Simin Behbahani (also spelled Bihbahani; née Siminbar Khalili; Persian: سیمین بهبهانی; 20 July 1927 – 19 August 2014) was an Iranian poet, lyricist, and activist. Renowned for her mastery of the ghazal, a traditional poetic form, she became an icon of modern Persian poetry. The Iranian intelligentsia and literati affectionately referred to her as the "Lioness of Iran."

In the course of her career, Behbahani was twice nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature and received numerous literary accolades from around the world. Her work not only enriched Persian literature but also highlighted her role as a significant cultural and intellectual figure in Iran.

Simin Behbahani, whose name at birth was Siminbar Khalili (Persian: سیمین بر خلیلی) (سيمين بر خليلی), was the daughter of Abbas Khalili, a poet, diplomat, newspaper publisher, and editor of the Aghdam [Fa] (English: action) newspaper, and Fakhr-Ozma Arghun, a poet and teacher of the French language. Abbās Khalili wrote poetry in both Persian and Arabic and he translated some 1,100 verses of Ferdowsi's Shahnameh into Arabic. Fakhr-Ozma Arghun was one of the progressive women of her time and a member of Kānun-e Nesvān-e Vatan'khāh (Association of Patriotic Women) between 1925 and 1929. In addition to her membership of Hezb-e Democrāt (Democratic Party) and Kānun-e Zanān (Women's Association), she was for a time (1932) editor of the Āyandeh-ye Iran (Future of Iran) newspaper. She taught French at the Nāmus, Dār ol-Mo'allemāt and No'bāvegān secondary schools in Tehran.

Simin Behbahani started writing poetry at twelve and published her first poem at the age of fourteen. She used the "Char Pareh" style of Nima Yooshij and subsequently turned to ghazal. Behbahani contributed to a historic development by adding theatrical subjects and daily events and conversations to poetry using the ghazal style of poetry. She has expanded the range of the traditional Persian verse forms and has produced some of the most significant works of the Persian literature in the 20th century.

She was President of the Iranian Writers' Association and was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1999 and 2002. In 2013, she was awarded the Janus Pannonius Grand Prize for Poetry.

In early March 2010, she could not leave the country due to official prohibitions. As she was about to board a plane to Paris, police detained her and interrogated her "all night long". She was released but without her passport. Her English translator, Farzaneh Milani, expressed surprise at the arrest as detention as Behbahani was then 82 and nearly blind, "we all thought that she was untouchable."

In 1988, during the mass execution of Iranian political and ideological prisoners, Simin Behbahani composed a poem titled "O Mothers". During a protest gathering of the Iranian women's movement in Daneshjoo Park, Simin Behbahani was attacked by police officers. She filed a complaint with the Judiciary of the Islamic Republic of Iran against the officer who had assaulted her, but according to her lawyer, Nasrin Sotoudeh, "the case was closed in the end." On 1 September 2008, Behbahani, along with a group of women's rights activists, appeared at the Islamic Consultative Assembly (Parliament of Iran) to protest the proposed Family Protection Bill. Addressing a member of parliament, she said: "Sir, I did not vote for you, because I do not even recognize your parliament, but I came here to tell you not to betray the people who voted for you. Do not allow a bill to pass that is against the women of Iran."

"You are not dead, nor will you die you will always live on, you have eternal life, you are the call of the Iranian people."— Simin Behbahani, in praise of Neda Agha-Soltan.