Across Iran's sprawling network of detention centers and revolutionary courts, the first week of November 2026 has brought a chilling escalation in state cruelty. From hospital rooms in Tehran where recovering political prisoners are chained to their beds, to the cells of Isfahan where mothers are imprisoned as their sons are sent to the gallows, the clerical regime is weaponizing medical deprivation, family hostage-taking, and accelerated executions to punish popular dissent.
60-Year-Old Shiva Esmaili Handcuffed to Her Bed After Spinal Surgery
Inside Tehran's Evin Prison, 60-year-old agricultural engineer and mother of three Shiva (Masoumeh) Esmaili has spent six years behind bars since her arrest in November 2020, serving a ten-year sentence handed down by Branch 26 of the Tehran Revolutionary Court. For years, prison authorities obstructed treatment for her worsening spinal condition and severe back pain.
When she was finally permitted to undergo urgent spinal surgery—paid entirely at her own personal expense—security agents shackled the 60-year-old mother directly to her hospital bed immediately after the operation. Now, despite doctors' warnings that she requires specialized post-operative care and complete rest, Evin Prison authorities have ordered her premature return to a prison ward lacking basic medical facilities, placing her at risk of permanent paralysis.
Imprisoned Mothers and Physicians: Somayeh Afshar and Dr. Safiyeh Sabzevari
Alongside the denial of medical care in prison wards, the judiciary is systematically targeting grieving mothers and community doctors. In Isfahan's Dowlatabad Prison, Somayeh Afshar—mother of January 2026 protester Alireza Sepahi—is serving a five-year prison sentence handed down by Branch 1 of the Revolutionary Court. Arrested just twenty days after her son in February 2026 to pressure him into forced televised confessions, Somayeh remained locked inside Dowlatabad Prison on October 4, 2026, the morning the judiciary executed her son at dawn. Denied even the right to mourn at her child's grave, she remains behind bars alongside imprisoned Isfahan pediatrician Dr. Zeynab Soleimani. Meanwhile, in northeastern Iran, general practitioner Dr. Safiyeh Sabzevari has been held in Sabzevar Prison in complete legal limbo since September 5, 2026, without disclosed charges.
Mass Food Poisoning in Qarchak Prison and Nine Executed in Isfahan
In Ward 4 of Qarchak Prison in Varamin, women detainees launched a collective refusal of prison meals on October 30, 2026, after spoiled rations caused an outbreak of acute food poisoning. Authorities refused to provide medical examinations or treatment in a facility where bathing water causes skin rashes and each female prisoner is rationed just a single pain-relief tablet per month.
While women detainees battle slow-motion medical torture behind bars, the judiciary is accelerating dawn hangings of youths arrested during the January 2026 uprising. On November 3, 2026, authorities in Isfahan executed 19-year-old Amirhossein Maleki and 20-year-old medical student Amirhossein Ebrahimi—bringing the total executed in the single 12-defendant "Meydan Alikhani" joint protest case to nine, and leaving the remaining three co-defendants (Shervin Bagherian, Ali Dashti, and Abolfazl Ebrahimi) at imminent risk of execution.
