File image.
Iranian police arrested as many as 21,000 “suspects” during the country’s 12-day war with Israel last June, state media reported on August 13, citing a law enforcement spokesperson.
With the start of the war on June 13, Iranian police began a campaign of widespread arrests accompanied by an intensified street presence based around checkpoints. It also made “public reports” in which it called on citizens to report on any individuals they thought were acting suspiciously.
“There was a 41 percent increase in calls by the public, which led to the arrest of 21,000 suspects during the 12-day war,” police spokesperson Saeid Montazerolmahdi said. He did not say what those arrested were suspected of, but Tehran has spoken before of people passing on information that may have helped direct the Israeli attacks.
The police also accelerated the deportations for Afghan migrants who were living illegally in the Islamic Republic during the war.
“Law enforcement rounded up 2,774 illegal migrants and discovered 30 special security cases by examining their phones. Two hundred and sixty-one suspects of espionage and 172 people accused of unauthorized filming were also arrested,” Montazerolmahdi said.
The spokesman added that the police handled more than 5,700 cases of cyber crimes such as online fraud and unauthorized withdrawals during the war, which he said had turned “cyberspace into an important battlefront.”
Montazerolmahdi did not specify how many of the suspects arrested during the war had since been convicted or released.
During the war, which ended with a sudden ceasefire on June 24, more than 30 Iranian senior military commanders and over a dozen of the Islamic Republic’s top nuclear scientists were assassinated.
The Mossad spy agency played a key role in these assassinations. The agency’s special forces also led a covert attack on Iranian air defenses and ballistic missiles, deploying suicide drones and guided missiles from within the territories of the Islamic Republic.
Despite the efforts of Iranian police and intelligence, the security situation in Iran has not improved much. A series of blasts and fires has been reported across the Islamic Republic since the end of the war, with reports revealing that Iranian officials suspect sabotage by Israeli intelligence.
Iran is certainly making efforts to improve the security situation. However, it should not be satisfied with the high number of arrests. Without deep reforms addressing the flaws that allowed the Mossad to hack its way into the Islamic Republic, Israel will maintain the upper hand.
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that number i’m certain is accurate “+” another 21,000…
21,000? just you wait. 10 years from now western media will insist that 21,000,000 were systematically murdered.