A senior Iranian cleric has called for the execution of protesters following a crackdown that has raised the death toll in Iran and suppressed the nationwide protest movement. Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami, in a Friday sermon, demanded the death penalty for those he described as “armed hypocrites” and accused protesters of being agents of Israel and the US.
Iran Protests: Calls for Executions Mount
Khatami, a member of the Guardian Council and a senior member of the Assembly of Experts, leveled accusations against demonstrators, claiming they were “butlers” and “soldiers” of foreign powers and vowed that neither Israel nor the US should “expect peace.”
The speech contrasted with statements from U.S. President Donald Trump, who this week suggested a military strike against Iran was postponed after Iranian authorities reportedly agreed to halt executions of protesters. Trump on Friday thanked Iran for stopping the execution of what he said was 800 protesters, though the source of that figure was unclear.
Iran’s supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, dismissed Trump as a “criminal” on Saturday for his involvement in the protests and promised further punishment for those involved. “By God’s grace, the Iranian nation must break the back of the seditionists just as it broke the back of the sedition,” Khamenei said.
Rights groups report that the repression of protesters continues, with more than 3,090 people killed in the unrest and nearly 4,000 cases awaiting review, according to the Human Rights Activists news agency. Over 22,100 people have been arrested, raising concerns about the treatment of detainees.
The protests began on December 28 when traders took to the streets in Tehran in response to a decline in the value of the rial. The demonstrations expanded to include calls for an end to the government, marking the most serious unrest since the 1979 revolution.
Authorities have brutally suppressed the demonstrations, with Human Rights Watch reporting “mass killings of protesters.” The government has characterized the unrest as a foreign-backed plot to destabilize the country.
Khatami claimed that protesters damaged 350 mosques, 126 prayer halls, and 20 other places of worship, as well as 400 hospitals, 106 ambulances, 71 fire trucks, and 50 other emergency vehicles.
The immediate unrest has subsided, but the future of the protest movement remains uncertain. Iran remains largely cut off from the outside world due to a continuing internet shutdown.
Reza Pahlavi, son of the late shah of Iran and a prominent opposition voice, continued to call for the overthrow of the government on Friday and urged Trump to intervene. Pahlavi stated, “I believe the president is a man of his word,” and added that “regardless of whether action is taken or not, we as Iranians have no choice to carry on the fight.”
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