Nach dem Anruf des im Exil lebenden Prinzen kommt es in der iranischen Hauptstadt zu Protesten; Bald darauf wird das Internet unterbrochen

Excerpt:

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — People in Iran’s capital shouted from their homes and rallied in the street Thursday night after a call by the country’s exiled crown prince for a mass demonstration, witnesses said, [a new escalation in the protests](https://apnews.com/article/iran-protests-nuclear-us-what-to-know-explainer-845b3ac10c37727add7118ec9c2f6e46) that have spread nationwide across the Islamic Republic. Internet access and telephone lines in Iran cut out immediately after the protests began.

The protest represented the first test of whether the Iranian public could be swayed by Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi, whose [fatally ill father fled Iran](https://apnews.com/article/iran-revolution-anniversary-ap-top-news-tehran-international-news-iran-c037d5af8b3b4be6ae47f125d847d0f0) just before the country’s 1979 Islamic Revolution. Demonstrations have included cries in support of the shah, something that could bring a death sentence in the past but now underlines the anger fueling the protests that began over Iran’s ailing economy.

Thursday saw a continuation of the demonstrations that popped up in cities and rural towns across Iran on Wednesday. More markets and bazaars shut down in support of the protesters. So far, violence around the demonstrations has killed at least 41 people while more than 2,270 others have been detained, said the U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency.

[The growth of the protests](https://apnews.com/article/iran-economic-protests-129cea0f8c39b6d5b5603c634acaa61e) increases the pressure on Iran’s civilian government and its Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. CloudFlare, an internet firm, and the advocacy group NetBlocks reported the internet outage, both attributing it to Iranian government interference. Attempts to dial landlines and mobile phones from Dubai to Iran could not be connected. Such outages have in the past been followed by intense government crackdowns.

Meanwhile, the protests themselves have remained broadly leaderless. It remains unclear how Pahlavi’s call will affect the demonstrations moving forward.

“The lack of a viable alternative has undermined past protests in Iran,” wrote Nate Swanson of the Washington-based Atlantic Council, who studies Iran.

Personal take:

This time is very different because its economic, not religious, related. Also Iran is totally the good guys now cutting internet access off.

Not excusing Iran this is a crisis of their own making, but it expect more of this as political chaos is convenient to some parties in the run up to November.