Concerns are rising among those outside Iran that the current information blackout might encourage hard-line elements within the country’s security forces to initiate a violent suppression of protests. This fear persists despite former President Trump’s warnings that he is prepared to take military action against Iran to shield peaceful demonstrators.

Trump publicly expressed his support for the Iranian protesters through social media, declaring that Iran is on the brink of achieving unprecedented freedom and that the United States is poised to offer assistance. Reports from The New York Times and Wall Street Journal, which cited unnamed US officials, revealed that Trump had been briefed on potential military responses against Iran, although he had yet to make a definitive decision.

The US State Department issued a stark warning, emphasizing, “Do not underestimate President Trump. When he commits to action, he follows through.”

Meanwhile, Iranian state television aired a live session of parliament where Qalibaf, a hard-liner with previous presidential ambitions, praised the police and Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, especially the volunteer Basij force, for their unwavering stance during the protests.

Qalibaf asserted, “The Iranian public should be aware that we will respond with utmost severity and impose strict penalties on those who are detained.”

He went on to directly threaten Israel, “the occupied territory” as he referred to it, and the US military, possibly with a preemptive strike.

“In the event of an attack on Iran, both the occupied territory and all American military centres, bases and ships in the region will be our legitimate targets,” Qalibaf said.

“We do not consider ourselves limited to reacting after the action and will act based on any objective signs of a threat.”

It remains unclear just how serious Iran is about launching a strike, particularly after seeing its air defences destroyed during the 12-day war in June with Israel. Any decision to go to war would rest with Iran’s 86-year-old Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

The US military has said in the Middle East it is “postured with forces that span the full range of combat capability to defend our forces, our partners and allies and US interests”. Iran targeted US forces at Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar in June, while the US Navy’s Middle East-based 5th Fleet is stationed in the island kingdom of Bahrain.

Israel, meanwhile, is “watching closely” the situation between the US and Iran, said an Israeli official, who spoke on condition of anonymity due to not being authorised to speak to journalists. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio overnight on topics including Iran, the official added.

Protests in Tehran and Mashhad

Online videos sent out of Iran, likely using Starlink satellite transmitters, purportedly showed demonstrators gathering in northern Tehran’s Punak neighbourhood. There, it appeared authorities shut off streets, with protesters waving their lit mobile phones. Others banged metal while fireworks went off.

Other footage purportedly showed demonstrators peacefully marching down a street and others honking their car horns on the street.

“The pattern of protests in the capital has largely taken the form of scattered, short-lived, and fluid gatherings, an approach shaped in response to the heavy presence of security forces and increased field pressure,” the Human Rights Activists News Agency said.

“At the same time, reports were received of surveillance drones flying overhead and movements by security forces around protest locations, indicating ongoing monitoring and security control.”

In Mashhad, Iran’s second-largest city some 725 kilometres north-east of Tehran, footage purported to show protesters confronting security forces. Flaming debris and dumpsters could be seen in the street, blocking the road. Mashhad is home to the Imam Reza shrine, the holiest in Shiite Islam, making the protests there carry heavy significance for the country’s theocracy.

Protests also appeared to happen in Kerman, 800 kilometres south-east of Tehran.

Iranian state television on Sunday morning took a page from demonstrators, having their correspondents appear on streets in several cities to show calm areas with a date stamp shown on screen. Tehran and Mashhad were not included. They also showed pro-government demonstrations in Qom and Qazvin.

Ali Larijani, a top security official, went on state TV to accuse some demonstrators of “killing people or burning some people, which is very similar to what ISIS does”, referring to the Islamic State group by an acronym. State TV aired funerals of slain security force members while reporting another six had been killed in Kermanshah. It also showed a pickup truck full of bodies in body bags and later a morgue.

Even Iran’s reformist President Masoud Pezeshkian, who had been trying to ease anger before the demonstrations exploded in recent days, offered a hardening tone in an interview aired on Sunday.

“People have concerns, we should sit with them and if it is our duty, we should resolve their concerns,” Pezeshkian said.

“But the higher duty is not to allow a group of rioters to come and destroy the entire society.”

More demonstrations planned Sunday

Iran’s exiled Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi, who called for protests on Thursday and Friday, asked in his latest message for demonstrators to take to the streets on Sunday. He urged protesters to carry Iran’s old lion-and-sun flag and other national symbols used during the time of the shah to “claim public spaces as your own”.

Pahlavi’s support of and from Israel has drawn criticism in the past, particularly after the 12-day war. Demonstrators have shouted in support of the shah in some protests, but it isn’t clear whether that’s support for Pahlavi himself or a desire to return to a time before the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

The demonstrations began on December 28 over the collapse of the Iranian rial currency, which trades at more than 1.4 million to $US1, as the country’s economy is squeezed by international sanctions in part levied over its nuclear program. The protests intensified and grew into calls directly challenging Iran’s theocracy.