London / New York / Tehran – When Zahra tried to call her mother in Tehran, no familiar voice answered. Instead, she heard an unnaturally sounding female voice in English: “Who is calling? I’m Alyssia. Do you remember me?” Then the line went dead. Her mother, a diabetic, is alone in a suburb of Tehran, without insulin, without a way out. Zahra, 32, is one of many Iranians living in exile whose attempts to reach their families during the Israeli bombardment end in silence – or with a robotic voice. Since June 15, when an Israeli missile struck an oil depot in southern Tehran, the ability of Iranians abroad to reach their loved ones has changed: Sometimes the phone rings endlessly. Sometimes an eerie AI fragment responds. Never: the mother, the brother, the son.
Many affected individuals in the United Kingdom, Canada, and the United States reported encountering pre-recorded voices when trying to contact relatives – some in broken English, others in Persian, a few even offering seemingly calming platitudes: “Picture a place that brings you peace… Maybe a forest, maybe the sound of waves.” But the effect brings no comfort. Only unease. Psychological warfare, some call it. A targeted disruption of the intimate thread that connects two worlds – exile and home, safety and fear. IT experts who reviewed the recordings are divided. Some believe the Iranian state is systematically redirecting foreign calls to chatbots or scripted messages to shield information. Others, like Berlin-based Marwa Fatafta of “Access Now,” consider an Israeli origin plausible – part of a disinformation strategy.
What is certain: Iran is in a state of emergency. Internet access has been cut, mobile networks restricted, satellite dishes banned, and Starlink users are being urged to be reported by neighbors. Speaking requires detours – like Ellie, who can now only reach her mother using a dual-phone method from the Iran-Turkey border. A contact there uses an Iranian SIM to call her mother, then holds that phone up to a Turkish one, where Zahra is on the line. “We told her that a robot is answering her calls. She was shocked. She said her phone hasn’t rung at all,” she says. Others like M., whose mother-in-law was admitted to the ICU after a strike on northeast Tehran, now receive only audio mantras, as if the suffering were not real, but a simulation: “Close your eyes. Walk through a forest. Feel the wind.” What truly remains is the opposite of comfort. “All I feel is helplessness,” M. says. And in the midst of this digital silence, a truth becomes painfully clear: it’s not just the infrastructure being bombed. It’s the voices. The closeness. The last bridges to hope.
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