Tehran, Jan 3 (.) Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei on Saturday urged the authorities to confront and harshly suppress the ongoing demonstrations, which entered their sixth consecutive day, dismissing the demonstrations as riots.
“Protest is legitimate, but protest is different from rioting. We talk to protesters, but there is no use in talking to rioters. Rioters must be put in their place,” Khamenei said, according to state media, reports Iran International.
He claimed that some demonstrators had been incited from abroad, accusing what he described as enemy-linked groups of exploiting economic grievances to destabilise the Islamic Republic.
“That some people, under various titles and names, come with the aim of destruction and creating insecurity, positioning themselves behind faithful, healthy and revolutionary merchants and exploiting their protests to cause unrest, is unacceptable,” he said.
“We will not back down in the face of the enemy,” Khamenei added. “Relying on God and with confidence in the support of the people, we will bring the enemy to its knees.”
The remarks came as protests entered their seventh day, with demonstrations reported in scores of locations across 22 provinces.
At least eight protesters have been killed so far, while at least 44 people have been shot and wounded by live ammunition or pellet guns fired by Iranian security forces.
After two days of relative calm in Tehran, crowds again poured into the streets on Friday night in the capital’s eastern and western districts. Similar rallies were reported in the holy cities of Mashhad and Qom.
US officials voiced support for the protesters. Mike Waltz said Washington and President Donald Trump “stand firmly with Iranians seeking freedom.”
Iranian officials, meanwhile, issued renewed warnings to external actors. Lawmaker Esmail Kosari, speaking to state media warned that any “action or adventurism” against Iran by any foreign player would be met with a response, “much more powerful than in the past,” adding that the US bases and interests in the region “will not see calm days.”
Threatening US President Donald Trump and Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu, he cautioned that the two should understand that Iran could deliver “far heavier blows” if it chose to do so.
The protests have drawn strong backing from student unions, merchant guilds and teachers’ associations, who have strongly condemned the regime’s increasingly repressive measures.
The Coordination Council of Iranian Teachers’ Trade Associations issued a statement addressed to the military, police and security forces, urging them not to turn on demonstrators.
“You come from the heart of this society. Standing against the people is standing against your own future and that of your children,” the council said. “Refrain from staining your hands with the blood of the people and be certain that history will not forget these moments.”
Tehran’s merchants have similarly called for a protest gathering on Sunday, according to a statement shared by the Telegram channel Civil Protest of the Bazaar.
Iranian merchants said they plan to assemble at pre-designated locations in the Tehran bazaar as part of what they described as a “nationwide movement seeking freedom, justice and dignity,” and urged others to continue alongside the public until their demands are met.
Meanwhile, students at the University of Art in Tehran said they fully supported the public’s legitimate protests, and stood in solidarity with the merchants, families and students carrying forth demonstrations nationwide. “We have nothing to say to you except one word: No!” they wrote in a statement addressed to the authorities.
Signs of dissent have also surfaced within the Artesh (Iran’s conventional armed forces), as recently captured video footage online showed an unidentified soldier writing “Long Live the Shah” on a wall and giving a salute, underscoring what observers describe as widening cracks between the Artesh and the Sepah (Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps), the main pillar of the theocratic system.
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