‘Khamenei is looking to go someplace,’ says Trump as protests intensify in Iran

President Donald J. Trump has said that he is following the ongoing protests in Iran closely and is aware of the reports that Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is planning to flee amid the crisis. Trump replied in the affirmative during an interview to Fox News when asked if he was following the ongoing protests in Iran and if he knew about Iranian leader Khamenei’s plan to flee to Moscow.

“Yeah, I'm following it very closely,” said Trump on the protests intensifying in Iran.

On being asked if he had read that Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has a Plan B to go to Russia, Trump said, “Or someplace, yeah. He’s looking to go someplace.”

Also Read: ‘Trump’s hands stained with the blood of Iranians, some rioters want to please him,’ says Khamenei amid ‘Death to America’ chants

Also Read: Reza Pahlavi urges Iranians to continue protests, warns Tehran may cut internet

‘Well, we’re going to hit them hard if they kill people’

On being further probed on whether he believes that Iran is on the verge of collapsing, Trump said, “Well, it could be. I mean, what they’ve done is they start, in the past, they’ve started shooting the hell out of people. And all of a sudden, people without any weapons whatsoever are standing there and you have machine guns gunning them down. Or they take them to prisons and then hang them and kill them. So they played rough. And I said, if they do that, we’re going to hit them very hard. Well, we’re going to hit them hard. We’re ready to do it. If they do that, we’re going to hit them hard. And so far, for the most part, there’s been some of it. But for the most part, they haven’t. There have been people killed. Some of them, the crowds are so big that some of them have had really like were stomped on. Literally, it was it was terrible.”

Also Read: Internet blackout in Iran as protests continue for 12th day; Reza Pahlavi heads to Mar-a-Lago

‘The enthusiasm to overturn that regime is incredible’

Referring to the huge crowds hitting the streets in Iran, Trump said the massive turnout at protests shows that the enthusiasm to overturn the current regime in Iran is incredible.

“The crowds are just they’re massive. The enthusiasm to overturn that regime is incredible. But there’s been people killed, but it’s more from death by it’s literally stomping. It’s it’s people running in a certain direction. So we’ll see what happens. We’ll see what happens. There’s so many people protesting,” Trump added.

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