Demonstrations, Protests and Riots

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      Dancing and Jumping Over Fire, Iranians Use Holiday to Defy Rules

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      Large crowds packed the streets to celebrate the tradition of Chaharshanbeh Suri. Iran has banned dancing in public, which has also been a way to protest.Iranians have looked for opportunities in recent months to display defiance against the rules of the clerical government. In Tuesday night’s annual fire festival, many found a chance.Across Iran, thousands of men and women packed the streets as they danced wildly to music and jumped joyfully over large bonfires, according to videos on social media and interviews with Iranians. The police said the crowds were so large in Tehran and other cities that traffic came to a standstill for many hours and commuters had difficulty reaching public transportation, according to Iranian news reports.Dancing, especially for men and women together, is banned in public in Iran and has long been a form of protest.In many places, the gatherings turned political, with crowds chanting, “Freedom, freedom, freedom,” “Death to the dictator” and “Get lost, clerics,” according to videos and interviews with participants. In the city of Rasht in northern Iran, a crowd booed security officers who drove by in motorcycles, videos showed.A man in Tehran celebrating Chaharshanbeh Suri. This year, the celebration became another example of how many Iranians have moved away from the ruling clerics.Arash Khamooshi for The New York TimesIranians were celebrating the ancient Persian tradition of Chaharshanbeh Suri before the coming new year, Nowruz, which is on the first day of spring. In a ritual on the eve of the last Wednesday of the year, people jump over fire to cleanse the spirit from malaise of the old year and take on the glow of the flames in preparation for the new year.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Washington State and ‘Uncommitted’ Will Test Biden Again Over Gaza War

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      Washington State’s primary voters will offer the next glimpse of how many Democratic voters oppose President Biden’s policy toward Israel’s war in Gaza, though it may be days before a full picture of the results is clear.The state’s primary on Tuesday comes after noteworthy numbers of Democratic voters in other states chose “uncommitted” in apparent protest of Mr. Biden’s position, including 13 percent in Michigan, 19 percent in Minnesota and 29 percent in the little-watched Democratic caucuses in Hawaii, where the antiwar advocacy groups that organized elsewhere did not have a presence.Washington’s brand of anti-establishment Pacific Northwest liberalism has the potential to be a good fit for the “uncommitted” vote that has won increasing slices of the Democratic electorate in recent weeks.And it is unlikely Mr. Biden’s forceful performance in his State of the Union address last week would have a strong impact on the results in Washington, which votes entirely by mail. More than 512,000 Democratic primary ballots had already been received by Thursday, when he delivered the speech, according to data from the Washington secretary of state’s office.Stuart Holmes, the director of elections for the secretary of state, said to expect about half the state’s ballots to be counted and reported when polls close on Tuesday night. The rest of the ballots will be tabulated and reported once a day until all votes are counted, with the vast majority of the counting expected to be complete by the end of this week, Mr. Holmes said.Shasti Conrad, the chairwoman of the Washington State Democrats, said the party would support Mr. Biden.“We know President Biden and Vice President Harris are working tirelessly toward an end to the violence and a just, lasting peace in the Middle East,” Ms. Conrad said. “Voters in Washington understand the tremendous progress Democrats have made.”“Uncommitted” backers have offered a low bar for success in each of the preceding states where they have been active.Larry Cohen, the chairman of Our Revolution, the political organization begun by supporters of Senator Bernie Sanders that is backing “uncommitted,” put the goal for success in Washington State at 10 percent — far less than previous states but more than “uncommitted” received in 2020, when 6,450 people, about 0.4 percent of Democratic primary voters, chose “uncommitted.”The state canceled its presidential primaries in 2012, the last time an incumbent Democratic president was seeking re-election. The parties held nominating caucuses instead. More

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      Navalny’s Heirs Seek a Political Future in Russia

