‘If Iran shoots peaceful protesters, US will come to their rescue,’ Trump warns

Dubai: US President Donald Trump warned Iran that Washington was “locked and loaded” to intervene if peaceful protesters are violently suppressed, triggering a sharp exchange of threats with senior Iranian officials as protests continued to roil the Islamic Republic.

“If Iran shots and violently kills peaceful protesters, which is their custom, the United States of America will come to their rescue. We are locked and loaded and ready to go. Thank you for your attention to this matter!” Trump posted on social media.

The warning came as demonstrations entered their sixth day across parts of Iran, sparked initially by the collapse of the rial currency and increasingly marked by anti-government slogans. At least seven people have been killed so far in violence surrounding the protests. While the unrest has become the biggest since 2022—after the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in police custody—it has not yet spread nationwide nor reached the same intensity.

Iranian officials swiftly pushed back against Trump’s remarks. Ali Larijani, a former parliament speaker and current secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, alleged, without evidence, that Israel and the US were stoking the demonstrations.

“Trump should know that intervention by the US in the domestic problem corresponds to chaos in the entire region and the destruction of the US interests,” Larijani wrote on X, which is blocked in Iran. “The people of the US should know that Trump began the adventurism. They should take care of their own soldiers.”

Larijani’s comments appeared to reference the extensive US military presence in the region. In June, Iran attacked Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar following US strikes on three Iranian nuclear sites during Israel’s 12-day war with Iran. No injuries were reported, though a missile struck a radome at the base.

Ali Shamkhani, an adviser to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and a former head of the same security council, issued a separate warning. “Any interventionist hand that gets too close to the security of Iran will be cut,” he said.

“The people of Iran properly know the experience of being rescued’ by Americans: from Iraq and Afghanistan to Gaza,” Shamkhani added on X.