Author: Arash Hejazi

Arash Hejazi’s interview with Radio Netherland about his memoir The Gaze of the Gazelle

As British embassy officials flee Iran, we speak to an Iranian man in the UK: Arash Hejazi. He’s the doctor who tried to rescue Neda Agha-Soltan, the young woman who was shot during the 2009 protests in Tehran and became an icon of the struggle for democracy there. YouTube: Death of Neda (warning: graphic content) Arash talks to host Jonathan...

Dr Shaheed, what you have presented is just the tip of the iceberg: An open letter to Dr Ahmed Shaheed, Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Islamic Republic of Iran

[Read the text in Persian Here] Dear Dr Ahmed Shaheed, Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Islamic Republic of Iran, I am Arash Hejazi, an Iranian physician, writer, publisher and journalist, and the Doctor who tried to save the young girl shot to death by the Iranian Basij or the pro-government militia, orchestrated by the Revolutiosnary...

Book Review: The Gaze of the Gazelle, the memoir of a little boy who became a revolutionary for truth

Source: Middle East Book Review We talk about the tyranny of the Shah of Iran and the even worse tyranny of the Mullah’s that followed. We talk about the politics of Iran today and its role in terrorism, violence and the instability of the Middle East. We talk about the conflict that the United States started using their dictator pal...

O World! Enough hesitation! It’s time to act

[I first published this post in 30 December 2009, but unfortunately, nearly two years later, the world is just starting to realise the real danger of the regime occupying the maginificent land of Iran. I decided to publish it again without changing a word.] [Read the text in Persian Here] [Read the text in French Here] Hundreds of newspapers have...

Paulo Coelho: [The Gaze of the Gazelle] an Important and Life-Affirming Memoir

On 20 June 2009, a brief video clip was circulated all over the world. It showed the death of a young, unarmed woman called Neda, who had been shot in the chest while taking part in a protest in Tehran and was bleeding to death on the street. Few images in the contemporary world have had such an instant and...

The National’s Review on The Gaze of the Gazelle: Witness to a death that changed history

Source: Noori Passela, The National, Sep 16, 2011 Arash Hejazi is an Iranian writer, publisher, doctor and one of the few to witness Neda Agha-Soltan’s dying moments first-hand, when he captured it on a mobile-phone camera during the 2009 riots. It was his choice to upload the video, whichsparked an international media frenzy over the death of the bright-eyed young...

A review on The Gaze of the Gazelle: Witness to a death that changed history

Source: Noori Passela, The National, Sep 16, 2011 Arash Hejazi is an Iranian writer, publisher, doctor and one of the few to witness Neda Agha-Soltan’s dying moments first-hand, when he captured it on a mobile-phone camera during the 2009 riots. It was his choice to upload the video, whichsparked an international media frenzy over the death of the bright-eyed young...

The killing of Neda Agha Soltan & an extract from The Gaze of the Gazelle

Arash Hejazi John Angerson Martin Fletcher, Saturday Times Magazine July 23 2011 2:52PM Arash Hejazi witnessed the shooting of Iranian student Soltan in Tehran in 2009. What he did next would rock the regime – and change his life for ever The house is part of a bland new estate on the western edge of Oxford. In its sparsely furnished...

Washington Post’s analysis on Iran is ignorant and Naive: There is more depth to what the Iranian people are doing

An article published in Washington Post on June 16 2011, called ‘In Iran, ‘couch rebels’ prefer Facebook’, claims — based on its interview with three or four Iranians, whose identity (except for Abbas Abdi) is not known — that the Iranian people have given up on their protests that started in 2009, because they prefer ‘playing Internet games such as...

Two feedbacks from Italian readers of The Gaze of the Gazelle (Negli occhi della gazzella)

Your book hit my the soul… Sorry but I write with translator, my name is Romina, I am writing from Italy (ancona-marche). I read the book In the Eyes of the Gazelle (the Gaze of the Gazelle: Negli occhi della gazzella), it was so beautiful! I tried to understand better what you meant, jihad, Basij, imams, mullahs, jinn, Shari’a, Tudeh...

