The first thing I thought of when I heard that Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was dead was how happy Masih Alinejad must be.
Alinejad, an Iranian journalist and activist, had worked for this day for the last 15 years. Since she was forced into exile in 2009, Masih Alinejad has worked tirelessly for freedom for Iranians, and, in parallel, for women’s rights in one of the most repressive regimes for women in the world.
She was facing arrest for her protest activities following the rigged 2009 presidential election, when incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was announced the winner with 62% of the vote over Mir-Hossein Mousavi. It was a preposterous outcome given the numerous irregularities discovered, including the fact that Mousavi won only 50% of the vote in Tabriz, the capital of his home province. Across the country, people poured into the streets, unbidden by any protest leader or any formal organization. More than 110 people were killed in the protests that became violent and were referred to afterwards as “The Green Revolution.”
After hearing she was to be arrested, Alinejad fled to Great Britain, where she began attending Oxford. After getting her degree, she moved to the United States in 2014 and became a citizen in 2019.
Alinejad began her career as a journalist in 2001, writing for several prominent reformist newspapers. “As a parliamentary reporter in Tehran, she covered corruption and misconduct among lawmakers, building a reputation for pointed, confrontational reporting,” notes the Times of India.
It has been her advocacy for basic freedoms for Iranian women of all ages, which dates to her early journalistic career, that has separated Alinejad from other Iranian activists.
Alinejad is best known for her campaign against Iran’s compulsory hijab laws. In 2014, she launched My Stealthy Freedom, inviting women to share photographs of themselves without headscarves. The campaign attracted more than one million likes and evolved into related movements such as White Wednesdays and My Camera Is My Weapon.
Through these initiatives, she positioned social media as a form of civil resistance.She hosts “Tablet” on Voice of America’s Persian service and has contributed to outlets including IranWire, Radio Farda and The New York Times. In 2021, she co-founded the World Liberty Congress. After the death of Mahsa Amini in 2022, she became one of the prominent voices supporting the Women, Life, Freedom movement. In January 2026, she addressed the United Nations, accusing Iran of committing war crimes
Alinejad married Kambiz Forouzandeh in 2014. Her memoir, The Wind in My Hair, published in 2018, became a bestseller. Over the years, she has received several honours, including the Geneva Summit Prize in 2015, the Moral Courage Award in 2022 and recognition as Time’s Woman of the Year in 2023. The New York Times once described her as “the woman whose hair frightens Iran.”
Indeed, more than any other activist, she used mockery against Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, accusing him and other leaders of being terrified of women.
“The Islamic Republic’s ideology has taken our bodies and our hair hostage for 40 years,” Alinejad told Benny Avni of the New York Post in 2018. She added, “In the past four years, women are taking action. We’re done negotiating, we are taking to the streets to take back our rights.”
Her advocacy has so riled the Iranian authorities that they’ve tried to assassinate her in her home in New York City three times. There was even an attempt to kidnap her by luring her away to supposedly meet her mother in Turkey, where she would have been snatched by the Iranian secret police and brought back to Iran, where she almost certainly would have been executed.
Not surprisingly, news of Khamenei’s death brought powerful emotions to the surface for the activist.
Finally, you’re dead finally, you’re gone @khamenei_ir
💃🏻💃🏻💃🏻🌻🌻🌻💃🏻💃🏻💃🏻 pic.twitter.com/6TYJ7Mps3B— Masih Alinejad 🏳️ (@AlinejadMasih) February 28, 2026
She shared her joy on the streets of New York City with total strangers, who were also celebrating Khamenei’s downfall.
Wow. What a video.
My heart reacts when I see other Iranian women feeling exactly what I felt when I heard the news. Watch how grief and joy explode at the same time.
If you’ve never lived under a dictator, you probably won’t understand it.
Do you? 😔 pic.twitter.com/MK3vXqrEgY— Masih Alinejad 🏳️ (@AlinejadMasih) March 3, 2026
Masih Alinejad has given Iranians hope that the future for all can be better. That’s a powerful message falling now on receptive ears.
Related: Mileposts on the Road to Oblivion: How Iran Falls
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