Iran Security Moves to Crush New Protests in Tehran: Via NYTimes.com .

Security forces began clashing with protesters shortly after they began massing in the streets of Tehran on Thursday evening, as an initially festive demonstration quickly turned grim, witnesses said.

Tear gas was fired into Lelah Park, they said, and a woman whose coat was covered in blood ran from Revolution Square, one of the main gathering spots during the initial weeks of protests over the June 12 election. She said that police officers were beating protesters.

It was the first protest in 11 days, and was called to commemorate the 10th anniversary of violent confrontations at Tehran University when protesting students were beaten and jailed. Iranian authorities had announced earlier that the demonstration was illegal and would be met with a “crushing response.”

But at the end of the work day, hundreds of protesters began packing the streets of one area of Tehran, chanting, clapping and sitting in jammed traffic as drivers honked their horns, witnesses said. Families brought their children. Many held a hand in the air in the defiant V for victory.

The security forces quickly moved in.

Reuters, citing witnesses, reported that the police used tear gas to disperse a group of about 250 protesters as they headed toward Tehran University, shouting support for a defeated presidential candidate, Mir Hussein Moussavi.

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“The enemies of the Iranian nation are angry with the post-election calm in Iran and try to damage it through their TV channels," he said, according to Press TV.

Those who “follow the statements by the enemies’ TV” would receive a “crushing response” from the people, he said.

The warnings coincided with other steps to prevent protests, The A.P. said. Cellphone messaging was down Thursday for a third straight day, apparently to prevent communication between protesters, while the government closed universities and declared an official holiday Tuesday and Wednesday, ostensibly because Tehran has been shrouded in a heavy dust and pollution cloud, The A.P. said.

Thursday’s demonstration came against a backdrop of rising anxiety and continued arrests. According to Press TV, a reformist member of Parliament, Mohammad Reza Tabesh, said the government’s approach — holding prisoners incommunicado — had left families of the accused frightened. And the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran, a group based in New York, said the government was continuing to make arrests.

The group said a prominent human rights lawyer, Mohammad Ali Dadkhah, was arrested in his office in Tehran around 4 p.m. on Wednesday.

“The Iranian government is trampling over every rule of due process,” Hadi Ghaemi, the group’s spokesman, said in a statement. “Not only are hundreds of detainees in incommunicado detention, in solitary confinement and possibly under torture, but their lawyers are rapidly being added to their ranks.”

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