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Jailed Catholic woman's hunger strike highlights Iran religious persecution — US demands action
The State Department condemned Iran’s intensified repression of Christians, including a Catholic woman on hunger strike in a prison known as one of the most brutal in the theocratic state.
The Trump administration statement on widespread human rights violations carried out by the Iranian regime coincides with new military strikes against it in response to Tehran’s attacks on commercial tankers in the Strait of Hormuz.
The Christian woman on hunger strike is 42-year-old Ghazal Marzban, who sits in Iran’s infamous Evin prison in Tehran, according to Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA). Iran sentenced Marzban, a Catholic, to nearly 10 years in prison for practicing her Christian faith, Iranian experts told Fox News Digital. Marzban’s physical health, as of late May, had deteriorated. Her current condition is not known.
It is unclear if the administration plans to ramp up pressure on Iran’s leaders for their widepsread persecution of religious minorities and opponents of the regime.
A State Department spokesperson told Fox News Digital, "We are aware of these reports. It is reprehensible that the Iranian regime continues to persecute religious minorities, including Iranian Christians."
Article 18, an organization that promotes religious freedom in Iran, noted that following Marzban’s conversion, the Islamic law graduate was banned from taking her bar entry examination. Her husband, who also converted to Christianity, has been denied medicine for his Parkinson’s disease, according to Article 18.
Fox News Digital sent a press query to Iran’s U.N. Mission about Marzban and the plight of practicing Christians in Iran.
The State Department spokesperson said, "In Iran, human rights and fundamental freedoms, including the freedoms of expression, peaceful assembly, association, and religion or belief, are completely ignored. The regime targets members of religious and ethnic minority groups and uses tactics like arbitrary arrest and torture to intimidate opponents and silence dissent."
After the regime reportedly murdered as many as 45,000 Iranian demonstrators within a 48-hour period in January, including as many as 22 Iranian Christians, the security forces of the regime arrested vast numbers of protestors.
President Trump has cited the number of 45,000 Iranians killed by the regime. The State Department told Fox News Digital that Iran’s leaders should free those protesters still in detention.
"We reaffirm our unwavering solidarity with the people of Iran and call for the immediate and unconditional release of all political and wrongfully detained prisoners, including those facing persecution for peacefully exercising their fundamental freedoms," said the State Department spokesperson.
Lisa Daftari, an expert on Iran who is the editor-in-chief of The Foreign Desk, told Fox News Digital that the joint U.S.-Israel elimination of the former Supreme Leader of Iran, Ali Khamenei, in February, "Hasn’t eased pressure. On the contrary, we are seeing more escalation and the implementation of even more hardline influences."
Daftari said the "Arrests of Christians jumped from 139 in 2024 to 254 in 2025, alongside longer and more frequent sentences. At least 11 people received over a decade. After the recent war, authorities claimed they had ‘neutralized’ 53 elements, which is how they refer to evangelical Christians. That is because the Islamic Republic views conversion as a security threat."
Hengaw, an organization that monitors human rights violations in Iran, reported on its website on July 3 that the regime plans to seize the St. Peter Church in Tehran. Daftari said, "This is a large Christian compound with schools and family homes, and roughly 20 Armenian and Assyrian families are being expelled under a Revolutionary Court order that’s been sitting unused since 1998."
When asked about a policy response from the U.S., Daftari said, "If there’s going to be a response, it has to be targeted. That means sanctions on the specific judges, intelligence officials and IRGC [Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps] actors involved in cases like St. Peter Church and Marzban. And the transfer of church property to entities like EIKO [a business empire controlled by the late Khamenei] should be treated as state seizure, not an internal legal matter, and raised accordingly in international forums."
Ramin, whose real name cannot be disclosed due to "security reasons," an expert for Open Doors, a global Christian organization that aids persecuted Christians, told Fox News Digital, "The threatened confiscation of St Peter’s Evangelical Church in Tehran is deeply concerning and should not be viewed merely as a property dispute. It reflects a wider and long-standing pattern of pressure on Iran’s Christian communities, including recognized historic churches, Protestant communities, converts and reported cases involving Catholic converts."
Ramin added, "St Peter’s is one of Iran’s historic Protestant churches, and the reported eviction of families from the compound sends a clear message of intimidation to the wider Christian community. Together with the arrest, detention and sentencing of Christian converts, including those from Catholic backgrounds, this shows that the Iranian authorities continue to treat the peaceful Christian faith as a security concern rather than as a basic right to freedom of religion or belief."
