Reports from Iran indicate that more than 100 Basij members were poisoned in an incident in Parand, a satellite city southwest of Tehran. One of the paramilitaries is reported to have died, while the rest were rushed to local hospitals. The person responsible, so far, has not been identified.

The Basij is no ordinary force. It is the volunteer paramilitary wing of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and one of the regime’s most feared instruments. For years, its members have been in charge of crushing protests, setting up street checkpoints and keeping the ayatollah government in power through brutal force.

Suspicion points to a coordinated act. Poisoning dozens of paramilitaries at the same time and in the same place does not look like coincidence, but like a direct message to the top of Iranian power in the midst of a wave of internal instability, after the recent war with the United States and Israel and the mass protests shaking the country.

Parand lies a few kilometers from the capital and hosts strategic regime facilities. The blow, if fully confirmed, would be one of the boldest acts against the Basij since the start of the conflict, and would show that the pressure no longer comes only from the air, but from within.