Shabtabnews In this dark night, I have lost my way – Arise from a corner, oh you the star of guidance.
Iranwire – January 8 and 9 marked one of the bloodiest crackdowns on protesters in Iranian history. This is not merely a claim but the consensus among researchers who study Iran’s history of war, invasion, and civil unrest. The exact death toll remains unconfirmed.
While the government speaks of 3,000 deaths, other media outlets estimate the number may be as high as 50,000. The steady emergence of new names and stories each day points to the vast scale of the killings.
This is the story of Nima Palizgar, a 39-year-old man in love, as told by his partner. Throughout our conversation, her voice is heavy with grief, tears streaming down her face.
“Even now, my whole body trembles when I talk about him. We were supposed to see each other before all this happened, but Nima worked so much that it never worked out. Every day at 5:00 a.m., he went to the auto manufacturing company where he worked. If he didn’t stay for overtime, he would take his old pickup truck out around 6:00 or 7:00 p.m. to work for Snapp. Nima always had back pain because he lifted people’s heavy loads by himself to move them with his truck.”
Nima’s life reflected the “double-shift” reality faced by many Iranians. Snapp is the Iranian equivalent of Uber.
Despite holding a specialized job at an auto factory, hyperinflation in 2026 pushed even skilled workers into the gig economy to cover basic expenses and support elderly parents.
The young woman’s composure breaks. On the night of January 8, 2026, during protests in Karaj, Islamic Republic forces killed Nima with a single bullet to the jugular.
She returns to that night, “He called me on January 8 and said, ‘I’ll come see you when I finish work this evening.’ He didn’t say anything about going to the protests. He had gone out with his parents. They were at Fardis Second Square when things suddenly turned chaotic, and Nima and his parents lost each other.”
His parents searched for hours as his phone went dead. Finally, a friend—a café owner—informed them that Nima was at the Parsin Clinic near Fardis Square. By the time the friend arrived, Nima had died. The bullet had severed his jugular.
When she speaks about Nima, her voice briefly comes alive again. “Nima was such a good, harmless man. He never raised his voice at anyone. Sometimes I would tell him, ‘You’re so oppressed, people treat you unfairly,’ and he would say, ‘If I make someone feel bad and they go to sleep with a heavy heart, my own tomorrow will be ruined.’ He helped everyone however he could—even strangers. He loved and protected animals.”
Nima was the sole support for his elderly parents. “He always said, ‘I am the pillar of their lives.’ He loved his mother deeply. He bought a car through installments and loans, but they never let him drive it even once. He always said he wanted to take his parents out so they could enjoy life, but he worked so much that this dream died with him. His friends used to joke, ‘Nima, your car has gone up in price.’ He would sigh and say, ‘That price is the cost of our dreams. It’s the price of our youth and our white hair.’”
Just days before January 8, Nima had spoken happily about a salary raise. “He said, ‘I’ll give you a treat to celebrate.’ He didn’t even live to see it. His birthday was in November. I bought him clothes as a gift, but I never got to see him wear them. Nima was an angel they took away from me.”
January 9: Families Wandering to Claim the Dead
A close family member told IranWire: “Nima’s body was first taken home, and on Friday morning, January 9, they took him to Behesht-e Sakineh cemetery in Karaj to obtain a burial permit.”
A friend of Nima described the scene, “January 9 felt like Judgment Day outside the morgue. I saw scenes I will never forget. A seven- or eight-year-old child saw his father’s body and said, ‘Give him my jacket, Dad is cold.’ A father was screaming, ‘You took my only son; you broke my spine.’ I saw mothers whose colorful clothes stood in stark contrast to the deathly pallor of their loved ones’ faces.”
Karaj, a satellite city of Tehran, was one of the main sites of the 2026 “Massacre Nights.” Behesht-e Sakineh became a focal point of grief and repression, as security forces used the release of bodies as leverage to force families into silence.
Finally, on January 10—after prolonged delays, harassment, and demands for large sums of money—Nima’s body was released.
“They had numbered the bodies. There was a tag on Nima’s foot that they told us must not be removed under any circumstances. We were allowed to take him only on the condition that no ceremony be held and that nothing become crowded. Some families were forced to accept the claim that their children were Basij members. For them, there were no problems, and the bodies were released easily.”
The “large sums of money” often refer to so-called “bullet fees” or “delivery fees” reported previously. The state also attempts to co-opt victims by labeling them “martyrs of the state,” allowing it to claim protesters as regime supporters. Refusing this designation is an act of immense courage for families, as it often leads to further harassment.
“He always said he wanted us to travel together, but he never had time to rest. It was work, work, work and in the end, all he received was a gravestone. There is an enormous void in our lives. His mother fainted more than ten times at his grave. She has become distraught and is close to losing her mind. It’s her right. Life is unbearably hard without Nima. I regret every moment I didn’t cherish.”
She cannot stop crying. “I go to his grave to find peace, but the memory of our unfulfilled dreams burns me like fire. Nothing will ever fill his place.”
“I’m Still Waiting; I Can’t Believe He’s Gone”
Nima used to surprise her by standing behind her door and texting: “I’m here, open up.” Now, she says she wakes in the middle of the night. “I’m waiting for him. I jump out of bed and run to the door, thinking he’s there, but it’s just an illusion.”
“I have seen enough hardship in my life. I recently lost my father due to the stress following heart surgery. But the pain of losing Nima, and all the other Nimas, will never leave my heart. I will remember every grieving family I saw there. After this, we will never return to life as we once knew it.”
