Iran Human Rights (IHR) recently reported that they believe that the Iranian regime is ramping up executions in the wake of the US strikes on the Islamic Republic of Iran. According to a CNN report, the Iranian regime has executed at least 47 political prisoners so far this year, a massive increase from 16 around the same time last year.
Each of these victims sitting on death row in Iran has a family that is suffering as they await the unjustified execution of their loved one. CNN recently interviewed Niki Nikbakht, who has two brothers, Hadi and Fazlollah, who are sitting on death row in Iran for politically related crimes.
According to information obtained by IHR, political prisoners Hadi and Fazlollah Nikbakht were sentenced to death on charges of efsad-fil-arz (corruption on earth) by the Golpayegan Revolutionary Court. The two brothers were arrested at their homes in Golpayegan on October 24, 2025, after they attempted to stop authorities from seizing their farmland.
According to the report, the defendants were accused of mobilizing youth to protest against the authorities.
Hadi has two sons and a five-month-old daughter, who never met her father because he was imprisoned by the Iranian regime when her mother was still pregnant.
According to CNN, Hadi, 45, and Fazlollah, 50, are just two out of dozens of Iranians sitting on death row in the Islamic Republic right now for politically related crimes that would never land one in prison, much less receive the death penalty, in any Western country.
Ahwaz dissident Hamid Mutashar, who heads the Ahwaz Liberal Party, stressed in a recent interview: “The Iranian regime’s accelerated execution spree in the aftermath of the recent US strikes is a desperate, criminal response, a clear admission of its fear and impending collapse. This is not just a crackdown. It is a violent attempt by a failing regime to silence the voices of liberty through terror.”
He continued: “The recent surge in executions carried out by the Iranian regime – particularly against our youth in Ahwaz, Kurdistan, and Azerbaijan – is not merely an act of domestic repression; it is a desperate, sociopathic reaction by a collapsing Nazi-style regime.
“By labeling innocent activists and freedom fighters as ‘agents of Israel,’ the regime attempts to mask its deep-seated paranoia and its fear of the growing unity among the non-Persian nations. These youth are not criminals; they are the conscience of our nations, executed simply because they dare to dream of a future free from Tehran’s tyranny.”
According to Mutashar, “The regime’s attempt to link our struggle for self-determination to external actors is a tired tactic to justify state-sanctioned murder. We call upon the international community – and specifically the human rights organizations in Israel and across the globe – to treat this for what it is: a crime against humanity.
“We demand immediate, tangible intervention to save the lives of those currently on death row. Silence is complicity. We urge the world to stand on the side of justice and to recognize that the collapse of this regime is not only a necessity for our survival but a prerequisite for regional and global peace.”
Iranian dissident Shabnam Assadollahi added, “The regime is once again using fear as a weapon to preserve its grip on power, sending a chilling message to every Iranian who dares to dream of freedom. [US] President [Donald] Trump and Prime Minister [Benjamin] Netanyahu must finish the job.
“If the Islamic Republic survives, it will continue what it has done for more than four decades: crushing its own people through terror while exporting violence, extremism, and instability beyond Iran’s borders. A regime that has built its power on repression and intimidation cannot be allowed to continue spreading the same ideology that has brought suffering to millions.”
Assadollahi claimed that she has received information from various sources inside Iran who claim that “the scale of the killings during the January 8-9 crackdown was far greater than publicly acknowledged. These sources allege that the number of those killed reached as high as 100,000 people.
“They further report that the bodies of many victims were transported to undisclosed facilities – what Persians refer to as human crematoriums – while countless families were denied the ability to recover or even identify the remains of their loved ones. These accounts require urgent international attention and a credible investigation.
“Since the 12-day conflict that began in February, the regime has intensified its machinery of repression, with hundreds reportedly executed by hanging. Every day of silence gives this regime more time to imprison, torture, and execute those who refuse to surrender their hope for freedom.”
Assadollahi stressed that she has sympathy for every Iranian imprisoned in the Islamic Republic because she has gone through what they went through: “I was only 16 years old when I was imprisoned in Evin and Ghezel Hesar prisons in the early 1980s. Terror had no timetable. It came in the middle of the night, in the early morning hours, and even in the middle of the day.
“Every opening of a prison door carried the question every prisoner feared: Who would not return? I learned to associate the amplified call to prayer echoing through the prison loudspeakers with fear and death. Instead of being a sound of comfort, it became a reminder of what was happening behind those walls. It was the sound that accompanied the execution of political prisoners and the destruction of families.
“As a teenager, I lived with the knowledge that I could be next. I was one of those young prisoners. I was 16 years old. More than four decades later, that memory has not faded. The same regime that imprisoned us, executed us, and tried to silence an entire generation continues its repression today.”
The Iranian people are still waiting
South Azerbaijani dissident journalist Ahmad Obali added, “When President Trump asked the protesters to go out and take over the government, and said that help was on the way, people really believed what he had to say and that the US would really come to help them.
“When Trump told the regime to stop the executions, or they would intervene, people really believed that the US would follow through. And now some people in Iran think that they have been deceived and left without all the help that the president promised. Therefore, Trump has a responsibility to actually help the people this time around to save his credibility.”
He added: “By now, the world must have realized that this regime in Iran is not capable of being reformed. The Iranian regime will continue on a killing spree of the prisoners to scare others from protesting. This regime will continue to train, fund, and arm its proxies from Lebanon to Iraq to Yemen and beyond to terrorize the region and to continue attacking shipping lanes in the Red Sea.
“This regime will continue attacking tankers in the Gulf and Sea of Oman to put pressure on oil prices and hijack the world economy. They think they have found a great tool to survive and put pressure on the US to back down by mining the Strait of Hormuz. It is time for the world and the US to wake up and realize that the only path to sustainable peace in the region is for this regime to go.”
Obali concluded: “As an Azerbaijani, I feel for the families of those executed and those who are going to be executed, many of whom are ethnic Azerbaijanis. When I was 17 years old, I was arrested and put in a detention center with 24 other detainees in one room. There was not enough room for people to lie down and sleep on the bare concrete floor.
“So we had to take turns to get some rest, and even then they would turn verses from the Quran on loudspeakers to deprive us of sleep. They would not let us go to the bathroom for over a day, so some detainees had to pee in plastic bags in order to prevent damage to their bladder. This does not include the physical or psychological torture I went through.
“I did not know if I would be executed the next day until I escaped from the prison. So I feel for the prisoners regardless of whether they are to be executed or not. It seems like this regime is going back to the 1980s-style of torture and executions.”
The Iranian regime also attacks dissidents who flee abroad, as Obali was physically assaulted outside Iran by agents of the regime.
Assadollahi concluded: “Every day this regime survives is another day it has to imprison, execute, and silence the Iranian people –and another day it has to strengthen the networks of terror it exports beyond Iran’s borders. This regime is not seeking peace. It is seeking time. Time to rebuild, time to deceive the world, and time to wait for international resolve to weaken.
“The Iranian people cannot afford another delay. Their lives cannot be placed on the calendar of elections or political calculations. Trump and Netanyahu, finish the job before it is too late. Do not allow this regime to buy another opportunity to continue its reign of terror.
“History will judge not only the brutality of the Islamic Republic, but also the choices made by those who had the power to stop it. The people of Iran have been waiting for freedom for over four decades. They are still waiting.”
The writer is the CEO of the Dona Gracia Center for Diplomacy and an Israel-based journalist. She is the author of Women and Jihad: Debating Palestinian Female Suicide Bombings in the American, Israeli and Arab Media.