Protests in Iran raged Friday night time within the Islamic Republic, on-line movies purported to point out, regardless of a threats from the nation’s theocracy to crack down on demonstrators after shutting down the web and chopping phone strains off to the world. The protesters gave the impression to be taking encouragement from repeated declarations of help by the Trump administration, and by the nation’s exiled crown prince, who known as on them Saturday to try to overwhelm safety forces and seize cities and cities.
An exterior rights teams that depends on data from contacts inside Iran says a minimum of 65 folks have been killed within the protests, which started in Tehran in late December as anger over Iran’s ailing economic system, however shortly unfold and morphed into probably the most important problem to the federal government in years.
Supreme Chief Ayatollah Ali Khamenei accused President Trump of getting palms “stained with the blood of Iranians” in remarks aired Friday on Iranian state TV, as supporters gathered earlier than him shouted “Loss of life to America!”
Protesters are “ruining their very own streets … as a way to please the president of america,” the 86-year-old Khamenei mentioned to the group at his compound in Tehran. “As a result of he mentioned that he would come to their support. He ought to take note of the state of his personal nation as a substitute.”
Iranian Supreme Chief Ayatollah Ali Khamenei feedback on nationwide protests, on Iranian State Tv within the capital Tehran, Jan. 9, 2026
IRIB/Handout/Anadolu/Getty
State media later known as the demonstrators “terrorists,” setting the stage for a potential violent crackdown –how Iran has responded to different main protests in recent times, regardless of Mr. Trump’s pledge to again peaceable protesters, with pressure if needed.
Trump’s points recent warnings to Iran’s leaders
Trump has repeatedly pledged to strike Iran if protesters are killed, a menace that has taken on better significance after the U.S. navy raid that seized Venezuela’s former President Nicolás Maduro. The president steered Friday any potential American strike would not “imply boots on the bottom however meaning hitting them very, very laborious the place it hurts.”
“Iran’s in large bother,” Trump mentioned. “It appears to me that the individuals are taking up sure cities that no one thought had been actually potential just some weeks in the past.”
He added: “I inform the Iranian leaders you higher not begin capturing as a result of we’ll begin capturing too.”
In a short social media put up printed within the very early hours of Saturday morning in Washington, Secretary of State Marco Rubio mentioned, “america helps the courageous folks of Iran.”
Iranian regime warns protesters can be punished “with none authorized leniency”
Iran’s judiciary chief Gholamhossein Mohseni-Ejei individually vowed that punishment for protesters “can be decisive, most and with none authorized leniency.”
In response to the Washington D.C.-based Human Rights Activists Information Company, which was based by anti-regime activists, as of Friday, the thirteenth day of unrest in Iran, a minimum of 65 folks had been killed, together with a minimum of 14 members of the safety forces. Greater than 2,300 folks had been arrested, and protests recorded in a minimum of 180 cities.
Protesters are seen close to burning automobiles amid evolving anti-government unrest in Tehran, Iran, in a screengrab obtained from a social media video launched on Jan. 9, 2026.
Social media by way of REUTERS
Iranian authorities shut down the web on Thursday night time as protests escalated sharply, seemingly as folks heeded a name by the exiled crown prince, a vocal opposition determine, for Iranians to boost their voices towards the regime.
In response to an replace posted on-line Saturday morning by the monitoring group NetBlocks, “metrics present the nationwide web blackout stays in place at 36 hours, severely limiting Iranians’ means to verify on the protection of mates and family members.”
That communications blackout has made it extremely troublesome to achieve a transparent image of the size of the protests general – and the Iranian authorities’ response to it. Another experiences put the demise toll from unrest a lot increased, with TIME citing a health care provider in Tehran as saying a minimum of 217 folks had been killed, as an example.
Iranian authorities have acknowledged a number of deaths, however normally solely these of safety forces.
Requested by CBS Information how severely he believes Iran’s autocratic rulers are taking the warnings from Mr. Trump to not kill protesters, Maziar Bahari, editor of the IranWire information web site, mentioned he was sure it had “actually scared many Iranian officers, and should have affected their actions by way of learn how to confront the protestors.”
“However on the identical time … it has impressed many protesters to come back out, as a result of they know that the chief of the world’s foremost superpower is supporting their trigger,” mentioned Bahari, who spent months in Iranian prisons after being arrested throughout a earlier spherical of huge unrest in 2009.
“Many individuals have known as what is going on in Iran proper now a revolution,” Bahari instructed CBS Information’ Haley Ott. “And we will see totally different indicators of revolution in Iran on the motion. However a revolution normally wants a pacesetter for the revolution. However we do not have that chief.”
However whereas a long time of draconian management over the media and the deliberate sidelining of dissident voices within the nation have disadvantaged Iran of a transparent opposition figurehead contained in the nation’s borders, many within the huge Iranian diaspora hope the nation’s ousted royal household may stage a comeback.
Head of Iran’s exiled royal household predicts his return is “very close to”
Iran’s exiled Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi has been seen by many analysts as a galvanizing pressure behind the momentum of this spherical of protests. On Saturday, he known as on Iranians not solely to proceed popping out into the streets, however to attempt to seize management of cities and cities from the authorities by overwhelming them.
“Our purpose is not simply to take to the streets. The purpose is to arrange to grab and maintain metropolis facilities,” Pahlavi mentioned in his newest video message posted on social media, calling for extra demonstrations on Saturday and Sunday.”
Hanging an optimistic tone, Pahlavi declared that he was “getting ready to return to my homeland,” suggesting the day on which he would give you the chance to take action, “very close to.”
A protester holds a placard of Iranian opposition chief and son of the final Shah of Iran, Reza Pahlavi, throughout an illustration towards the Iranian regime’s crackdown on protests in central Paris, France, Jan. 4, 2026.
Blanca CRUZ/AFP/Getty
However Pahlavi has lived in exile for almost 50 years, and whereas he has lengthy sought to place himself as a leader-in-waiting, it is from clear how a lot actual help he has contained in the nation.
His father, Iran’s Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, was extensively despised inside Iran when he fled into exile himself amid avenue protests in 1979, because the Islamic Revolution that introduced the present regime to energy took maintain.
The Standoff with Iran
Extra