Iran threatens to crack the whip on protesters
Iran’s supreme leader insisted Saturday that “rioters must be put in their place” after a week of protests that have shaken the Islamic Republic, likely giving security forces a green light to aggressively put down the demonstrations. The first comments by 86-year-old Ayatollah Ali Khamenei come as violence surrounding the demonstrations sparked by Iran’s ailing economy has killed at least 10 people.
The protests show no sign of stopping and follow US President Donald Trump’s warning to Iran on Friday that if Tehran “violently kills peaceful protesters,” the United States “will come to their rescue.” While it remains unclear how and if Trump will intervene, his comments sparked an immediate, angry response, with officials within the theocracy threatening to target American troops in the Mideast.
They also take on new importance after Trump said Saturday that the US military captured Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, a longtime ally of Tehran. The protests have become the biggest in Iran since 2022, when the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in police custody triggered nationwide demonstrations. However, the protests have yet to be as widespread and intense as those surrounding the death of Amini, who was detained over not wearing her hijab, or headscarf, to the liking of authorities.
Speaking to an audience in Tehran, state television aired remarks by Khamenei that sought to separate the concerns of protesting Iranians upset about the rial’s collapse from “rioters.” “We talk to protesters, the officials must talk to them,” Khamenei said. “But there is no benefit to talking to rioters. Rioters must be put in their place.”
He also reiterated a claim constantly made by officials in Iran, that foreign powers like Israel or the United States were pushing the protests, without offering any evidence. He also blamed “the enemy” for Iran’s collapsing rial. “A bunch of people incited or hired by the enemy are getting behind the tradesmen and shopkeepers and chanting slogans against Islam, Iran and the Islamic Republic,” he said.
“This is what matters most.” Two deaths overnight into Saturday involved a new level of violence. In Qom, home to the country’s major Shiite seminaries, a grenade exploded, killing a man there, the state-owned IRAN newspaper reported. Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei speaking in a meeting in Tehran, Iran.
