At 10pm families gather on rooftops in Iran's capital city to shout together, their voices echoing throughout the sprawling city's mostly empty streets.

     This ritual, reminiscent of the 1979 Iranian revolution which led to the overthrow of the US-backed dictator Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, has become the "responsibility" of one young woman's family. This young woman Aamina [not her real name] has been risking her security to correspond with Truthout. Names and certain details are being withheld to protect her in light of the ongoing crackdown on journalists and activists in Iran. Aamina recently returned to Iran to be with her family.

     "There used to be more slogans like 'Ya Hossein, Mir Hossein'," Aamina said, in support of presidential challenger Mir-Hossein Mousavi. But the slogans have evolved as the crisis has. Now they shout "Alaho Akbar [God is the greatest], down with the dictator and down with the liar." Aamina said that in the distance she even hears people shouting "down with [Ayatollah Ali] Khamenei," the Supreme Leader of Iran.

     This shift from protesting the official results of the June 12 election to protesting the restrictive system of governance in Iran is striking and significant.

     "Some of my neighbors use some radical slogans and last night they said that they do not care about the election anymore. They want this regime to change. They said that they made a mistake and they brought this regime with their 'Alaho Akbar' in 1979 and now they want to remove it with the same slogan," Aamina said.

     Incumbent president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was declared the winner of the election, officially receiving 63 percent of the vote. His nearest rival, former prime minister Mir-Hossein Mousavi, officially received 33 percent of votes cast. Supporters of challenger Mousavi have declared the election to be fraudulent. Hard evidence of election theft has not been produced, but Mousavi supporters continue to doubt the official tally in part because overnight some 77 percent of the nearly 40 million votes were counted by hand according to the government. Protesters took to the streets, and dramatic images of street fights, police and militia brutality, and death captivated the attention of people around the world.

     Neda

     The shooting death of a young woman protester, Neda Agha-Soltan, has become a rallying point for the people defying the regime. A video of Neda seconds after she was shot captured her last moments.

     "Neda will be remembered as a hero. Her name has a powerful meaning. Neda in Persian has a spiritual meaning. It is an imaginary voice, and many believe that her death was a spiritual voice for people to gather more," Aamina said.

     A BBC interview with Dr Arash Hejazi, a medical doctor who tried in vain to save Neda's life on the scene, can be viewed here.

     The last round of protests took place Wednesday. Aamina was on her way home when she saw security forces moving in to break up the gathering.

     "I personally saw the guards moving towards where people were gathering while I was coming back from a friend's house. I took my camera out. I recorded as much as possible. They were shooting towards the sky in order to open traffic."

     The streets have been calm for two days, but tension lingers in the capital city.

     "There is a general sadness when we go in the street. It seems like no one has enough energy to work, but they do so anyway. Life has to go on. But then towards the afternoon you can feel the tension, the stress. 'Is something going to happen today?' I have heard people asking each other. It's like they all go to work and then they wait to see what to do."

     The possibility of a general strike has been discussed on the street, according to Aamina, but she does not yet know of any plan of action.

     "The only problem is that people of Tehran have not had a strike in about 30 years. It will take these businessmen a while to actually plan on a strike. In Kurdistan, the border states of Iran and Iraq, there are reports of many strikes. Kurdish people are more willing to do so because they are so used to it. In Tehran, people are still in an experimental stage."

     The civilians are also battling against censorship. Aamina described technology used by the Iranian government to interfere with satellite television. Using jamming signals Aamina called "parasites," the government has apparently blocked out certain news channels including the BBC, Voice of America, and CNN. Press reports have pointed to Internet filtering and interference with wireless communications by the government.

     Aamina made clear in her communications that the people of Iran who are defying the regime are hoping for support from the international community.

     "What this Freedom movement is demanding from the Global Community is to limit this new government in every single way … People want the Global Community to put a stop to the sale of systems that allows this government to limit the gathering of information," Aamina wrote, adding, "Another issue is the number of Political Prisoners who were mostly Journalists or reformist activists who are being tortured or whom we have no news from. There is a possibility of slaughter, and that is what we are scared of. There are many students that have been lost for weeks and there are no indications of where they are or what has happened to them."