Barry Rosen, the press attaché at the United States Embassy in Tehran, was held hostage for 444 days in the early years after the revolution by forces known as the “Students Following the Line of the Imam,” a group that carried out the 1979 U.S. Embassy takeover.
In a note he published on the social media platform X, he points to the direct role of Masoumeh Ebtekar, the spokesperson for the hostage-takers and a former senior official of the Iranian regime.
Rosen writes that during interrogations, Ebtekar angrily and threateningly warned the hostages that they would face trial and immediate execution.
I was the press attaché at the U.S. Embassy in Tehran when I was taken hostage for 444 days by the zealous followers of Ayatollah Khomeini. During that time, the spokesperson for the hostage‑takers, Massoumeh Ebtekar—whom we called “Mary”—interrogated us with venom and publicly…
— Barry Rosen (@brosen1501) January 25, 2026
The children of officials of Ali Khamenei’s government, however, live today in a completely different situation.
Rosen notes in his writing that Issa Hashemi, the son of Masoumeh Ebtekar, now lives in Los Angeles and works as an academic.
This image stands in complete contrast to the anti-American slogans and violent behavior of the ruling generation.
Expulsion of Ali Larijani’s daughter, one of the figures implicated in crimes of Khamenei’s government, from a university
As part of these revelations, another example is also raised.
Fatemeh Larijani Ardeshir, the daughter of Ali Larijani, the former secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council and a senior figure of the Iranian regime, has recently been expelled from the Winship Cancer Institute of Emory University.
This occurred after the U.S. Treasury Department imposed sanctions on Ali Larijani and other key figures involved in repression.
Emory University has not yet confirmed a direct link between the expulsion and the sanctions.
Contrary to Predictions, Protests in Iran Expanded After the 12-Day War
For many Iranians living abroad, the issue of the children of Khamenei’s government officials is not merely an individual news item. It has become a symbol of deep injustice.
While inside Iran, regime forces have killed thousands of protesters, pressured families, and even demanded money to hand over the bodies of victims, the children of those same officials live in complete safety.
The affluent lives of Khamenei government officials’ children in the land of the “enemy”
These reports show that the children of Iranian regime officials benefit from freedoms, education, and opportunities in the very countries their parents label as “enemies.”
This contradiction reflects accumulated anger formed over decades of repression.
The exposure of these examples has contributed to the growth of a movement aimed at revealing the ruling system’s structural hypocrisy.
Each new disclosure lays this contradiction barer and raises more serious questions about accountability and justice.
