Targeted Eye Injuries in Iran’s Protest Crackdown: The Case of Elahe Tavakol.
Since the outbreak of Iran’s “Woman, Life, Freedom” protests in September 2022, Iranian security forces have repeatedly deployed metal pellet and rubber bullets to disperse crowds. Independent investigations by human-rights monitors, including Amnesty International and the Center for Human Rights in Iran, have documented a pattern of deliberate targeting of protesters’ faces and eyes, resulting in hundreds of partial or total blinding injuries across the country.
One of the most widely reported cases is that of Elahe Tavakolian, an Iranian PhD student. According to contemporaneous social-media documentation and interviews compiled by rights groups, Tavakolian was struck in the eye by a pellet during a demonstration, leaving a bullet fragment lodged in her skull. Medical evaluations confirmed the need for specialized treatment abroad.
On 23 March 2024, while awaiting surgery in Italy to remove the fragment, Tavakolian published a video statement on Instagram:
“I am here to take the bullet out of my head because it has moved around and got infected. The plan is to remove the bullet. A guest that is rough and cruel brought oppression. I am alive to shed light on these events and show this betrayal. Because the silent people are traitors, they can see the suffering of their children and the youth that are being lost. But they have stayed silent.”
Her account underscores two key findings repeatedly cited in international reports: first, that ocular injuries are not accidental but part of a systematic pattern of crowd-control tactics designed to intimidate and disable; second, that survivors often become crucial witnesses, documenting state violence even as they recover from life-altering wounds.
Tavakolian’s decision to speak publicly at personal risk has amplified calls from UN Special Rapporteurs and international NGOs for independent investigations into Iran’s use of force and for accountability under international human-rights law. Her case exemplifies how individual testimony, when corroborated by rights documentation, serves as both evidence of state repression and a catalyst for global advocacy.
