Supplied by Rueters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Iranians striving to maintain a semblance of normal life after weeks of US and Israeli bombing and a deadly crackdown on protesters in January remain daunted by the future as damage from airstrikes and internet cuts take a toll.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
With Iran and the US wrangling over a truce extension and an agreement to end the conflict, shops, restaurants and government offices have stayed open. On sunny spring mornings, city parks are busy with family picnics and young people playing sports while others gather at streetside cafes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But behind such peaceful scenes, Iran\u2019s economy is in tatters and people are fearful of a new government clampdown and angry about the destructive airstrikes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The difficulties that spurred mass unrest in January look likely to worsen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Talks in Islamabad this month \u2013 the first direct negotiations between the United States and Iran in years \u2013 ended without an agreement. But with the current fragile ceasefire due to end on Wednesday, US President Donald Trump said on Sunday that his envoys would head to Pakistan and were prepared to hold more talks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
FEAR OF INCREASED PRESSURE AS THEOCRACY ENDURES<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe war will end, but that\u2019s when our real problems with the system begin. I\u2019m very afraid that if the regime reaches an agreement with the United States, it will increase pressure on ordinary people,\u201d a 37-year-old named Fariba, who took part in the January unrest, told Reuters by phone from Iran.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cPeople have not forgotten the regime\u2019s crimes in January, and the system has not forgotten that people do not want it. They are holding back now because they don\u2019t want to fight on a domestic front as well,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The bombing has killed thousands, according to official death tolls, including many at a school on the first day of the conflict.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It has also destroyed infrastructure across the country, raising the prospect of mass job layoffs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Iran\u2019s revolutionary theocracy looks as entrenched as ever after surviving weeks of intense bombardment and asserting control over global oil supplies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIranians understood that this war is not going to topple the regime, but at the same time, it\u2019s going to make their lives much worse economically,\u201d said Omid Memarian, Iran analyst at independent US-based think tank Dawn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe military is not going to put down their guns. They are going to stay and it\u2019s going to be bloody. It\u2019s going to be costly, with no prospect for a better future,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In well-heeled north Tehran this week, Reuters interviewed young Iranians on camera about the war and their concerns. Foreign media in Iran operate under guidelines set by the Culture and Islamic Guidance Ministry, which regulates press activity and permissions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mehtab, who works at a private company and asked not to use her family name, said things could be worse for Iranians given the impact of war and years of sanctions and isolation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI do not want to say that it is normal, but as an Iranian with such a history, it is not very bad. We can live with it,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That view was not shared by Iranians Reuters reached by phone. They voiced far greater anxiety while speaking anonymously for fear of reprisals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cYes, people are enjoying the ceasefire for now \u2014 but what comes next? What are we supposed to do with a regime that has become even more powerful?\u201d said Sara, 27, a private teacher who declined to give her family name or location.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
IRANIANS LEFT WITH FEW OPTIONS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Thousands were killed when the authorities crushed weeks of protests in January, prompting Trump to say he would come to the aid of Iranians.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Iran\u2019s permanent mission to the UN in Geneva did not immediately respond to requests for comment for this story. It has previously blamed the violence in January on \u201carmed terrorists\u201d linked to Israel and the United States.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu both said early in the war that they hoped it would topple the ruling clerics, that goal faded as the bombing continued.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Anger over the crackdown meant that many Iranians wanted new rulers, but soon soured on the war, Memarian said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI think it became more clear for many Iranians that this war is not designed, or is not aimed, at helping the Iranian people,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Neither Mehtab nor other women sitting at a cafe in north Tehran were wearing the hijab, a head covering that was mandatory for decades in Iran. Looser public dress codes are the result of mass protests in 2022, including over women\u2019s rights, which the authorities violently suppressed while tacitly backing off from enforcement of some dress rules.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Independent UK-based Iranian political analyst Hossein Rassam said it became clear in January that authorities would not back down again easily, and later that they would not crumble under military attack.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The war had left Iranians even more polarized than before, but with few options. \u201cThis is a moment of reckoning for Iranians because, at the end of the day, Iranians, especially Iranians inside the country, realize that they need to live together. There is nowhere to go,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2018FIRE UNDER THE ASHES\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Many fear repression could now worsen. \u201cOn the streets, women are going around without the hijab, but it\u2019s unclear whether these kind of freedoms will continue after a deal with the United States. Pressure will 100 percent increase, because once there is peace with Washington, the regime will no longer face the same external pressure,\u201d Arjang, a 43-year-old father of two, told Reuters by phone from north Tehran.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The January protests brought no tangible change to people\u2019s lives, while leading the authorities to severely restrict internet use \u2013 a blow to both businesses and ordinary people desperate for information during war.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cEven the smallest things, like connecting with our family members who live outside the country, are impossible,\u201d said Faezeh, 47, as she played volleyball with friends in a north Tehran park.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Popular frustration may start to mount after the war ends and people are less afraid of being labelled as traitors, said Memarian.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThere is a lot of fire under the ashes,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Supplied by Rueters. Iranians striving to maintain a semblance of normal life after weeks of US and Israeli bombing and a deadly crackdown on protesters in January remain daunted by the future as damage from airstrikes and internet cuts take a toll. With Iran and the US wrangling over a truce extension and an agreement<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12227,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[43],"tags":[178],"coauthors":[475],"class_list":{"0":"post-12226","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world-2","8":"tag-iran"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/IRAN-CRISIS-TEHRAN.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12226","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12226"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12226\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12228,"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12226\/revisions\/12228"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/12227"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12226"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12226"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12226"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cvnznews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcoauthors&post=12226"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}