Political activist and human rights advocate
On March 8, 1979, tens of thousands of Iranian women took to the streets, demanding the right to choose what to wear on the first International Women’s Day of the post-revolutionary Iran.
The rally that was supposed to be a celebration of women, became the start of a six-day battle against the newly imposed Islamic dress code on them. It was perhaps the earliest sign that the revolution they had fought for had been hijacked.
Only weeks before, many of these same women—students, doctors, lawyers, nurses, teachers, activists—had marched against the dictatorial rule of Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi, fighting for freedom, democracy, and equality, unaware that they would become the first victims of Iran’s Islamization led by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.
On March 7, 1979, Khomeini decreed that all women working in government offices must heed Islamic diktats and cover their hair. The following day, women arriving at work unveiled were turned away.
Many felt this was not about clothes, but control. They saw it as an attempt to erase women from public life. And they fought back.
“We did not rise to go back,” thousands chanted marching from the University of Tehran toward the Prime Minister’s office. “In the dawn of freedom, women’s rights are missing.”
The peaceful demonstration was met with brute force. Islamist revolutionaries and pro-Khomeini mobs stormed the march with sticks and knives. Dissenting women were beaten and stabbed. They were called enemies of Islam and agents of the West.
But they did not back down.
For six days, they marched through the streets of Tehran, defying the cold, the growing danger, and the bitter sneering of those who dismissed their struggle as secondary to the revolutionary cause.
The dismissive view was by no means limited to Iranian masses. It was shared by many Western intellectuals who, bewitched by the revolution in Iran, ignored or actively justified the repression of the new regime.
Thinkers afar: enablers and allies
While feminists like French philosopher Simone de Beauvoir and American writer Kate Millett stood in solidarity with women in Iran, others like de Beauvoir’s compatriot Michel Foucault helped legitimize the Islamic Republic.
De Beauvoir recognized the Iranian women’s fight as part of the global struggle for gender equality, helping establish the International Committee for Women’s Rights (CIDF) to amplify their voices. Millett traveled to Iran to document their struggle and was arrested and expelled for her efforts.
Foucault also visited Iran but had a wholly different view of the events. He romanticized the revolution, reducing it to a rejection of Western imperialism and ignoring its catastrophic consequences for women and dissidents. He brushed aside human rights concerns as Western biases, a framing that persists in various forms to this date.
Another lasting influence in Western intellectual circles is Palestinian-American philosopher and literary critic Edward Said.
Said’s most influential work, Orientalism, was published a year before the revolution in Iran. He focused on Western narratives about the East. While many of his arguments against colonialism were valid, they were weaponized by Islamists to deflect criticism.
Said, unlike Foucault, never glorified Iran’s transformation. Others used his emphasis on culture, however, to depict forced veiling and gender segregation as cultural differences rather than human rights violations, failing to—or choosing not to— challenge the repression in a meaningful way.
A Legacy of Resistance
Back in Iran, the forced veiling of women was completed and codified in 1983. Those daring to flout the law would be punished by official enforcers or emboldened thugs. The Six-Day Protest of 1979 was defeated.
But it heralded a long fight for equality that’s continued to this date.
In 2022, the world watched as Iranians across Iran took to the streets after a 22-year-old Kurdish woman named Mahsa Amini died in custody, having been detained for not covering her hair fully.
Amini’s tragic death—a state murder by all accounts—ignited the largest uprising against the Islamic Republic. Young men tore down posters of supreme leader Ali Khamenei as young women set their scarves on fire.
Their slogan? “Woman, Life, Freedom.”
The struggle against hijab and gender apartheid is not just an Iranian issue—it is a global human rights fight. Iranian and Afghan women continue to resist, even as the Islamic Republic and the Taliban impose laws aimed at erasing them from public life.
What happened on March 8, 1979, is not just history, it is a warning. Revisiting that eventful day and what has happened in Iran since, may help Western intellectuals and politicians see mandatory hijab for what it is: systemic, religious oppression, not a symbol of cultural relativism.
When enforced by law, hijab is not a cultural practice. It is a means of control. Iranian and Afghan women are calling for solidarity, demanding that the world listen to them rather than the Foucaults of the world.
International Women’s Day is a day to honor those who fought and are fighting for equality. It also has to be a day to reject the view that dismisses their struggle, and enables their oppressors.
