Iran International is now claiming that more than 12,000 Iranians were slaughtered in a coordinated massacre as the regime crushed nationwide protests, a figure that should shock every freedom-loving American. The outlet says the killings were concentrated over two nights and were hidden beneath a shuttering of the internet and brutal media blackout that looks designed to bury evidence.
That report is not some anonymous rumor; Iran International says its estimate is based on sources inside Tehran — from the Supreme National Security Council to elements of the Revolutionary Guard, as well as testimonies from medical staff, cemetery records, and eyewitnesses. The editorial board calls this the largest killing spree in Iran’s contemporary history and points to January 8 and 9 as the deadliest nights. Whatever the final tally, the scale and the method described smell like state-sanctioned terror.
The Islamic Republic’s own spokesmen, predictably, offer a far different story — an official told Reuters the government counts roughly 2,000 dead — while independent human rights monitors inside and outside Iran have confirmed hundreds of names and warned that many more deaths remain unverified because of the blackout. HRANA, the rights news agency, has already documented hundreds of confirmed fatalities and more than 10,000 arrests as communications were cut across the country. The contrast between inside evidence and official spin is glaring and damning.
This is not a protest turned violent; by every reasonable account it reads like an organized, calculated slaughter ordered from the top and executed by the IRGC and Basij militias. The regime’s playbook — blackouts, rushed burials, forced confessions — is chillingly familiar, and it exposes the moral bankruptcy of a clerical regime that will gun down its own children to stay in power. The United States is reportedly weighing a range of responses, from tariffs to cyber options and even strikes, and anyone who values liberty should demand decisive pressure now.
Meanwhile, the world’s democracies must stop issuing calm statements while adolescents and young men and women are mowed down in the streets; diplomats have begun to summon Iranian envoys, but that is not enough. Western elites who wring their hands about human rights should be held to account for their silence and must back sanctions, aid for refugees, and aggressive exposure of Tehran’s crimes until accountability is real. The American people — and conservatives in particular — know what standing for freedom looks like: it is not neutrality in the face of massacre.
Patriots in Congress and in the White House must act with urgency: protect dissidents, lift the veil of censorship with every tool possible, and make it clear that anyone who collaborates in this bloodletting will be isolated and punished. This crisis tests our principles — will we stand with the brave Iranians risking everything for freedom, or will we let the mullahs erase their sacrifice with silence and indifference? The answer should be loud, unapologetic, and unambiguous: America stands with the people seeking liberty, and we will not look away.
