It’s make or break time today between the U.S. soccer team versus the Iranian team. If the U.S. ties or loses the match, the team goes home. For soccer fans, it’s a big match. For the rest of us, it’s been interesting to watch what has been going on in Qatar during the 2022 World Cup.

It wasn’t completely unexpected that Qatar has strict rules of conduct for soccer fans that Western visitors find restrictive. Islamic countries are governed according to their religious laws. So, when there was a big ruckus caused by teams wearing LGBTQ patches on their jerseys or reporters wearing gay pride t-shirts being told to remove them, no one should have been surprised. But, they were, or so they said, and the stories were written. The patches and t-shirts are to draw attention to the LGBTQ community and they did. Islamic countries are not tolerant of LGBTQ people and most people know that.

A female reporter from Argentina was robbed as she reported on-air in a crowd celebrating a win.

Budweiser thought it had a deal to sell beer during the matches and that was nixed at the last minute.

The World Cup in Qatar has been complicated by the protests in Iran. The Ayatollah’s regime is cracking down on protesters, led by women fighting for basic rights like not having to wear a hijab, for example. The Basij, a paramilitary wing of Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guard, is blinding protesters. The violence against protesters increases as the protests grow and the regime struggles to control them.

Khamenei’s niece was arrested last week.

To recap, the Iranian protests began after the death of a 22-year-old Kurdish woman, Mahsa Amini on September 17 in Tehran. She died in custody of Iran’s morality police. The morality police arrested her when she refused to cover her head in public.

In Qatar, the Iranian protesters are finding support from some of the teams. The Iranian team refused to sing the national anthem before their first match. The powers that be noticed and began to apply pressure to the team to shape up. The American team posted a schedule of the big match-up today against Iran and temporarily altered the Iranian flag as a way to show support of the protesters. It was only up for 24 hours on social media. Nonetheless, Iranian officials called for the U.S. team to be banned from competing for violating FIFA rules.

During a press conference on Monday, the U.S. team’s coach and captain answered questions from the media and the Iranian reporters hijacked the event to ask political questions, not soccer-related questions. The men handled the situation very well.

Later on Monday, it was reported that the Iranian regime upped their pressure on the country’s players. The families of the players have been threatened with torture and imprisonment if the players do not “behave” before the match. The assumption is that they are talking about the team doing anything that can be viewed as a protest against the regime – like not singing the national anthem.

Following the refusal of Iranian players to sing the nation’s national anthem in their opening match against England on November 21, the source said that the players were called to a meeting with members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

The source said that they were told that their families would face “violence and and torture” if they did not sing the national anthem or if they joined any political protest against the Tehran regime.

The players sang the anthem before their second game against Wales last Friday, which saw 2-0 victory for Iran.

The source, who is closely monitoring Iran’s security agencies operating in Qatar over the World Cup period, said that dozens of officers from the IRGC had been drafted in to monitor the Iranian players who are not allowed to mingle outside the squad or meet with foreigners.

“There are a large number of Iranian security officers in Qatar collecting information and monitoring the players,” the source said.

The Iranian team’s coach is Portuguese and he met with IRGC officers after the threats to the players and their families. Carlos Queiroz has not commented on what happened during that meeting. He did say that Iranian players can protest at the World Cup but only within FIFA regulations.

The regime tried to bribe the players with cars and other gifts before they protested ahead of the match against England. The regime switched its tactics to threats after it was humiliated when the team refused to sing the national anthem. The regime is using hundreds of actor supporters to create a false sense of support among the fans. The regime will significantly increase the number of actors by the thousands for the match with the U.S. today.