MASHDAD, Iran — The night before Ashoura is the busiest and most passionate night of the year in Iran’s holy city of Mashhad. Iranians flock to “the place of martyrdom” to commemorate and remember Imam Hussein, the grandson of the Prophet Muhammad, and partake in a communal mourning experience at the Shrine of Imam Reza, the eighth Shiite Imam.
According to many locals, however, this year Ashoura had a different feel.
