Trump: Time for new leadership in Iran as clash with Khamenei sharpens

Dubai: President Donald Trump on Saturday openly called for an end to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s 37-year rule, escalating US rhetoric against Iran’s leadership even as nationwide protests appear to have waned following a deadly crackdown that rights groups say killed thousands.

“It’s time to look for new leadership in Iran,” Trump told POLITICO, responding to a series of posts by Khamenei on X that accused the U.S. president of being responsible for deaths during the unrest.

Trump’s remarks mark the latest — and sharpest — shift in tone over the past week, during which he has alternated between threatening military action, encouraging Iranian protesters to overthrow state institutions, and praising Tehran for what he claimed was a halt to mass executions.

The US president said he had been presented with “very strong options” to strike Iran last week after the death toll from the crackdown rose into the hundreds. By Tuesday, as deaths climbed into the thousands, Trump appeared close to authorizing military action, urging Iranians to continue protesting.

“Iranian Patriots, KEEP PROTESTING — TAKE OVER YOUR INSTITUTIONS!!!” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “Save the names of the killers and abusers… HELP IS ON ITS WAY.”

By Friday, however, Trump abruptly softened his tone, thanking Iran’s leadership for allegedly cancelling more than 800 scheduled executions, a claim for which he offered no evidence.

“The best decision he ever made was not hanging more than 800 people two days ago,” Trump said on Saturday, adding that he had been informed the killings had stopped.

Khamenei, in a series of posts on X, blamed Trump directly for the violence in Iran and accused the US of orchestrating unrest.

“We find the US President guilty due to the casualties, damages and slander he inflicted upon the Iranian nation,” Khamenei wrote, adding that Washington had made “extensive preparations to orchestrate this sedition.”

“The Iranian nation defeated the US,” he said in another post.

After being read the remarks during his POLITICO interview, Trump responded with a personal and scathing rebuke of Iran’s supreme leader.

“What he is guilty of, as the leader of a country, is the complete destruction of the country and the use of violence at levels never seen before,” Trump said. “Leadership is about respect, not fear and death.”

“The man is a sick man who should run his country properly and stop killing people,” Trump added, calling Iran “the worst place to live anywhere in the world because of poor leadership.”

The US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) said it had verified 3,090 deaths, including 2,885 protesters, and more than 22,000 arrests during the unrest — figures that could not be independently confirmed.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment on Trump’s remarks or his shifting stance.

Fragile calm, rising stakes

The exchange highlights the fragility of the current calm between Washington and Tehran, with Trump’s rhetoric swinging between encouragement of regime change and restraint on military action.

It also comes as Khamenei recently declared in a public address that “the Iranian nation has defeated America,” underscoring a deepening war of words at a volatile moment for the region.

Iranian officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment.