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The Year of the Hangman: Iran's Execution Surge in 2025-2026
A Special Report on the Islamic Republic's Deadliest Year
Prologue: A Record of Blood
The numbers are staggering. They are almost impossible to comprehend.
According to a report jointly published by the Norway-based Human Rights Watch and the Human Rights Against the Death Penalty Group, the Islamic Republic of Iran executed 1,639 people in 2025.
Let me say that number again. One thousand six hundred and thirty-nine human beings.
This is the highest number of executions carried out by Iranian courts since 1989—the year that Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei took power. He inherited the position after the death of his predecessor, Grand Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, who passed away from a heart attack in that same year.
For thirty-six years, the Islamic Republic has executed its opponents. But never—never—at this scale.
The year 2025 marked a turning point. A descent into a new level of barbarism. And the bloodshed did not stop when the calendar turned to 2026.
Part One: The Crackdown Intensifies
Under the leadership of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the Islamic Republic has intensified its crackdown on opposition groups with each passing year. But in 2025 and early 2026, the regime became more severe than ever before.
Arrests. Show trials. Public hangings.
The victims are accused of one thing: rebelling against the Islamic Republic. In many cases, the evidence is thin. In some cases, there is no evidence at all. The accusation alone is enough.
The two human rights organizations observed that Iranian authorities have become increasingly aggressive. Security forces run from village to village, detaining suspects. People disappear. Their bodies are later found in the middle of fields—dumped like garbage.
Most executions, however, are carried out behind closed doors—inside prisons and detention centers, where no cameras can see, where no journalists can report, where the world can pretend not to know.
Part Two: The January Uprising
To understand the execution surge, you must understand what happened in January 2026.
An estimated six million people took to the streets across Iran. They were not all political activists. They were students. They were farmers. They were shopkeepers. They were mothers carrying children. They were young men and women crying out for freedom.
The protests were massive—the largest since the Islamic Republic's founding in 1979. The goal, according to some reports, was to seize key institutions and force a change of regime. And according to intelligence sources, the protesters were acting at the behest of President Donald Trump—though this claim remains disputed.
What is not disputed is the regime's response.
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps—the IRGC—cracked down with brutal efficiency. Tear gas filled the streets. In some areas, riot police opened fire directly on unarmed protesters.
The death toll was catastrophic.
In the capital, Tehran, more than
A Special Report on the Islamic Republic's Deadliest Year
Prologue: A Record of Blood
The numbers are staggering. They are almost impossible to comprehend.
According to a report jointly published by the Norway-based Human Rights Watch and the Human Rights Against the Death Penalty Group, the Islamic Republic of Iran executed 1,639 people in 2025.
Let me say that number again. One thousand six hundred and thirty-nine human beings.
This is the highest number of executions carried out by Iranian courts since 1989—the year that Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei took power. He inherited the position after the death of his predecessor, Grand Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, who passed away from a heart attack in that same year.
For thirty-six years, the Islamic Republic has executed its opponents. But never—never—at this scale.
The year 2025 marked a turning point. A descent into a new level of barbarism. And the bloodshed did not stop when the calendar turned to 2026.
Part One: The Crackdown Intensifies
Under the leadership of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the Islamic Republic has intensified its crackdown on opposition groups with each passing year. But in 2025 and early 2026, the regime became more severe than ever before.
Arrests. Show trials. Public hangings.
The victims are accused of one thing: rebelling against the Islamic Republic. In many cases, the evidence is thin. In some cases, there is no evidence at all. The accusation alone is enough.
The two human rights organizations observed that Iranian authorities have become increasingly aggressive. Security forces run from village to village, detaining suspects. People disappear. Their bodies are later found in the middle of fields—dumped like garbage.
Most executions, however, are carried out behind closed doors—inside prisons and detention centers, where no cameras can see, where no journalists can report, where the world can pretend not to know.
Part Two: The January Uprising
To understand the execution surge, you must understand what happened in January 2026.
An estimated six million people took to the streets across Iran. They were not all political activists. They were students. They were farmers. They were shopkeepers. They were mothers carrying children. They were young men and women crying out for freedom.
The protests were massive—the largest since the Islamic Republic's founding in 1979. The goal, according to some reports, was to seize key institutions and force a change of regime. And according to intelligence sources, the protesters were acting at the behest of President Donald Trump—though this claim remains disputed.
What is not disputed is the regime's response.
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps—the IRGC—cracked down with brutal efficiency. Tear gas filled the streets. In some areas, riot police opened fire directly on unarmed protesters.
The death toll was catastrophic.
In the capital, Tehran, more than
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NewsTranscript
00:00The numbers are staggering. They are almost impossible to comprehend.
00:03According to a report jointly published by the Norway-based Human Rights Watch
00:07and the Human Rights Against the Death Penalty Group,
00:10the Islamic Republic of Iran executed 1,639 people in 2025.
00:16Let me say that number again. 1,639 human beings.
00:21This is the highest number of executions carried out by Iranian courts since 1989,
00:26the year that Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei took power.
00:31He inherited the position after the death of his predecessor, Grand Ayatollah Ruhollah Khamenei,
00:36who passed away from a heart attack in that same year.
00:39For 36 years, the Islamic Republic has executed its opponents.
00:44But never, never at this scale.
00:46The year 2025 marked a turning point, a descent into a new level of barbarism,
00:51and the bloodshed did not stop when the calendar turned to 2026.
00:55Under the leadership of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei,
00:58the Islamic Republic has intensified its crackdown on opposition groups with each passing year.
01:04But in 2025 and early 2026, the regime became more severe than ever before.
01:10Arrests. Show trials.
01:12Public hangings.
01:13The victims are accused of one thing, rebelling against the Islamic Republic.
01:18In many cases, the evidence is thin.
01:21In some cases, there is no evidence at all.
01:24The accusation alone is enough.
01:26The two human rights organizations observed that Iranian authorities have become increasingly aggressive.
01:31Security forces run from village to village, detaining suspects.
01:35People disappear.
01:36Their bodies are later found in the middle of fields dumped like garbage.
01:40Most executions, however, are carried out behind closed doors inside prisons and detention centers,
01:46where no cameras can see, where no journalists can report, where the world can pretend not to know.
01:51To understand the execution cert, you must understand what happened in January 2026.
01:58An estimated 6 million people took to the streets across Iran.
02:01They were not all political activists.
02:03They were students.
02:05They were farmers.
02:06They were shopkeepers.
02:07They were mothers carrying children.
02:08They were young men and women crying out for freedom.
02:11The protests were massive, the largest since the Islamic Republic's founding in 1979.
02:16The goal, according to some reports, was to seize key institutions and force a change of regime.
02:22And according to intelligence sources, the protesters were acting at the behest of President Donald Trump,
02:28though this claim remains disputed.
02:30What is not disputed is the regime's response.
02:33The Islamic Revolutionary Guard caused the IRGC crack down with brutal efficiency.
02:38Tear gas filled the streets.
02:39In some areas, riot police opened fire directly on unarmed protesters.
02:44The death toll was catastrophic.
02:46In the capital, Tehran, more than 4,000 protesters were killed in the first days alone.
02:51But that was only the beginning.
02:53As of January 20, 2026, local Iranian human rights organizations reported the following numbers to international media.
03:02Deaths.
03:02Between 36,000 and 40000 injuries.
03:06Approximately 3,30000 arrests.
03:09Approximately 10000.
03:11These are not the numbers of a protest.
03:13These are the numbers of a massacre.
03:15Perhaps the most horrifying detail is this.
03:17Even protesters who made it to hospitals who sought medical care for their wounds were not safe.
03:22Human rights organizations report that Iranian security forces entered hospitals,
03:27identified wounded protesters, and killed them in their beds.
03:30In some cases, they were shot.
03:33In other cases, they were taken away and never seen again.
03:36The regime's message was clear.
03:38There is no refuge.
03:39There is no sanctuary.
03:41There is no safe place to be an opponent of the Islamic Republic.
03:44The execution numbers tell the same story.
03:47In 2024, Iranian courts executed 975 people.
03:52That number was already horrifying.
03:54It drew international condemnation.
03:56But in 2025, the number jumped to 1,639.
04:01That is an increase of 68%.
04:0468% in a single year.
04:06The largest year-over-year increase since the Islamic Republic's founding.
04:10And the idea of executing people of using the death penalty as a political weapon has been revived with renewed
04:16energy after the January 2026 uprising.
04:20The regime is not slowing down.
04:22It is accelerating.
04:23Beyond the executions and the protest deaths, there is another category of victim that disappeared.
04:29Human rights organizations are investigating reports of abductions that happen every night across the country.
04:35Security forces knock on doors.
04:37They pull people from their homes.
04:39They stop cars at checkpoints and take passengers away.
04:42These people are not arrested in any legal sense.
04:45There are no charges.
04:47There are no lawyers.
04:48There are no court dates.
04:49They simply vanish.
04:51Days later, sometimes weeks later, their bodies are found in fields, in alleys, in shallow graves.
04:57Or they are never found at all.
04:58Human rights monitors call these enforced disappearances.
05:02Under international law, they are a crime against humanity.
05:06Despite this reign of terror, young Iranians who cry out for freedom are still prepared to oppose the Islamic Republic.
05:13They are afraid.
05:14Of course, they are afraid.
05:16They have seen 40,000 of their fellow citizens killed in a single month.
05:20They have seen 100,000 arrested.
05:22They have seen 1,639 executed in a single year.
05:26They fear another round of mass killings.
05:29But the fear has not extinguished the flame.
05:31Protesters are still giving signs through social media, through whispered conversations, through coded messages, that they will gather again.
05:38They want to show the world that the majority of Iranians do not support the current regime, and the numbers
05:44back them up.
05:44In a country of more than 90 million people, polls and surveys indicate that approximately 80% do not support
05:51the Islamic Republic of Iran.
05:5380%.
05:54The regime is a minority.
05:56It rules by force, not by consent.
05:59U.S. President Donald Trump has watched these events closely.
06:02He has stated that he wants to see a revival of protests against the Iranian regime.
06:06But he has also said something that might surprise you.
06:09He does not want to see protesters killed in the same way as in January.
06:13He wants to see a change of leadership in Iran, but only through peaceful means.
06:17However, Prime Minister Yad Vashem, the text appears to refer to an Israeli or Western leader.
06:23The name is preserved as Given has offered a different perspective.
06:26He said that the regime in Tehran would not fall if the Iranian people do not rise up.
06:31He sees this as the only opportunity for the Iranian people to overthrow their dictatorial leader.
06:37There is no foreign army that can do it for them.
06:39There is no missile strike that can topple the system from outside.
06:43The regime would only fall when the people decide collectively, courageously, that they have had enough.
06:48The ground prince of Iran, the heir to the monarchy that was overthrown in 1979, currently lives abroad.
06:54He has not forgotten his country.
06:56He has not abandoned his people.
06:58He still tells his compatriots at home to be very careful.
07:01He urges them to wait for the right time to rise up against the Islamic Republic.
07:06But he also acknowledges a painful truth.
07:08He has left.
07:09He is not there.
07:10And only the United States, he believes, can help free the Iranian people from the current oppressive regime.
07:16He urges the people not to lose hope.
07:18The US and Israel's war strategy, he says, is still in place despite the talks and ceasefires.
07:24The fight is not over.
07:26But the people of Tehran and other cities are living in fear.
07:29Even as some groups dare to oppose the government, they do so knowing that the next knock on the door
07:34could be their last.
07:36The Islamic Republic is not blind to its unpopularity.
07:39It knows that 80% of the population does not support it.
07:42So it has built a propaganda machine to create the illusion of support.
07:47The regime regularly organizes mass ceremonies.
07:49It mobilizes hundreds of thousands of people, busloads of government employees, members of state-sponsored militias, students from religious schools,
07:58and leads them in demonstrations against the United States.
08:01These rallies are televised.
08:03They are photographed.
08:04They are presented to the world as proof that the Iranian people stand with the Islamic Republic.
08:10But who are these people?
08:11Most of them are members of the regime's inner circle, the sons of Revolutionary Guard Generals.
08:16Government employees who attend under threat of losing their jobs.
08:19People who are paid to show up.
