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Iranian Woman Sentenced to Flogging after Protesting Her Brother's Murder during January Protests
(The Times-UK) Fatemeh Jamalpour - Roody, 27, was sentenced to be flogged following the death of her brother, Mehdi, 37, who was shot several times in the head during the nationwide demonstrations in January. Roody wrote about his killing on X, raging against the Islamic Republic. She had earlier run-ins with the authorities began in 2023, after she posted a photograph of herself without a hijab. At the time, she went into hiding as security forces raided her home, beat her father and interrogated him for hours, threatened relatives and beat her friends so badly they were almost unrecognizable. After Roody spoke out about her brother's death, she received a summons, charged with disturbing public order. She said: "As soon as I found out about the sentence, I was shocked....The idea that someone is going to whip you in this day and age as a legal punishment never becomes normal." The woman who carried out the flogging recited "Bismillah al-Rahman al-Rahim" ("In the name of Allah, the most compassionate, the most merciful") every two lashes. By the end, Roody said, she had heard it 30 times - 60 lashes in all. "She was an older woman in a black chador....She was religious....I hated her polite, ceremonial tone. She spoke to me as if she were doing something normal."