Deported into the Heart of the Dictatorship, the Secret Pact with Tehran and Our Rage

A plane full of people who sought protection has been turned into a tool of political power games. Around one hundred Iranian men and women were put this week into a U.S.-chartered aircraft that flew from Louisiana via Qatar to Tehran. What sounds like a sober administrative procedure is in truth a brutal signal: Washington has pushed its deportation agenda so far that it has become an instrument of international diplomacy and geopolitical favors.

Many of the nearly 100 deported are not ordinary migrants but predominantly regime opponents: activists, journalists, converts, women’s rights activists, people from the LGBTIQ community, people who have long been listed as "dangerous" by the Iranian security apparatus. We have seen the problem coming for weeks, we have been trying to help people. Where do you start, where do you stop, we are all too small and financially too weak for that. Sending these people back does not only mean returning them to a repressive system — it means sending them effectively to their deaths. In Iran, public executions, show trials, torture and the disappearance of dissidents are part of everyday life. Anyone on a blacklist there has little chance of escaping a sentence or state repression.

The deportation is embedded in a diplomatic corridor whose edges reach toward Jerusalem. The "ceasefire" between Israel and Iran propagated by Trump - the official cornerstones are not confirmed, yet several negotiation levels point to a triangle: Israel is to suspend its direct attacks on Iranian positions in Syria and Iraq; Iran is to scale back the activities of its proxies in Lebanon (Hezbollah), in Yemen (Houthis) and in the region. In parallel, informal economic and humanitarian channels are being sketched out: deliveries of medicines and energy, limited relaxations for certain traded goods, possibly even quiet concessions regarding intelligence information. For Washington the deportation is a lever - proof that it is willing to deliver concrete favors to achieve political concessions. For Tehran the acceptance of the returnees is an internal political signal: the leadership demonstrates sovereignty and the ability to make agreements with old enemies without giving up its power base.

In the USA journalists like us, lawyers and NGOs are now desperately trying to get at least some of these people out or to keep their cases in the public eye. But the means are minimal, the bureaucratic hurdles gigantic, and every day counts. In our newsrooms and networks anger is spreading: How can it be that in wealthy, educated countries golf professionals make fun of Trump for a headline story, while activists and opponents are flown to their deaths? How can it be that universities fund studies into why people fall in love with AI chatbots, that the damn money is there for that - "artificial intelligence as the perfect partner" - while for basic human rights every cent has to be begged? There is money for every absurd trend, but those who fight for freedom have to do it like a dog, by their own strength, against a system of pervasive indifference and cynicism.

The reality on the ground is horribly concrete: lawyers reported cases in which asylum procedures were halted or delayed, of people who under pressure signed "voluntary" returns because months of detention, isolation and lack of prospects made any choice a farce. NGOs trying to resist the returnees now are confronted with closed embassies, missing files and the fact that diplomatic agreements between states override the rights of individual people. Legally, much can only be set in motion once the cases are public - but secrecy and political interests narrow the space for solidarity action. The path will lead to Iran, that is owed to those people who have done no one any harm. What remains is the attempt to help with all available means: emergency petitions to international bodies, rallying support networks, seeking political sponsors who make cases visible. It is a fight against time, bureaucracy and political calculation. And it is a fight against the coarsening of perception across almost the whole world: when societies that call themselves educated invest their resources more in trends, luxury and technology than in the protection of the persecuted, there are moral consequences. This plane should never have taken off.

We continue to document, we collect names and evidence. And we will remind the public: states may make deals, diplomats may reach agreements, but the responsibility for human lives lies with all of us. If there is a last hope, it is to ensure this case does not pass by quietly and unnoticed. We carry rage.