The Iranian people have endured over four decades under one of the most repressive regimes in modern history. Since the fall of the Shah in 1979, the Islamic Republic has ruled with an iron fist—executing, imprisoning, torturing, and silencing all dissent. Despite it all, the people have never stopped resisting. The protests that erupted in 2009, 2017, 2019, and again in 2022 during the “Woman, Life, Freedom” uprising show that the spirit of freedom still burns in Iran. But the tragic truth is: they are unarmed.
This is no accident. It is the calculated strategy of a regime that understands what all tyrants understand: an armed population is a threat to authoritarian power. A disarmed population can be crushed.
Masih Alinejad, founder of the My Stealthy Freedom movement, said: “The Islamic Republic is afraid of its people. That’s why it bans guns, protests, freedom of speech, and women’s hair.”
The bravery of the Iranian people is beyond dispute. Young girls faced down armed riot police with nothing but their voices. Mothers buried sons and still stood in the streets chanting for justice. But without the ability to defend themselves, they are slaughtered while the world watches.
Narges Mohammadi, imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize laureate and civil resistance leader, wrote in a smuggled letter: “The Islamic Republic is a system that survives only through fear and force… If we had the means to defend ourselves, it would not have survived this long.”
Even under the Shah—a Western-aligned monarchy—ordinary Iranians were not broadly armed. Gun ownership was restricted to elites, tribal groups, and rural hunters with permits. There was no institutional right to bear arms. So when the Islamists seized power, the people had no way to resist.
In contrast, the Founders of the United States understood tyranny and enshrined the right to bear arms in the Second Amendment. Thomas Jefferson wrote, “The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government.”
The Second Amendment is not about hunting or sport. It is about survival. Iran is what happens when people have no ability to resist with force. The state becomes the sole wielder of violence—and it will use that monopoly to crush all opposition. This isn’t theory. It’s reality. And it’s being lived by 86 million Iranians today.
Sattar Beheshti, an Iranian blogger tortured to death in custody in 2012, once wrote: “They fear our words, but what they truly fear is that one day we may no longer be powerless to stop them.”
We must support the Iranian people in their pursuit of freedom. But we must also learn from their plight. Never surrender your right to self-defense. Never disarm in the face of government promises of protection. Those promises are as fragile as paper, and when they burn, only the armed remain free. Disarmament is not peace. It is preparation for tyranny.
By Doris Wise, Founder, Jews Can Shoot