Mansour Borji, the executive director of Article 18, told Fox News Digital that "The targeting of Christians whom the founders of the Islamic Republic viewed as an ideological threat began from the earliest days of the revolution. This included both Catholic and Protestant communities. Within days of the 1979 revolution, the Rev. Arastoo Sayyah, an Anglican priest, was murdered in his office. Foreign missionaries were expelled within the first year and Christian schools, hospitals and churches soon came under increasing pressure."
He added that, "Since 2008, Article18 has documented numerous confidential cases involving the arbitrary arrest of Catholic converts, harassment of church leaders, visa denials for clergy, the revocation of citizenship from a long-serving bishop and the confiscation and demolition of church property."
Borji continued, "The recent move against St. Peter’s Church is therefore not an isolated incident or a new development. It is part of a long-standing pattern of systematic pressure on independent Christian communities. The Islamic Republic is a totalitarian regime that has consistently sought to suppress any institution or community that operates outside its ideological control."
In the wake of the intensified persecution of Iranian Christians, he warned that "If the Islamic Republic regains the capacity to project its ideology with renewed confidence, the consequences are likely to extend across the region and beyond."
He urged that perpetrators "face targeted sanctions, visa restrictions and asset freezes under existing human rights mechanisms."
Borji said that "Governments, especially in the EU, U.K. and other trade partners, should also make religious freedom a consistent part of their engagement with Iran, rather than treating it as a secondary issue. Appeasing a regime that persecutes its own people has rarely produced moderation."
With US unleashing attacks, Iranian official threatens that the Islamic Republic will deliver a 'hard slap'
An Iranian official warned that the Islamic Republic will deliver a "hard slap" while another blatantly threatened the U.S. that "if you strike, you'll get hit," according to automatic translations from the two men's Persian-language posts on X.
Ebrahim Rezaei, whose profile on the social media platform indicates that he is a representative in Iran's Parliament and the spokesperson for the National Security and Foreign Policy Commission, wrote in a post on X, "The martyred Khamenei taught us not to fear America and showed that 'falsehood will perish.' Await the hard slap from the Iranians."
The speaker of Iran's Parliament, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, warned, "America still hasn’t learned that bullying and breaking promises are no longer cost-free. Let me put it plainly: if you strike, you’ll get hit. Don’t flail around pointlessly, or you’ll sink even deeper: the Strait of Hormuz will only open with 'Iranian arrangements,' not American threats."
Both of the men issued their posts on Wednesday after U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) announced more strikes against Iran.
"At the direction of the Commander in Chief, U.S. Central Command forces have started conducting additional strikes against Iran to further degrade their ability to threaten freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz. The United States is holding Iran accountable for recent unjustified aggression against commercial shipping and civilian crews freely navigating a vital international waterway," CENTCOM had noted in a post on X.
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The U.S. military later provided more information about the attacks.
"U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) forces completed an additional round of strikes against Iran, July 8, to further degrade Iran's ability to attack commercial shipping and innocent civilian mariners in the Strait of Hormuz," CENTCOM noted on Wednesday night.
"U.S. forces struck approximately 90 Iranian military targets including air defense systems, coastal surveillance assets, missile and drone storage sites, naval capabilities, and military logistics infrastructure along Iran’s coastline. The latest strikes follow successful execution of offensive strikes in Iran the night before," the announcement noted. "CENTCOM forces hit approximately 80 Iranian military targets July 7, including more than 60 Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps small boats, to impose heavy costs for Iran violating the ceasefire by attacking three commercial vessels navigating the Strait of Hormuz."
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President Donald Trump indicated on Wednesday that, as far as he was concerned, the U.S.-Iran Memorandum of Understanding ceasefire was "over."
Kuwait and Bahrain have both reported coming under attack.
The Kuwait Army noted in a Thursday post on X, which was written in Arabic, "The Official Spokesman for the Ministry of Defense, Major General Saud Abdulaziz Al-Otaibi, stated that the armed forces detected, at dawn today, (3) ballistic missiles, (1) cruise missile, and (10) hostile drones within Kuwaiti airspace, which were successfully intercepted and dealt with."
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The Bahrain Defense Force noted in a post that was in Arabic, "The General Command clarifies that, with firm resolve and high combat readiness, the Bahrain Defense Force's air defense systems confronted, intercepted, and destroyed several treacherous Iranian aerial attacks this morning, Thursday, July 9, 2026 CE."
