WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said Wednesday that he’s been told “on good authority” that plans for executions in Iran have stopped, even as Tehran has signaled fast trials and executions ahead in its crackdown on protesters.

The U.S. president’s claims, which were made with few details, come as he’s told protesting Iranians in recent days that “help is on the way” and that his administration would “act accordingly” to respond to the Iranian government. But Trump has not offered any details about how the U.S. might respond and it wasn’t clear if his comments Wednesday indicated he would hold off on action.

“We’ve been told that the killing in Iran is stopping ― it’s stopped ― it’s stopping,” Trump said. “And there’s no plan for executions, or an execution, or executions ― so I’ve been told that on good authority.”

The president on Tuesday consulted with his national security team about next steps after telling reporters he believed the killing in Iran was “significant.”

Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and key White House National Security Council officials began meeting last Friday to develop options for Trump, ranging from a diplomatic approach to military strikes.

The Iranian security force crackdown on the demonstrations has killed at least 2,586, the U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency reported.

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — The death toll from nationwide protests in Iran has surpassed 2,500, activists said, as Iranians made phone calls abroad for the first time in days Tuesday after authorities severed communications during a crackdown on demonstrators.

The number of dead climbed to at least 2,571 early Wednesday, as reported by the U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency. That figure dwarfs the death toll from any other round of protest or unrest in Iran in decades and recalls the chaos surrounding the country’s 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Iranian state television offered the first official acknowledgment of the deaths, quoting an official saying the country had “a lot of martyrs” and that it did not release a toll earlier because of the dead suffering gruesome injuries. However, that statement came only after activists reported their toll.

The demonstrations began a little over two weeks ago in anger over Iran’s ailing economy and soon targeted the theocracy, particularly 86-year-old Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Images obtained Tuesday by The Associated Press from demonstrations in Tehran showed graffiti and chants calling for Khamenei’s death — something that could carry a death sentence.

Soon after the new death toll became public, U.S. President Donald Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform: “Iranian Patriots, KEEP PROTESTING – TAKE OVER YOUR INSTITUTIONS!!!”

He added: “I have canceled all meetings with Iranian Officials until the senseless killing of protesters STOPS. HELP IS ON ITS WAY.”

However, hours later, Trump told reporters that his administration was awaiting an accurate report on the number of protesters that had been killed before acting “accordingly.”

Trump said about the Iranian security forces: “It would seem to me that they have been badly misbehaving, but that is not confirmed.”

Iranian officials once again warned Trump against taking action, with Ali Larijani, secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, responding to U.S. posturing by writing: “We declare the names of the main killers of the people of Iran: 1- Trump 2-” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The activist group said 2,403 of the dead were protesters and 147 were government-affiliated. Twelve children were killed, along with nine civilians it said were not taking part in protests. More than 18,100 people have been detained, the group said.

With the internet down in Iran, gauging the demonstrations from abroad has grown more difficult. The AP has been unable to independently assess the toll. Iran’s government has not offered overall casualty figures.

Skylar Thompson with the Human Rights Activists News Agency told AP the new toll was shocking, particularly since it reached four times the death toll of the monthslong 2022 Mahsa Amini protests in just two weeks.

She warned that the toll would still rise: “We’re horrified, but we still think the number is conservative.”

Speaking by phone for the first time since their calls were cut off from the outside world, Iranian witnesses described a heavy security presence in central Tehran, burned-out government buildings, smashed ATMs and few passersby. Meanwhile, people were concerned about what comes next, including the possibility of a U.S. attack.

“My customers talk about Trump’s reaction while wondering if he plans a military strike against the Islamic Republic,” said shopkeeper Mahmoud, who gave only his first name out of concern for his safety. “I don’t expect Trump or any other foreign country cares about the interests of Iranians.”

Reza, a taxi driver who also gave just his first name, said protests are on many people’s minds. “People — particularly young ones — are hopeless, but they talk about continuing the protests,” he said.

Several people in Tehran were able to call the AP on Tuesday and speak to a journalist. The AP bureau in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, was unable to call those numbers back. Witnesses said text messaging was still down, and internet users in Iran could connect to government-approved websites locally but nothing abroad.

Anti-riot police officers wore helmets and body armor while carrying batons, shields, shotguns and tear gas launchers, according to the witnesses. Police stood watch at major intersections. Nearby, witnesses saw members of the Revolutionary Guard’s all-volunteer Basij force, who carried firearms and batons. Security officials in plainclothes were visible in public spaces.

Several banks and government offices were burned during the unrest, witnesses said. Banks struggled to complete transactions without the internet, they added.

