Three young men were publicly hanged in Qom on 19 March, charged with moharebeh — "waging war against God." Saleh Mohammadi was 19 years old. He turned 19 in his cell on 11 March — eight days before the state killed him. He had been arrested, tried, and sentenced to death in under three weeks. His family alleges his confession was extracted under torture1. Saeed Davoudi was 21. Mehdi Ghasemi's age has not been published2.
All three were arrested during the January 2026 protests — the same uprising in which Amnesty International documented snipers on rooftops firing into crowds, deliberately aiming at heads and torsos, and for which President Pezeshkian issued a public apology. That apology reads differently now. The judiciary that sentenced these men answers to The Supreme Leader, not the elected president — a structural division that has defined Iranian governance since 1979. The moharebeh charge, carrying a mandatory death sentence under Iran's interpretation of Islamic law, has been applied to protest cases since the 2009 Green Movement, converting political dissent into a theological capital crime.
The timing replicates a pattern. After the 2022–2023 protests following Mahsa Jina Amini's death in morality police custody, Iran executed at least four protesters — Mohsen Shekari, Majidreza Rahnavard, Mohammad Mehdi Karami, and Seyyed Mohammad Hosseini — as international attention began to wane. The current war provides far deeper cover. Amnesty International accused the authorities of "arbitrary executions" designed to intimidate "an already traumatised population, under bombardment"3. Iran Human Rights warned of imminent mass executions of political prisoners "in the shadow of war," stating dozens more with death sentences face immediate risk, including minors4.
The international mechanisms that might ordinarily exert pressure — UN Human Rights Council proceedings, bilateral diplomatic protests, sustained media campaigns — are consumed by the conflict itself. Sweden, whose dual national Kouroush Keyvani was hanged on espionage charges on 18 March, has limited leverage over a state under active bombardment. The calculation behind the timing is straightforward: execute while the cameras point elsewhere. For as long as the war absorbs global attention, there is no political cost.
