This week marks the seventh year since the imprisonment of seven Baha’i leaders by the Islamic Republic. The Baha’i—whose religion is an offshoot of Islam founded in 19th-century Persia—have been subject to systematic repression since the 1979 revolution. Elliott Abrams writes:

The persecution [of the Baha’i] continues to increase—including since the election of the supposed reformer Hassan Rouhani as president in 2013. For example, there were 57 Baha’i in prison in 2011, but by January 2014 the number had reached 136 (in addition to hundreds more awaiting trial or sentencing). . . . And state-controlled media have greatly increased their attacks on the Baha’i: instead of once every day or two in previous years, last year attacks were running an amazing average of 400 per month. . . .

The Baha’i have no clergy and have self-governing communities with ad-hoc leaders. Their informal leadership group in Iran . . . was arrested in May 2008 and sent to Tehran’s notorious Evin prison. There these seven men and women remain today, seven years later. They’ve been charged with espionage, cooperation with Israel, and “spreading corruption on earth,” among other crimes. They were tried in closed sessions in 2010. One of the lawyers who tried to represent them, Nobel laureate Shirin Ebadi, says there was no evidence against them—nor did they get a fair trial. But all seven were sentenced to twenty-year terms.

On this seventh anniversary of their incarceration, it’s worth remembering the viciousness and the deceit with which the Iran continues to treat its peaceful Baha’i citizens. The truth about life in the Islamic Republic is revealed not by the smooth diplomats it sends abroad for international negotiations, but by the suffering of these peaceful and vulnerable citizens.

Early Friday morning, Israel attacked military installations near the Iranian cities of Isfahan and nearby Natanz, the latter being one of the hubs of the country’s nuclear program. Jerusalem is not taking credit for the attack, and none of the details are too certain, but it seems that the attack involved multiple drones, likely launched from within Iran, as well as one or more missiles fired from Syrian or Iraqi airspace. Strikes on Syrian radar systems shortly beforehand probably helped make the attack possible, and there were reportedly strikes on Iraq as well.

Iran itself is downplaying the attack, but the S-300 air-defense batteries in Isfahan appear to have been destroyed or damaged. This is a sophisticated Russian-made system positioned to protect the Natanz nuclear installation. In other words, Israel has demonstrated that Iran’s best technology can’t protect the country’s skies from the IDF. As Yossi Kuperwasser puts it, the attack, combined with the response to the assault on April 13,

clarified to the Iranians that whereas we [Israelis] are not as vulnerable as they thought, they are more vulnerable than they thought. They have difficulty hitting us, but we have no difficulty hitting them.

Nobody knows exactly how the operation was carried out. . . . It is good that a question mark hovers over . . . what exactly Israel did. Let’s keep them wondering. It is good for deniability and good for keeping the enemy uncertain.

The fact that we chose targets that were in the vicinity of a major nuclear facility but were linked to the Iranian missile and air forces was a good message. It communicated that we can reach other targets as well but, as we don’t want escalation, we chose targets nearby that were involved in the attack against Israel. I think it sends the message that if we want to, we can send a stronger message. Israel is not seeking escalation at the moment.