Opinion expressed by the author are not necessarily the views of Iran International.
“Iran is very alone at the moment” said Barkey, an adjunct senior fellow for Middle East studies at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington DC.
The push for a resolution to a decades-old insurgency by the Kurdish Workers Party against the Turkish state comes as the Middle East's tectonic plates shift and global alliances are in flux as President Donald Trump cast upends US commitments.
"We have a completely changed strategic situation in the Middle East," said Barkey, "no one at the moment has any dominance in the Middle East and it's up for grabs."
"Iran, for the foreseeable will not be able to do what it used to do in the past," added Barkey.
After 15-months of direct combat and proxy warfare pitting Iran against Israel throughout the region, Tehran has come off worse.
It's main ally Hezbollah in Lebanon took a heavy toll from an Israeli ground invasion and air strikes. Most notably, Iran's oldest ally in Syria's Assad dynasty was toppled by Sunni Islamist rebels closer to Turkey, giving Ankara a new regional ward.
How Turkey benefits from peace with the PKK
The jailed leader of the PKK Abdullah Ocalan called on its members to lay down arms in an address from his island prison near Istanbul on Feb. 27.
That announcement was followed by a ceasefire days later which ended 40 years of armed struggle for a Kurdish homeland.
While President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's rapprochement is largely driven by domestic political considerations to create a new constitution enabling him to run for a third presidential term in 2028, Turkey stands to likely make gains in Northern Iraq, where many PKK fighters are stationed.
Turkey’s gains may be Iran’s losses.
“Both Turkey and Iran would like to influence Iraqi Kurds,” said Barkey.
The Turks and PKK making peace formally will help in those efforts to increase influence.
The relationship between Turkey and Iran Barkey characterized as complex, but one in which there are at least cordial ties and a stable border. Both Islamic nations, however, are revisionist with ideals of grandeur.
Turkey's Minister of Foreign Affairs, Hakan Fidan, said in an interview with Al Jazeera Arabic last month that Iran's foreign policy of relying on militias led to more losses than gains.
Shifting tectonic plates
Recent diplomatic tensions between Tehran and Ankara represents a broader shift in the Middle East.
Add to the mix Turkey reportedly offering to send peacekeepers to Ukraine, contingent on the war ending with Russia – and Israel, striking southern Syria and attempting to increase ties with Syrian Kurds.
Israel says it part of a new policy to demilitarize southern Syria, but the new government led by the Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) hardline Islamist group which is close to Turkey has denounced Israel.
“The Israelis also are risking by going too far into trying to punish the Syrians, forcing the Syrians, essentially to look for allies,” said Barkey on Eye for Iran.
One ally that Damascus will not reach out to is Tehran, maintaining its anti-Islamic republic stance.
“That’s it,” said Barkey on there being zero chance that Iran could reestablish itself in Syria, while Ankara enjoys a close relationship with the new HTS leaders.
“The Syrians and HTS blame Iran for propping Assad in power all these years, that Assad would not have succeeded in staying in power this long, or even winning the civil war if it wasn't for Iranian support.”
Reports: The offer of Turkish peacekeepers in Ukraine
Turkey is not signaling support of Ukraine by offering up peacekeepers, said Barkey.
Rather it's a chance for Erdogan to appear relevant on the world stage. Iran, on the other, despite its relationship with Russia, is irrelevant.
“Before Iran was a very useful if not a direct instrument of the Russians but a useful actor on the international scene because it created so many problems for the United States and its allies,” said Barkey.
Barkey questioned Iran's ability to send ballistic missiles to Russia after significant blows by Israel to its stockpile.
Meanwhile, Russia has positioned itself as a mediator between Washington and Tehran over potential nuclear talks.
"No leader has done more for Russia than Trump, so Moscow could pressure Iran," Barkey told Eye for Iran.
"It is quite possible that the Russians will put some pressure on the Iranians, whether it's real or make believe," said Barkey.
The changing alliances, new world order and the stable unpredictability of Trump, may further destabilize the Islamic Republic while Turkey gains the upper hand in the region.
You can watch the full episode of Eye for Iran with Henri Barkey, an adjunct senior fellow for Middle East studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, on YouTube or you can listen on Spotify, Apple, Amazon, Castbox or any major podcast platform.