In 1976, longtime Village Voice columnist Nat Hentoff looked at the state torturing and killing its own citizens under the Shah of Iran.

Shahrabad became a national curiosity after Iranian outlets reported that about 40 of the village’s roughly 240 residents were twins, an unusually high proportion.

The Iranian landscape welcomes travel enthusiasts with rolling hills, dramatic mountains and valleys that seem to hold stories older than time itself. Encircling the emerald pastures are snow-dusted ...