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      Aleksei Navalny’s team has found a new leader in the opposition leader’s widow, Yulia Navalnaya. But Navalny’s death has so far brought little change to their insular tactics.Aleksei A. Navalny built Russia’s largest opposition force in his image, embodying a freer, fairer Russia for millions. His exiled team now faces the daunting task of steering his political movement without him.The movement has found a leader in Mr. Navalny’s widow, Yulia Navalnaya, who has presented herself as the new face of the opposition to President Vladimir V. Putin. Ms. Navalnaya, 47, is aided by a close-knit team of her husband’s lieutenants, who took over running Mr. Navalny’s political network after his imprisonment in 2021.Maintaining political momentum will be a challenge. Few dissident movements in modern history have managed to stay relevant, let alone take power, after the death of a leader who personified it. And so far, Mr. Navalny’s team has made little attempt to unite Russia’s fractured opposition groups and win new allies by adjusting its insular, tightly controlled ways.A spokeswoman for Mr. Navalny’s team, Kira Yarmysh, did not respond to questions or interview requests; nor did several of Mr. Navalny’s aides.In their public statements, Mr. Navalny’s top aides have said their movement will have to change to continue confronting Mr. Putin without its leader, though it is unclear what the new strategy might be.Even from prison, Mr. Navalny had “managed to support us, to infect us with optimism, to come up with projects, come up with cool political ideas,” Leonid Volkov, Mr. Navalny’s chief political organizer, said in a video published on social media last month. “Without Aleksei, things will not be as before.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Many Iranians Boycott Elections, Despite Pleas and Roses

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      Ordinary Iranians, fed up with a faltering economy and the government’s oppressive rules and violent crackdowns on peaceful protests, heeded calls to stay home.Iran held parliamentary elections on Friday, but despite officials’ last-minute attempts to increase voter turnout with pleas on social media and roses at polling stations, many people stayed away from the ballot in an act of protest against the government, according to witnesses, interviews and news reports.In the capital, Tehran, the turnout was estimated at 11 percent, the hard-line parliamentary candidate Ali Akbar Raefipour said in a post on social media, and across the country, turnout was around 40 percent, according to IRNA, the official Iranian news agency — even with polls extending their opening hours to 10 p.m. from 8 p.m.The current speaker of the Parliament, Gen. Mohammad Ghalibaf, a commander of the Revolutionary Guards Corps who is running for re-election on the conservative ticket, took to the social media platform X on Friday to plead with people to call at least 10 others and urge them to vote.“It’s not just winning the elections that matters, increasing participation is also a priority,” General Ghalibaf said in his post.For many ordinary Iranians fed up with a faltering economy — and with the government’s oppressive rules and violent crackdowns on peaceful protests — their demands for change extend far beyond what is offered by the existing political parties, with their reformist and conservative factions.Ahead of the vote, calls for a widespread boycott of the election had gained steam, with prominent activists and dissidents encouraging Iranians to turn the occasion into a protest against the government. The jailed Nobel Peace Prize laureate Narges Mohammadi said in a statement that boycotting the vote was a “moral duty.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      2 Charged After Pouring Red Powder Over Case Holding U.S. Constitution

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      Two activists poured the powder over the protective case at the National Archives Museum last month to call attention to climate change, prosecutors said.Two climate activists who dumped red powder over the display case that contains the U.S. Constitution at the National Archives Museum last month were charged on Thursday with destruction of government property, prosecutors said.The activists, Donald Zepeda, 35, of Maryland, and Jackson Green, 27, of Utah, poured the powder over the display case in the rotunda of the building on Feb. 14 as part of a “stunt, which was intended to draw attention to climate change,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia said in a statement on Friday.During the episode, which officials said was captured on video by supporters of Mr. Green, the two men also poured red powder over themselves and then stood before the Constitution as they called for solutions to climate change.The Constitution was not damaged, according to the National Archives Museum, which said that the powder was found to be a combination of pigment and cornstarch.“Fortunately, the four pages of the Constitution on display were not at risk for damage by this incident,” said Stephanie Hornbeck, a national preservation program officer.The rotunda was closed after the episode, which cost more than $50,000 to clean up, prosecutors said.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Farmers Clash With Police and Macron at Paris Agricultural Fair

