Video Shows Anti-Regime Momentum Building in Iran

“It’s ten past six in Tehran, just after sunset. According to today’s call for protest, demonstrations should have begun ten minutes ago. But for the past half hour I’ve been hearing car horns, sporadic gunfire, and the low hum of the city,” a journalist in northern Tehran reported via satellite phone.

Iranians were back on the streets for a third consecutive night following calls to action by former Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi. From outside the country, high-quality video calls made possible by satellite internet allowed real-time reporting from inside Tehran, even as the regime imposed a near-total communications blackout.

Pahlavi urged protesters to appear two hours earlier than the last two nights and to bring national symbols, including the banned Lion and Sun flag, to “take over public spaces.”

His message coincided with state media denials of the previous night’s demonstrations. Official outlets instead claimed that small groups of “terrorist monarchists” were vandalizing homes and public buildings.

“There is no internet, no international calling, not even domestic phone service within or between cities,” a Tehran based citizen journalist told me. “Even state news agencies have been offline since Thursday.”

According to the journalist, Iranians are now largely cut off from one another, relying on state television, state newspapers, and a limited number of international Persian language broadcasts whose satellite signals penetrate regime jamming.

“It’s nearly impossible to determine how many people have been killed,” he said. “Collecting information is extremely difficult and rebroadcasting it back into Iran is even harder.” He noted a significant difference from previous internet shutdowns. “This time, people anticipated it. Anyone who could afford it bought Starlink.”

Recent estimates suggest that between 40,000 and 50,000 Starlink terminals are now active inside Iran. The service is owned by Elon Musk, who recently posted a message in Persian on X, responding to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s threat that security forces would “crush the unrest.”

“What a delusion!” Musk wrote.

The phrase quickly became a protest slogan, chanted across multiple cities during Friday night’s demonstrations.

Using Starlink connections, I spoke with several Iranian citizen journalists across the country late Friday and again Saturday, as preparations were underway for another night of protests.

“Friday night was larger than Thursday and this will continue to grow,” said one citizen journalist in Tehran, who shared videos showing protesters marching in the streets and using coordinated noise to push back security forces. “Outside of regime-organized rallies, I have never seen gatherings like this in Iran,” he told me.

He added that casualties were almost certainly higher on Friday night than the night before. Precise figures remain impossible to verify, but a doctor told Time magazine that at least 217 injured protesters died in six Tehran hospitals on Thursday alone.

In western Tehran, residents reported that Khamenei’s speech was broadcast through powerful loudspeakers. Protesters responded with chants of “Javid Shah!” or “Long live the shah!”

Both Tehran-based sources confirmed that ATMs and card payment systems have stopped functioning. “People need cash,” one said. “It’s unclear whether the machines are down due to internet disruptions or a direct order from authorities.”

A journalist in Kerman, the hometown of the late Qods Force leader Qasem Soleimani, reported, “At least 14 people were killed here on Thursday. But it hasn’t deterred anyone. People returned to the streets again tonight.”

He said protests have spread to smaller cities, including Zarand and Jiroft. On January 8, 2026, demonstrators set fire to Soleimani’s statue in Azadi Square; on January 9, they attempted to pull it down entirely.

“People came out in families, across all age groups,” he said. “There are no landlines, no mobile networks, no internet access, yet people remain coordinated. They know where and when to gather.” The primary chants, he said, were “God save the shah!” and “Pahlavi will return!”

Multiple videos circulating from inside Iran show bodies laid out on hospital floors in Fardis, roughly twenty-five miles west of Tehran, as well as in Shiraz.

A video circulating on social media shows an individual saying the footage was recorded on January 9 in Mashhad, documenting the situation inside a hospital and the condition of people wounded during the protests.

While these videos cannot be independently verified, they are consistent with reports of mass casualties conveyed to international media.

As protests continued, senior Islamic Republic officials escalated their rhetoric. Iran’s Prosecutor General Mohammad Movahedi Azad said Saturday that protesters would be treated as “enemies of God,” a capital offense under Iranian law, according to remarks reported by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-linked Tasnim News Agency. Tasnim also reported that at least 100 people had been arrested in Tehran province over the past twenty-four hours for “disrupting public order” and leading riots.

The European Union, Britain, and Canada have confirmed reports of arrests and protesters killed by security forces. Among many Iranians, however, attention has turned to whether U.S. warnings will translate into action. President Donald Trump reiterated his position during a meeting with oil executives attended by journalists.

“I’ve made the statement very strongly that if they start killing people like they have in the past, we will get involved,” he said. “We’ll be hitting them very hard where it hurts. That doesn’t mean boots on the ground, but it means hitting them very, very hard where it hurts.” He later added: “I tell the Iranian leaders, you better not start shooting because we’ll start shooting, too.”

Secretary of State Marco Rubio echoed the administration’s stance, writing on X on January 9: “The United States supports the brave people of Iran.”

Inside Iran, state television broadcast footage of regime-organized rallies in major cities, portraying public support for the government. In several broadcasts, speakers issued direct threats against Trump, including calls for his assassination.

The rhetoric extended to senior officials. Hassan Rahimpour Azghadi, a member of the Supreme Council of the Cultural Revolution, called on regime supporters worldwide to target American missions and individuals. Speaking on live television, he said, “The Islamic Republic should do to Trump exactly what the United States did to Maduro.”

He added: “If Trump were grabbed right now and slapped twice, he would howl like a dog.”

In his latest speech, Khamenei declared that the world should wait for the “collapse of Trump’s regime.” The remark quickly became the subject of mockery among Iranians, many of whom asked which would end first: Trump’s presidential term or Khamenei’s thirty-seven-year theocratic rule.

The protests on the night of January 10 should offer a clearer indication of the regime’s ability or inability to reassert control in the days ahead. For now, Iranians wait for protesters and citizen journalists to return home, reconnect to the sky, and search for the brief appearance of Musk’s SpaceX satellites overhead.