Have they? If the Iranian regime has ended the massacres, what has happened to the protests?
And what does that mean for all of the assets that had already started moving on the regional chessboard?
“We have been notified pretty strongly — but we’ll find out what that all means… We’ve been told that the killing in Iran is stopping, and it’s stopped,” Trump tells reporters in the Oval Office without elaborating on who passed along that message to Tehran. ...
“There’s no plan for executions… I’ve been told that on good authority,” Trump says. “I’m sure if happens, we’ll all be very upset.”
Needless to say, this seems a little odd, given the existential crisis that faces the Iranian mullahs. The regime can't afford to allow a popular uprising to expand and sustain itself, which is why they have murdered as many as 20,000 Iranians in an orgy of violence over the last few days. If they stop shooting, the people will seize the momentum and depose the mullahs and the IRGC junta that undergirds their theocratic rule. The only way this makes sense is if the slaughter has succeeded in clearing the streets.
At least for now, the status of the protests is unclear. However, as Time Magazine notes, the predicament of the Iranian people has not changed, and they desperately want some kind of intervention:
Despite an almost total communications blackout, a small number of Iranians have managed to send messages out of the country. They describe mounting civilian deaths and streets awash with blood—and say many protesters are pinning their hopes on President Donald Trump following through on his threats against Iran’s rulers. ...
Only days ago, city streets were crowded with demonstrators chanting for the downfall of the government. Now, according to residents and phone footage that has circulated online, those same streets are patrolled by trucks mounted with heavy machine guns.
“If Uncle doesn't do something it's over. They will just go on killing people until no one’s left,” the Niavaran district resident said, referring to Trump as “Uncle” out of fear that Iranian intelligence might somehow be monitoring Starlink, the satellite internet system that circumvents the state’s blackout.
The regime hasn't exactly offered much in the way of de-escalation. Earlier today, they openly threatened to assassinate Trump:
Iran issued a sickening threat against President Trump Wednesday, broadcasting a picture of the commander in chief during the 2024 Butler rally assassination attempt — with the words “This time it will not miss the target.”
The ominous warning was aired on Iranian state-run TV, Agence France Presse (AFP) reported.
It marks Tehran’s most direct threat yet against Trump, following his repeated threats that the US will strike the country if it continues its brutal crackdown on anti-government protesters.
Nor does it appear that the regime has changed its approach with their subjects. CBS News reports this afternoon that reprisals have actually increased, albeit less directly than just simply spraying the crowds with live ammunition. Instead, the IRGC and mullahs are targeting the merchant class that finally stopped supporting them, destroying their businesses as examples pour encourager les autres:
Mohammad Saedinia is one particularly high-profile example.
He is famous in Iran as the owner of a chain of candy shops and buzzing cafes beloved by residents in the capital Tehran, especially young liberals. He also established a popular shopping mall near the holy city of Qom.
The regional justice department in Qom announced Wednesday that Saedinia had been arrested, accusing him of "calling on the people to riot and cause chaos."
Saedinia's only crime appears to have been closing his cafes at the very outset of the protests in late December, and to make it clear in a social media post that it was in solidarity with business people — including many stall holders from Tehran's main bazaar — who closed their shops to express their anger over a catastrophic plunge in the value of Iran's currency.
Those demonstrations against economic hardship and the regime's appalling financial record snowballed quickly into the nationwide protests against the Islamic Republic's leadership itself.
The regime has not turned over a new leaf. If the killings have stopped on the streets, they will continue in the shadows, because fear and violence is the only levers that the mullahs have to cling to power. That prompts the question: just who told Trump that the killings have stopped, and what evidence made those claims credible? And if they have stopped, what role did Trump's threats play in that change of direction? And can the regime still hang on if the people keep going into the streets, now that the bullets have reportedly stopped?
We'll see soon enough what the truth may be. It may well be a head-fake by Trump, especially since it does not yet appear that any of the pieces on the chessboard have yet moved back to their original positions.
Update: This mirrors my thinking on the head-fake thesis:
It may be exactly this kind of offer that the mullahs can't refuse, in Godfather-speak. In the novel, Mario Puzo called that phrase the final rattle before Vito Corleone would strike. I'd bet that's what Trump has in mind, too. "Either make this true, or else..."
https://hotair.com/ed-morrissey/2026/01/14/breaking-trump-declares-killings-executions-have-stopped-in-iran-n3810843
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