Iran’s top university expels student over toy rat that mocked Ali Khamenei

Sharif University’s student affairs office said the ruling against Reza Dalman, a 24-year-old master’s student in computer engineering, was final. “The final ruling was communicated to the university for implementation on August 16,” the office said

Dalman was arrested on March 19 and released on bail about a month later. Student m a tree during protests at Sharif in late February, before a Basij-affiliated student climbed up and took it down

The toy was an insult with a name. Critics began calling Ali Khamenei “Moush-Ali,” or Rat-Ali, after the late supreme leader largely vanished from public view during the 12-day war with Israel in June 2025, when reports said he had taken shelter in a fortified underground facility

Moush means mouse, or rat. The nickname spread from social media into chants at protests inside Iran and among the diaspora, a way of mocking a leader his opponents said had run for cover

Dalman published an image of the final decision, stamped “confidential,” on his X account. Among the points the university listed against him was that during his defense he showed “no expression of remorse.”

The expulsion sits alongside a judicial case against Dalman and a widening series of disciplinary rulings at one of Iran’s most prominent universities

Expulsion orders reach 10

Three more Sharif students have received preliminary expulsion orders, bringing to 10 the number facing such rulings, the United Students group said on Wednesday

The latest are Ariana Kouchaki, an industrial engineering undergraduate, Ali Alirezaei, a mathematics undergraduate, and Arash Hatami, a physics undergraduate. Kouchaki and Hatami were each barred from studying at any university in Iran for one year, while Alirezaei received a five-year nationwide ban, according to the group

Seven other Sharif students had already received expulsion orders. Dalman’s is the only case finalized by the Ministry of Science; the rest remain preliminary

Source: www.iranintl.com