The truth about Iran is not what the Washington press corps wants you to believe, and Ben Domenech cut through that propaganda on Life, Liberty & Levin, warning that the regime is “totally winning” by using mass murder to cling to power. Americans should listen when someone says our usual media narrative downplays the brutality because it interferes with the uncomfortable fact that an Islamist dictatorship is executing its own people to survive.
Independent human rights organizations have documented a brutal, nationwide crackdown since late December, cataloguing unlawful use of live ammunition, beatings, mass arrests, and horrific injuries among civilians, including children. These on-the-ground findings make clear this is not mere “economic unrest” but a regime lashing out to crush dissent and terrorize a population demanding basic freedoms.
Official numbers out of Tehran and activist tallies tell two very different stories, and that discrepancy should alarm every freedom-loving American. The Iranian government’s own figures are far lower than those collected by independent monitors and activists, who report thousands dead and tens of thousands detained in a crackdown that echoes the worst excesses of the Ayatollahs’ rule.
Meanwhile, large swaths of the mainstream media have tried to cage the narrative, calling these uprisings “economic protests” or minimizing the scale so sympathies for the regime can be preserved or weaponized. Domenech and others on conservative outlets refuse to let that lie stand, demanding the American people see what is happening and recognize who the real victims and villains are.
This is not a remote foreign problem we can shrug off; the carnage inside Iran has real geopolitical consequences and requires a strong American response rather than hand-wringing and appeasement. Reports of U.S. naval movements and loud public pressure are precisely the sort of posture that keeps tyrants guessing and reminds oppressed people that liberty still has defenders.
Patriots should be angry but focused: support the Iranian people’s courage, demand sanctions and accountability for the murderers in Tehran, and stop listening to media elites who excuse tyranny with euphemisms. Ben Domenech did the right thing by calling out the spin — now it’s up to Americans to demand our leaders match our moral clarity with decisive action.
