The tradition of Chaharshanbeh Suri includes people going into the streets and alleys to make fires, and jump over them while singing and dancing. There is no religious significance attached to Chaharshanbeh Suri and it serves as a cultural festival for all Iranian Jews, Muslims, Armenians, Turks and Zoroastrians alike. Indeed this celebration, in particular the significant role of fire, is likely to hail from Zoroastrianism.

Today Khamenei said on his website that Chaharshanbeh Suri has "no basis in sharia (Islamic religious law) and creates a lot of harm and corruption, (which is why) it is appropriate to avoid it."

In the past few years, local municipalities have helped Iranians organize the festival but it is unclear whether they will do so this year in the wake of Khamenei's remarks.

The Chaharshanbeh Suri is the ancient Iranian festival dating at least back to 1700 BCE of the early Zoroastrian era. It’s not something that Iranians decided to do this year or previous one; they did it every year like these 31 years under the Islamic regime.