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      At the annual show where the French countryside comes to the capital, President Emmanuel Macron’s efforts to calm a monthlong confrontation were met with anger.France’s farmers vented their fury at President Emmanuel Macron on Saturday as he arrived at the annual agricultural show in Paris, a giant fair long seen as a test of presidents’ relationship with the countryside.A large crowd that had camped outside the night before broke in and scuffled with police officers in riot gear while Mr. Macron entered through a side door to meet with unions demanding an end to hardships in the industry.During an hourlong closed-door meeting before the fair opened, with top cabinet members at Mr. Macron’s side, farmers sang the French national anthem, “La Marseillaise,” at the top of their lungs, blew whistles, raised fists and shouted for the president to resign, as skittish prize cows and pigs brought to the capital from farms around the country looked on nervously from their display pens.The rowdy confrontation was the latest in a monthlong showdown that has seen farmers blockade roads around France and in Paris — a movement that has spread to other countries, including Greece, Poland, Belgium and Germany.At issue are what farmers say are sharply rising costs, unfair competition from imports allowed into Europe from other countries able to produce food more cheaply, and especially European Union regulations intended to contain or reverse climate change.Agriculture accounts for about 30 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, and the European Union says drastic change is required. Farmers say European targets are imposing suffocating administrative and financial burdens.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Alexei Navalny Inspired Me to Start Pussy Riot. His Vision Is Immortal.

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      Aleksei Navalny spent most of his life working toward a free Russia. Since his death, the Pussy Riot founder Nadya Tolokonnikova has been reflecting on her friend’s legacy. In this audio essay, she calls on the West to take seriously the threat that Vladimir Putin poses to global peace.(A full transcript of this audio essay will be available within 24 hours of publication in the audio player above.)Illustration by Akshita Chandra/The New York Times; Photograph by Mladen Antonov/AFP, via Getty ImagesThis episode of “The Opinions” was produced by Jillian Weinberger. It was edited by Kaari Pitkin and Annie-Rose Strasser. Mixing by Carole Sabouraud. Original music by Sonia Herrero, Pat McCusker and Carole Sabouraud. Fact-checking by Mary Marge Locker. Audience strategy by Kristina Samulewski.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: [email protected] the New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, X (@NYTOpinion) and Instagram. More

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      N.Y.C. Protest Calling for Gaza Cease-Fire Targets Pro-Israel Senators

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      Demonstrators marched to the Manhattan headquarters of the lobbying group AIPAC, then to the offices of senators who have accepted donations from the group, where some were arrested.More than a dozen people were arrested Thursday evening during a peaceful pro-Palestinian protest inside a Manhattan building where Senators Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand, Democrats of New York, have offices.Wearing black T-shirts reading “Cease Fire Now” and holding up signs demanding that the senators “stop funding genocide,” the protesters linked arms and sat on the floor in front of elevators in the lobby of the building at 780 Third Avenue, singing slogans and ignoring instructions to leave until police officers arrested them.The demonstration, organized by a local chapter of Jewish Voice for Peace, a progressive activist group, was the latest in what have become almost daily protests throughout New York City since Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7. Those attacks killed at least 1,200 Israelis, according to Israeli officials; Israel’s subsequent military operation in Gaza has killed 29,000 Palestinians, according to Gazan health officials. The mounting death toll and humanitarian crisis in Gaza have prompted international calls for a cease-fire.By about 3:30 p.m. Thursday, several hundred protesters had gathered at Dag Hammarskjöld Plaza, in front of the United Nations headquarters, where the United States this week cast the lone vote against a resolution calling for an immediate cease-fire in the Gaza Strip. It was the third time the Biden administration had blocked similar resolutions, signaling its continued support of Israel.Accompanied by a heavy police presence, the demonstrators on Thursday marched through a light rain toward the headquarters of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, a powerful lobbying group established decades ago to promote Israel’s interests in the United States.Organizers blamed senators supported by AIPAC for passing an aid package this month that included $14.1 billion for Israel’s war against Hamas. The bill must still go through the House, where its fate is uncertain.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More