08:21They are not the Iranian people.
08:23They are a carefully selected, heavily coerced minority.
08:26Currently, a ceasefire is being implemented between Iran and the United States.
08:31The 40-day war has paused.
08:33The bonds have stopped falling for now.
08:35But experts see that the Iranian people are in a state of limbo.
08:38They give signs that a new revolution will break out.
08:41But no one knows when.
08:42The arse military is withdrawing from the war, leaving the Islamic Republic to survive wounded, but still standing.
08:49The United States is pushing the Islamic Republic to accept certain conditions.
08:54The goal, according to Trump, is regime change.
08:56But not through invasion.
08:58Through pressure.
08:59Through isolation.
09:00Through the slow strangulation of the economy.
09:02And yet, the regime survives.
09:05Here is a fact that cannot be ignored.
09:07The Islamic Republic has already lost many of its top leaders.
09:11On the very first day of the 40-day war, February 28, the most senior ayatollah of the Islamic Republic
09:17was killed by us and the Israeli warplanes.
09:19The man who had ruled Iran for nearly four decades was gone within hours of the conflict's outbreak.
09:24And he was not alone.
09:25Over the course of the war, more than 50 top leaders and generals were killed by American and Israeli airstrikes.
09:33The Irk's command structure was decapitated.
09:35The regime's chain of command was shattered.
09:37Prime Minister Niho, preserved as given, acknowledged that the Iranian people must now put aside their fears and gather the
09:43courage to overthrow the Islamic Republic,
09:46a regime that itself came to power by overthrowing the Iranian monarchy.
09:50Prince Mohamed bin Salman, the text, appears to conflate the Saudi crown prince with the Iranian crown prince.
09:56I will preserve the name as given, but note the likely intended reference is to Reza Pahlavi, the son of
10:02the last shah of Iran,
10:03still believes that the United States of America, under the Trump administration, will bring about a regime change in Tehran.
10:10He believes that the monarchy will be restored.
10:13Whether that belief is realistic or not, it gives hope to the Iranian diaspora,
10:17the millions of Iranians who fled the Islamic Republic and now live in exile,
10:22watching from afar, waiting for the day they can return to a free homeland.
10:26The international community has not remained silent.
10:29One month ago, the Unhuman Rights Council, based in Geneva, Switzerland, held an emergency session.
10:35The topic was the Islamic Republic of Iran.
10:37The council adopted a resolution condemning the regime.
10:40The language was strong, unusually strong for own body that often waters down its criticisms to achieve consensus.
10:47The resolution called the Islamic Republic of Iran the most barbaric regime facing the world today.
10:52It accused the regime of committing war crimes and crimes against humanity.
10:56Why?
10:57Because the Islamic Republic has resorted to killing its own people to maintain power.
11:02Not enemies.
11:03Not foreign combatants.
11:04Its own citizens.
11:06Its own children.
11:07Its own future.
11:08Let us return to the numbers one more time, because numbers have a way of becoming abstract.
11:13They need to be made human.
11:151,639 executions in 2025.
11:19That is more than 4 people every single day.
11:217 days a week.
11:2252 weeks a year.
11:25975 executions in 2024.
11:27A 68% increase.
11:2940,000 protesters killed in January 2026 alone.
11:34330,000 injured.
11:35100,000 arrested.
11:37Tens of thousands disappeared.
11:3980% of the population does not support the regime.
11:42These are not statistics.
11:44These are human beings.
11:46Each number is a face.
11:47Each number is a name.
11:49Each number is a story that ends in blood.
11:51The ceasefire holds.
11:53The diplomats talk.
11:54The world watches.
11:55But the question that remains the question that no one can answer is this.
11:59How long can a regime survive when 80% of its people want it gone?
12:03How long can the Islamic Republic of Iran continue to execute, imprison, and disappear
12:09its own citizens before the next uprising comes?
12:12And when it comes, not if.
12:13But when will the world do more than watch?
12:15The Iranian people are waiting.
12:17They have been waiting for 47 years.
12:19They are tired.
12:20They are afraid.
12:21They are grieving.
12:22But they have not given up.
12:24And that, perhaps, is the regime's greatest fear.
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