Iran protests see 599 people dead. Will Donald Trump order 'regime change' soon?

U.S. President Donald Trump said Iran wants to negotiate with Washington after his threat to strike the Islamic Republic over its crackdown on protesters in nationwide demonstrations that activists said Monday had left at least 599 people dead.

Iran had no direct reaction to Trump's comments, which came after the foreign minister of Oman — long an interlocutor between Washington and Tehran — traveled to Iran this weekend. It also remains unclear just what Iran could promise, particularly as Trump has set strict demands over its nuclear program and its ballistic missile arsenal, which Tehran insists is crucial for its national defense.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, speaking to foreign diplomats in Tehran, insisted “the situation has come under total control” in remarks that blamed Israel and the U.S. for the violence, without offering evidence.


Meanwhile, pro-government demonstrators flooded the streets Monday in support of the theocracy, a show of force after days of protests directly challenging the rule of 86-year-old Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Iranian state television aired chants from the crowd, which appeared to number in the tens of thousands, who shouted “Death to America!” and “Death to Israel!”

US President Donald Trump has options to intervene in protest-hit Iran that range from low to high risk, but choosing his course depends on him deciding his ultimate goal. It has been 10 days since Trump said the United States was "locked and loaded" and ready to "come to the rescue" if Iran's clerical state kills demonstrators who have taken to the streets in major numbers.

Since then, Trump has kept threatening a military option, even as hundreds of people have died, according to rights groups.

Iran has been a sworn foe of the United States since the 1979 Islamic revolution toppled the pro-Western shah. The downfall of the Islamic republic in power since then would transform the Middle East.

But Trump has previously lashed out against "regime change" as a goal, especially pointing to lessons from US involvement in Iraq, a smaller country.

Trump on Monday exercised economic leverage, announcing 25 percent tariffs on Iran's trading partners, and he has spoken of ways to forcibly restore internet access shut by Tehran.

The two governments have also revealed that they have been in communication, coordinated by Trump's friend and roving envoy Steve Witkoff.

Trump in June ordered strikes on Iranian nuclear sites in support of an Israeli campaign.

While Trump had previously spoken of a diplomatic resolution, the attack was in line with his inclination, as seen again recently in Venezuela, for one-off military operations he quickly claims as successes.

Vali Nasr, a professor at Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, noted 130 to 150 Iranian cities have seen protests.

"Trying to hit security forces in all of these, or even major cities of Iran, is more than just a few airstrikes," Nasr said.

As Trump likely "doesn't want to get his hands dirty, a performative strike may be more where he wants to go," Nasr said.

Behnam Ben Taleblu, a research fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, said the risk from intervention was less that Iranians rally around the flag than that they become afraid to go out.

"The challenge of the strikes is how to make sure they don't lead to the disbursement of protesters rather than the amplification of protests, if the strikes go off the rails -- if targeting is poor, if intelligence is poor," he said.

He said the impact would also be high if Trump finally decides not to strike.

Inaction would "play into the regime's narrative of painting America as not able to actually come through," Ben Taleblu said.

Pahlavi and a number of Republican hawks have voiced opposition to diplomacy, warning it would only give the Islamic republic a lifeline.

But Mohammad Ali Shabani, editor of the Amwaj.media site that closely follows Iran, believed many Iranians would welcome a deal that eases sanctions and "lifts the shadow of war."

"I think this would supersede any kind of short-term survival for the Islamic republic because the way things are structured, I think most Iranians at this point accept that the Islamic republic is not going to be there forever."