A top Iranian official on Friday declared that American troops and assets in the Middle East are now “legitimate targets” for military strikes after President Trump posted to Truth Social that the US was ready to support peaceful protesters in Tehran.
“The dishonorable president of American should know that with this official confession all American centres and forces throughout the region will be our legitimate targets in response to any possible adventurism,” Speaker of the Iranian Parliament Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf said in a statement.
It came hours after Trump issued a vague promise of support of peaceful protests erupting in Iran.
A top Iranian official on Friday declared that American troops and assets in the Middle East are now “legitimate targets” for military strikes after President Trump posted to Truth Social that the US was ready to support peaceful protesters in Tehran. AP“If Iran shoots and violently kills peaceful protesters, which is their custom, the United States of American will come to their rescue,” he wrote. “We are locked and ready to go.”
The exchange less than a week after Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian told Iranian state media that he believed Tehran was “at total war with the United States, Israel and Europe.”
“They want to bring our country to its knees,” Pezeshkian said.
Videos circulating on social media Friday depicted Iranian civilians taking to the streets with chants calling for the fall of their radical Islamist government.
“Iranians, shout out, scream for your Shah!” a group of protesters chanted in one video, signaling support for the Iranian government overthrowing 1979 for the current regime.
Protesters attacking a government building in Fasa, Iran. UGC/AFP via Getty Images
Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei speaks during a meeting in Tehran. Iranian Supreme Leader'S Office via ZUMA / SplashNews.comAt least seven people have been killed in the past week as protests have escalated across Iran triggered by an economic crisis — partly influenced by increased US sanctions against the authoritarian regime that considers the US a top adversary.
It is the largest public movement against Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei since 2022, when Iranians took to the streets to protest the death of a woman arrested for not wearing her hijab — or headscarf — the proper way.
Trump did not specify what actions the US was prepared to take to come to the protesters’ “rescue,” but Behnam Ben Taleblu, senior director of the Iran Program at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies told The Post the president has many options at his disposal.
Iranian forces shooting unarmed protesters in Marvdasht, Iran. Simay Azadi
An overturned car and multiple fires burn as protesters chant outside a police station, during Iran’s biggest demonstrations in three years. via REUTERSUS intervention could take the shape of “more sanctions;” “covert or cyber operations;” “targeted strikes on the regime’s apparatus of repression, symbols of power and economic interests” or giving the “green light” to Israel to take matters into its own hands.
“No doubt even just saying this will and likely has caused panic and confusion in Tehran, and that is a good thing,” Taleblu said. “Lots of options, and the president has both us and the Iranians right where he wants us: watching, waiting, and guessing.”