For Neda: The film: Tuesday 21 June, 10.00 PM on More 4 (UK only)

On 20 June 2009, Neda Agha Soltan was shot in the heart by a sniper and lay bleeding to death in a backstreet of Tehran. Within hours of her death this young Iranian woman’s dying moments, captured on mobile phones, were appearing on computer screens across the world. Anthony Thomas’s film tells Neda’s personal story and attempts to find out...

The Iranian Police Killed the Daughter of an Iranian Dissident at Her Father’s Funeral

Iranian activist dies in scuffle at her father’s funeral Haleh Sahabi, daughter of veteran dissident Ezatollah Sahabi, reportedly clashed with security forces guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 1 June 2011 11.18 BST The daughter of a prominent veteran Iranian dissident has died after reportedly scuffling with security forces at his funeral. she was holding a picture of her father to her chest and...

Arash Hejazi’s Interview with the Italian Magazine Io Dona: I can’t live in silence, Neda’s eyes hunt me

“Non posso vivere nel silenzio, gli occhi di Neda mi perseguitano” Dal suo rifugio a Londra parla ilmedico che cercò di salvare la studentessa-simbolo della rivolta iraniana. E che trovò il coraggio graziea Paolo Coelho di Emanuela Zuccalà, Io Dona, 20 May 2011 UNA RAGAZZA A TERRA, il volto percorso da rivoli di sangue scuro. Due uomini tentanodi rianimarla. Uno...

‘You don’t deserve to be published’ Book censorship in Iran

Censorship is as old as human intellect. It has been practised in almost every country at some level throughout history: from 399 BC, when Socrates was forced to drink poison, to the horrors of the Inquisition, and the oficial coining of the concept with the publication of Index Librorum Prohibitorum by the Roman Catholic Church; from the obligation of English publishers to register their books with the Stationers’ Company in the 16th century until the case of D. H. Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover; and the Nazi book-burning campaign and the absolute offfijicial control of the governments of the USSR, China, and Eastern European countries over published material.

Chief of the ‘Moral Security’ Police in Tehran: Not observing the Islamic cover for women, using satellite dishes and dog-walking are infringing the civil rights!

Aftabnews.ir 09/05/2011 َ The highlights of General Roozbahani’s interview with Aftabnews on Monday 09 May: – The police will enter the war with West’s cultural invasion and moral corruption with all its might. – We will strictly prohibit dog-walking after the legistlation is passed through the parliament. Dogs creat insecurity for the citizens and sometimes they bark! – Not observing...

Arash Hejazi’s interview with his shadow

“If I have decided that I should write, It is only because I should introduce myself to my shadow–a shadow which rests in a stooped position on the wall, and which appears to be voraciously swallowing all that I write down.” from The Blind Owl, by Sadeq Hedayat. I am having a very sincere and straightforward interview with my shadow,...

More than 150 Iranian prisoners killed or injured during clash with the Guards

Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRNA), 16/03/2011 According HRNA, 150 inmates of the Ghezel-Hessar Prison near in Karaj, Iran, have been killed or injured by the security guards last night, after protesting to the imminent execution of 10 prisoners. According to reports, the prisoners shouted: ‘Stop Executions!’ and they broke down the gates to the wards. At 9pm last night,...

Mousavi and Karroubi, the opposition leaders in Iran, apply for permission to rally in Tehran, in support of the protesters in Egypt

Just two days after Ayatollah Khamenei, the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran claimed in the Friday Prayers on 2 February that Egypt’s insurrection, and similar popular revolts across the Arab world, are inspired by Islamist political ideology and have their origin in the 1979 Iranian revolution that overthrew the Shah and thus encouraged the protesters in these...