{"id":411200,"date":"2026-01-16T16:34:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-16T16:34:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/411200\/"},"modified":"2026-01-16T16:34:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-16T16:34:08","slug":"prayer-leader-in-iran-and-the-faithful-call-for-executions-over-protests-a-red-line-for-trump","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/411200\/","title":{"rendered":"Prayer leader in Iran and the faithful call for executions over protests, a red line for Trump"},"content":{"rendered":"

A hard-line cleric leading Friday prayers in Iran\u2019s capital demanded the death penalty for protesters detained in a nationwide crackdown<\/a> and directly threatened U.S. President Donald Trump, showing the rage gripping authorities in the Islamic Republic over demonstrations that have challenged their authority.<\/p>\n

\"FILE<\/p>\n

FILE – Iranian senior cleric Ahmad Khatami delivers his sermon during Friday prayer ceremony in Tehran, Iran, Friday, Jan. 5, 2018.<\/p>\n

Ebrahim Noroozi \/ AP<\/p>\n

Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami\u2019s sermon, carried by Iranian state radio, sparked chants from those gathered for prayers, including: \u201cArmed hypocrites should be put to death!\u201d Executions, as well as the killing of peaceful protesters, are two of the red lines laid down by Trump<\/a> for possible military action against Iran over the protests, which began Dec. 28 over Iran\u2019s ailing economy and soon morphed into protests directly challenging the country\u2019s theocracy.<\/p>\n

Iranian authorities cut off access to the internet Jan. 8<\/a> and intensified a bloody crackdown on all dissent, which the U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency reports has killed at least 2,677 people.<\/p>\n

Khatami, appointed by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and a member of both the country\u2019s Assembly of Experts and its Guardian Council, described the protesters as the \u201cbutlers\u201d of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and \u201cTrump\u2019s soldiers.\u201d He insisted their plans \u201cimagined disintegrating the country.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThey should wait for hard revenge from the system,\u201d Khatami said of Netanyahu and Trump. \u201cAmericans and Zionists should not expect peace.\u201d<\/p>\n

Khatami long has been known for his hard-line views in Iran, including in 2007, when he said a fatwa calling for the death of writer Salman Rushdie<\/a> remained in effect. He also threatened Israel in a 2018 speech by saying Iran could \u201craze Tel Aviv and Haifa to the ground\u201d with its missile arsenal.<\/p>\n

His fiery speech came as allies of Iran and the United States alike sought to defuse tensions. Russian President Vladimir Putin spoke Friday to both Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian and Israel\u2019s Netanyahu, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.<\/p>\n

Peskov said \u201cthe situation in the region is quite tense, and the president is continuing his efforts to help de-escalate it.\u201d<\/p>\n

U.S. and Iran trade accusations<\/p>\n

Days after Trump pledged \u201chelp is on its way\u201d for the protesters, both the demonstrations and the prospect of imminent U.S. retaliation appeared to have receded. One diplomat told The Associated Press that top officials from Egypt, Oman, Saudi Arabia and Qatar had raised concerns <\/a> with Trump that a U.S. military intervention would shake the global economy and destabilize an already volatile region. <\/p>\n

Yet the Trump administration has warned it will act if Iran executes detained protesters. Iran and the U.S. traded angry accusations Thursday at a session of the United Nations Security Council, with U.S. ambassador Mike Waltz<\/a> saying that Trump \u201chas made it clear that all options are on the table to stop the slaughter.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gholam Hossein Darzi, the deputy Iranian ambassador to the U.N., blasted the U.S. for what he said was American \u201cdirect involvement in steering unrest in Iran to violence.\u201d<\/p>\n

Iran authorities list protest damage<\/p>\n

Khatami, the hard-line cleric, also provided the first overall statistics on damage from the protests, claiming 350 mosques, 126 prayer halls and 20 other holy places had sustained damage. Another 80 homes of Friday prayer leaders \u2014 an important position within Iran\u2019s theocracy \u2014 were also damaged, likely underlining the anger demonstrators felt toward symbols of the government. <\/p>\n

He said 400 hospitals, 106 ambulance, 71 fire department vehicles and another 50 emergency vehicles also sustained damage.<\/p>\n

As a cleric in the public positions, Khatami would have access to such data from authorities, and mentioning it at Friday prayers likely meant Iran\u2019s government wanted the information to be communicated without having to formally address the public.<\/p>\n

Even as protests appeared to have been smothered inside Iran, thousands of exiled Iranians and their supporters have taken to the streets<\/a> in cities across Europe to shout out their rage at the government of the Islamic Republic<\/a>.<\/p>\n

More than a week into the nationwide internet shutdown, some Iranians crossed borders to communicate with the outside world. A border crossing with Iran in Turkey\u2019s eastern province of Van has not seen a major influx of Iranians fleeing the unrest, but a number of Iranians crossing the border Friday said they have been making short jaunts to the neighboring country to get around the communications blackout.<\/p>\n

\u201cI will go back to Iran after they open the internet,\u201d said a traveler who gave only his first name, Mehdi, out of security concerns.<\/p>\n

The death toll<\/a> of at least 2,677, provided by the U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency, exceeds that of any other round of protest or unrest in Iran in decades and recalls the chaos surrounding the country\u2019s 1979 Islamic Revolution<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The agency has been accurate throughout years of demonstrations, relying on a network of activists inside Iran that confirms all reported fatalities.<\/p>\n

The AP has been unable to independently confirm the group\u2019s toll. The Iranian government has not provided casualty figures.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A hard-line cleric leading Friday prayers in Iran\u2019s capital demanded the death penalty for protesters detained in a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":411201,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,197294,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":{"0":"post-411200","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-states","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-middle-east-world-nation","10":"tag-news","11":"tag-united-states","12":"tag-united-states-of-america","13":"tag-unitedstates","14":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","15":"tag-us","16":"tag-usa"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/411200","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=411200"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/411200\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/411201"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=411200"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=411200"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=411200"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}