Iran’s Students Hold Anti-Regime Protests as Universities Reopen

Students helped grow initial protests into a national movement crushed by the government. As the new semester began, they chanted and marched again.Demonstrators gathering at Amirkabir University in Tehran, in an image from a social media post that was verified by The New York Times.Credit...via Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesFeb. 21, 2026, 4:14 p.m. ETStudents at multiple universities in Iran held anti-government demonstrations on Saturday, the first day of the new semester, according to state media, student groups and videos verified by The New York Times.The campus demonstrations came a month after a deadly government crackdown quelled a protest movement demanding the ouster of Iran’s authoritarian clerical rulers. The activism of Iran’s students, along with that of shopkeepers at Tehran’s historic bazaars, helped initial protests snowball into a nationwide movement that at one point appeared to pose a significant threat to the regime.In Tehran, large crowds of students — wearing black to mourn those killed in the earlier protests — marched and gathered on Saturday in rallies at Sharif University and Amirkabir University, two prestigious technology institutes.Demonstrators at Sharif University chanted “Death to the dictator!,” referring to Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, as they moved through the campus, according to social media footage verified by The Times. In one verified video, demonstrators pushed and shoved one another in the center of a large crowd, in what appeared to be clashes between opposing protest groups.The Iran-broadcasting" class="entity-link entity-organization" data-entity-id="11781" data-entity-type="organization">Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting network, a state media outlet, said the demonstration at Sharif University began as a silent sit-in, which “turned into a gathering,” with the “chanting of subversive slogans.” It added that the atmosphere then “became tense.”At Amirkabir University, a student group wrote in a Telegram post that protesters had chanted “our target is the entire system,” and said some students had been arrested when police blocked the university’s entrance, without offering more details. The semiofficial Tasnim news agency said no students had been arrested. The Iran-broadcasting" class="entity-link entity-organization" data-entity-id="11781" data-entity-type="organization">Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting network said tensions on the campus had been “limited and short-term.”Student groups at a university in Mashhad, in the country’s northeast, and Shahid Beheshti University, outside Tehran, also held demonstrations, according to groups at each campus.The Iranian government did not publicly acknowledge the protests, though state-affiliated news media reported on the tension on university campuses.Students, particularly at universities, have long been at the forefront of struggles for democratic change in Iran, including in the revolution that toppled the monarchy and birthed the Islamic Republic in 1979. In turn, the Iranian government has raided campuses, arrested students and, at times, banned them from higher education altogether.Iran’s government has said that more than 3,000 people were killed in the crackdown on protesters in January. Rights groups like the U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency say at least 7,000 protesters were killed and the numbers are expected to rise as more deaths are verified.The large number of deaths — most over the span of three nights in early January — amounted to the deadliest unrest in Iran’s modern history. The government has continued its crackdown, arresting dissidents and prosecuting those it believes fomented the unrest.Pranav Baskar is an international reporter and a member of the 2025-26 Times Fellowship class, a program for journalists early in their careers.Devon Lum is a reporter on the Visual Investigations team at The Times, specializing in open-source techniques and visual analysis.SKIP