Tehran, Iran – U.S. President Donald Trump’s announcements regarding significant concessions from Tehran have provoked anger among supporters of the Iranian establishment, leading to official rejections and clarifications. Several current and former senior officials, state media, and staunch supporters of the Islamic Republic voiced anger, frustration, and confusion after the U.S. leader made a series of claims, with only days remaining in a two-week ceasefire agreed upon on April 8.
On Friday, Trump stated that Iran and the U.S. would jointly excavate enriched uranium buried beneath the rubble of bombed Iranian nuclear sites and transfer it to the U.S. He asserted that Iran had agreed to cease uranium enrichment on its territory. He also claimed the Strait of Hormuz had been opened and would never be closed again, even as the U.S. naval blockade of Iran’s ports remained, and sea mines were either removed or in the process of being removed. Trump further emphasized that Iran would not receive billions of dollars of its frozen assets abroad due to U.S. sanctions, and that the 10-day ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon was entirely unrelated to Iran.
Amid Pakistan’s ongoing mediation efforts for another round of negotiations, Iran’s Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, who led the Iranian delegation to the Islamabad talks earlier this month, rejected all of Trump’s claims. “With these lies, they did not win the war, and they certainly will not achieve anything in negotiations either,” he posted on X early Saturday. By Saturday noon, the Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) released a statement, asserting that the Strait of Hormuz is once again heavily restricted and under the “strict management” of the armed forces. It cited continued “acts of piracy and maritime theft under the so-called label of a blockade” by Washington as the reason.
‘Haze of Confusion’
In the hours between Trump’s flurry of announcements on Friday and official responses from Iranian authorities, supporters of the establishment voiced serious concerns about any major concessions. “Is there no Muslim out there to inform the people a bit about what is happening?!” Ezzatollah Zarghami, a former state television chief and current member of the Supreme Cyberspace Council, which controls Iran’s heavily restricted internet, wrote on X. Alireza Zakani, the hardline mayor of Tehran, stated that if any of Trump’s claims were true, the Iranian establishment must be cautious “not to gift the vile enemy in negotiations what it failed to achieve in the field.”
A fan account on X for Saeed Jalili, an ultra-hardline member of the Supreme National Security Council who has opposed any deals with the U.S. for decades, suggested that “dissent” might be at play. It called for Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei, who has not been seen or heard from outside of several attributed written statements, to release a voice or video message to confirm the situation. Jalili’s main account distanced itself from the comment, stating that the fan account – which was subsequently deleted – was a sign of “infiltration” by Iran’s enemies attempting to sow discord. Iranian state media released another written statement attributed to Khamenei on Saturday to mark Army Day, but it made no mention of the political drama unfolding hours earlier or the negotiations with the U.S.
The dissonance was clearly evident on state television and other state-linked media on Friday, especially those affiliated with the IRGC. Multiple state television hosts and analysts harshly attacked Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi for tweeting on Friday that the Strait of Hormuz was “declared completely open for the remaining period of ceasefire, on the coordinated route as already announced by Ports and Maritime Organisation.” One host demanded immediate clarification from Araghchi. Another pointed out that the top diplomat’s tweet was in English, and since the Iranian people lack access to X due to a seven-week state-imposed near-total internet shutdown, the message was not directed at them. With a huge Hezbollah flag in the background, a furious presenter on state television’s Channel 3 claimed that Araghchi was somehow “the representative of the people of Lebanon, Yemen, and Iraq” because they are part of Iran’s “axis of resistance” of armed forces, and thus he should demand concessions on their behalf from Trump. Morteza Mahmoudvand, a representative for Tehran in the Iranian parliament, went as far as saying Araghchi would have been impeached had it not been for “the excuse of war.” The Fars and Tasnim news sites, affiliated with the IRGC, also heavily criticized Araghchi and called for further explanations on Friday evening, with Fars arguing that “Iranian society was plunged into a haze of confusion.”
Armed Supporters in the Streets
Critical comments from supporters of the Iranian government also flooded social media, including local messaging applications and the comments sections of state-run sites. “We took to the streets every night with clear demands, but you shook hands with the killer of our supreme leader and handed our strait to the Zionists,” one user wrote on Friday in the local app Baleh, in reference to Israel. “After all these years of sanctions and war and costs imposed on the people, if you are to give up the uranium and the strait, then why did you play with the people’s livelihoods and the blood of the martyrs for so long?” another user wrote. A large number of analysts and media personalities, including Hossein Shariatmadar, the head of the Kayhan newspaper, appointed by the late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, also voiced criticism and demanded answers on Fars and other outlets.
Regardless of whether there will be more mediated negotiations in Pakistan or if the war will continue, Iran continues to encourage and arm supporters to take to the streets to maintain control. State media on Friday aired footage of more armed convoys moving through the streets of Tehran, waving the flags of Lebanon’s Hezbollah, Iraq’s Hashd al-Shaabi, and other groups. The video showed women and children manning heavy machineguns mounted on the back of pick-up trucks during a rally in downtown Tehran. With no end in sight to the state-imposed internet shutdown, which has wiped out millions of jobs in Iran, in addition to destroyed steel factories and other infrastructure, the Iranian economy continues to suffer. The timing of the back-and-forth between Trump and Iranian officials meant that oil prices dropped before Western markets closed on Friday, and the Iranian currency experienced increased volatility. The rial was priced at approximately 1.46 million against the U.S. dollar on Saturday morning, the first day of the working week in Iran. However, it shot back up to about 1.51 million after the IRGC announced the repeated closure of the Strait of Hormuz.
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