounting the governor's talk. "No more mercy. They are aiming to topple the Islamic Republic. But we will eradicate them." The governor's office declined to comment.

As security forces fanned out across the country, security advisors briefed Khamenei on the scale of the unrest, according to the three sources familiar with the talks at his compound.

The interior minister presented the number of casualties and arrests. The intelligence minister and head of the Revolutionary Guards focused on the role of opposition groups. When asked about the interior and intelligence minister's role in the meeting, the government spokesman's office declined to comment.

Khamenei, the three sources said, was especially concerned with anger in small working-class towns, whose lower-income voters have been a pillar of support for the Islamic Republic. Their votes will count in February parliamentary elections, a litmus test of the clerical rulers' popularity since US President Donald Trump exited Iran's nuclear deal – a step that has led to an 80% collapse in Iran's oil exports since last year.

Squeezed by sanctions, Khamenei has few resources to tackle high inflation and unemployment. According to official figures, the unemployment rate is around 12.5% overall. But it is about double that for Iran's millions of young people, who accuse the establishment of economic mismanagement and corruption. Khamenei and other officials have called on the judiciary to step up its fight against corruption.

'Blood on the streets'

Officials in four provinces said the message was clear – failure to stamp out the unrest would encourage people to protest in the future.

A local official in Karaj, a working-class city near the capital, said there were orders to use whatever force was necessary to end the protests immediately. "Orders came from Tehran," he said, speaking on condition of anonymity. "Push them back to their homes, even by shooting them." Local government officials declined to comment.

Residents of Karaj said they came under fire from rooftops as Revolutionary Guards and police on motorcycles brandished machine guns. "There was blood everywhere. Blood on the streets," said one resident by telephone. Reuters could not independently verify that account.

In Mahshahr county, in the strategically important Khuzestan province in southwest Iran, Revolutionary Guards in armored vehicles and tanks sought to contain the demonstrations. State TV said security forces opened fire on "rioters" hiding in the marshes. Rights groups said they believe Mahshahr had one of the highest protest death tolls in Iran, based on what they heard from locals.

"The next day when we went there, the area was full of bodies of protesters, mainly young people. The Guards did not let us take the bodies," the local official said, estimating that "dozens" were killed.

The US State Department has said it has received videos of the Revolutionary Guards opening fire without warning on protesters in Mahshahr. And that when protesters fled to nearby marshlands, the Guards pursued them and surrounded them with machine guns mounted on trucks, spraying the protesters with bullets and killing at least 100 Iranians.

Iran's authorities dispute the US account. Iranian officials have said security forces in Mahshahr confronted "rioters" who they described as a security threat to petrochemical complexes and to a key energy route that, if blocked, would have created a crisis in the country.

A security official told Reuters that the reports about Mahshahr are "exaggerated and not true" and that security forces were defending "people and the country's energy facilities in the city from sabotage by enemies and rioters."

In Isfahan, an ancient city of two million people in central Iran, the government's vow to help low-income families with money raised from higher gas prices failed to reassure people like Behzad Ebrahimi. He said his 21-year-old nephew, Arshad Ebrahimi, was fatally shot during the crackdown.

"Initially they refused to give us the body and wanted us to bury him with others killed in the protests," Ebrahimi said. "Eventually we buried him ourselves, but under the heavy presence of security forces." Rights activists confirmed the events. Reuters was unable to get comment from the government or the local governor on the specifics of the account.

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