From Post To Pistol: The Deadly Price Omid Sarlak Paid For Burning Khamenei's Picture In Iran | VIDEO

Mourners chanted 'Death to Khamenei' at the funeral of Omid Sarlak, found dead hours after burning the Supreme Leader's image. Authorities claimed suicide, but family alleged murder amid Iran's crackdown.

Iranian man, Omid Sarlak, found with a gunshot. (Photo: Social media/X)

The death of a young Iranian man, Omid Sarlak, found with a gunshot wound hours after he posted an image of himself burning a picture of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Instagram, has led to fresh anti-government protests. While Iranian authorities have officially ruled the death a suicide, family members and hundreds of mourners attending his funeral on Monday openly blamed the regime.

Sarlak, in his 20s and from Lorestan province in western Iran, posted the provocative image and message on Friday.

pic.twitter.com/lbMg1IcJGf — FARID (@FARID48772411) November 2, 2025

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Official Suicide Claim vs. Mourners' Defiance

State media in Iran, including the IRNA news agency and Tasnim, were quick to refute opposition claims that Sarlak had been murdered.

Official Account: Ali Asadollahi, the police chief in Aligudarz, Sarlak's town, was quoted as saying by IRNA that the man was found dead in his car from a self-inflicted gunshot, with a pistol beside him. Tasnim further denied "anti-revolution media" claims, saying there was no open case against Sarlak and that he had killed himself with a gunshot to the head.

Family/Mourner Account: Dozens of mourners at Sarlak's funeral on Monday chanted defiant slogans in social media footage widely broadcast by opposition outlets, including Iran International and Radio Farda: "They killed him!" and "Death to Khamenei." There was also a video of Sarlak's father, which was posted by several opposition outlets, weeping and saying, "They killed my boy."\

Islam is dead in Iran.

At the funeral of 25 year old Omid Sarlak, murdered by the terrorist Islamic Republic occupying Iran, his family & friends recited Persian poetry from the Shahnameh, aka the "Book of Kings", in lieu of Arabic verses from the Quran. pic.twitter.com/VDqWtvoUWN — Goldie Ghamari | (@gghamari) November 4, 2025

Though Sarlak's father later appeared in an interview on local state-run television, urging the public not to believe social media rumors, this was widely interpreted by activists as a coerced statement.

Political Symbolism and Royalist Sympathy

The final social media posts by Sarlak turned him into a symbol of dissent. His video of the burning Khamenei portrait contained a recording of the voice of the late Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, to indicate his sympathy for the Iranian monarchy which was ousted in the 1979 Islamic revolution.

Reza Pahlavi, the U.S.-based son of the deposed Shah, described Sarlak on X as having "stood against the oppression of the Islamic republic and sacrificed his life for Iran's freedom."

Broader Crackdown and Human Rights Concerns

The incident unfolded in an increasingly heightened atmosphere of internal repression in Iran, three years after widespread nationwide protests and several months after a brief conflict between Israel and Iran. The UN's special rapporteur on human rights in Iran, Mai Sato, pointed out last week that "external aggression has fuelled deeper internal repression," highlighting an "alarming" surge in executions and "mass arrests" targeting activists.

International human rights groups have repeatedly documented cases of government critics found dead under suspicious circumstances that authorities invariably classify as suicides.

Disclaimer: This report is based on competing claims from Iranian state media and opposition media based outside of Iran. The circumstances of Omid Sarlak's death, whether suicide or murder, are reportedly being investigated, and the claims of mourners are unconfirmed by independent sources.