Shops were open, though there was little foot traffic in the capital. Tehran’s Grand Bazaar, where the demonstrations began Dec. 28 over the collapse of Iran’s rial currency, opened Tuesday. A witness described speaking to multiple shopkeepers who said security forces ordered them to reopen no matter what. Iranian state media did not acknowledge that order.

The witnesses spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal.

It also appeared that security service personnel were searching for Starlink terminals, as people in northern Tehran reported authorities raiding apartment buildings with satellite dishes. While satellite television dishes are illegal, many in the capital have them in homes, and officials broadly had given up on enforcing the law in recent years.

On the streets, people also could be seen challenging plainclothes security officials, who were stopping passersby at random.

State television also read a statement about mortuary and morgue services being free — a signal that some likely charged high fees for the release of bodies amid the crackdown.

Khamenei, in a statement carried by state TV, praised the tens of thousands who took part in pro-government demonstrations nationwide on Monday.

“This was a warning to American politicians to stop their deceit and not rely on traitorous mercenaries,” he said. “The Iranian nation is strong and powerful and aware of the enemy.”

State TV on Monday aired chants from the crowd, which appeared to number in the tens of thousands. They chanted “Death to America!” and “Death to Israel!” Others cried out, “Death to the enemies of God!” Iran’s attorney general has warned that anyone taking part in protests will be considered an “enemy of God,” a death-penalty charge.

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Nationwide protests challenging Iran’s theocracy reached the two-week mark Sunday, as the death toll in violence surrounding the demonstrations reached at least 116 people killed, activists said.

With the internet down in Iran and phone lines cut off, gauging the demonstrations from abroad has grown more difficult. But the death toll in the protests has grown to at least 116 and over 2,600 others detained, according to the U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency. The agency has been accurate in multiple rounds of previous unrest in Iran.

Iranian state TV is reporting on security force casualties while portraying control over the nation, without discussing dead demonstrators, whom it increasingly refers to as “terrorists.” However, it also acknowledged protests went on into Sunday morning, with demonstrations in Tehran and in the holy city of Mashhad to the northeast.

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has signaled a coming clampdown, despite U.S. warnings. Tehran escalated its threats Saturday, with the Iran’s attorney general, Mohammad Movahedi Azad, warning that anyone taking part in protests will be considered an “enemy of God,” a death-penalty charge. The statement carried by Iranian state television said even those who “helped rioters” would face the charge.

“Prosecutors must carefully and without delay, by issuing indictments, prepare the grounds for the trial and decisive confrontation with those who, by betraying the nation and creating insecurity, seek foreign domination over the country,” the statement read. “Proceedings must be conducted without leniency, compassion or indulgence.”

U.S. President Donald Trump offered support for the protesters, saying on social media that “Iran is looking at FREEDOM, perhaps like never before. The USA stands ready to help!!!” The New York Times and Wall Street Journal, reporting citing anonymous U.S. officials, said on Saturday night that Trump had been given military options for a strike on Iran, but hadn’t made a final decision.

The State Department separately warned: “Do not play games with President Trump. When he says he’ll do something, he means it.”

Saturday marked the start of the work week in Iran, but many schools and universities reportedly held online classes, Iranian state TV reported. Internal Iranian government websites are believed to be functioning.

State TV repeatedly played a driving, martial orchestral arrangement from the “Epic of Khorramshahr” by Iranian composer Majid Entezami, while showing pro-government demonstrations. The song, aired repeatedly during the 12-day war launched by Israel, honors Iran’s 1982 liberation of the city of Khorramshahr during the Iran-Iraq war. It has been used in videos of protesting women cutting away their hair to protest the 2022 death of Mahsa Amini as well.

It also repeatedly aired video of purported protesters shooting at security forces with firearms.

In one online video verified by The Associated Press, protesters demonstrated Friday in northern Tehran’s Saadat Abad area, with what appeared to be thousands on the street.

“Death to Khamenei!” a man chanted.

The semiofficial Fars news agency, believed to be close to Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard and one of the few media outlets able to publish to the outside world, released surveillance camera footage of what it said came from demonstrations in Isfahan. In it, a protester appeared to fire a long gun, while others set fires and threw gasoline bombs at what appeared to be a government compound.

The Young Journalists’ Club, associated with state TV, reported that protesters killed three members of the Guard’s all-volunteer Basij force in the city of Gachsaran. It also reported a security official was stabbed to death in Hamadan province, a police officer killed in the port city of Bandar Abbas and another in Gilan, as well as one person slain in Mashhad.

The semiofficial Tasnim news agency, also close to the Guard, claimed authorities detained nearly 200 people belonging to what it described as “operational terrorist teams.” It alleged those arrested had weapons including firearms, grenades and gasoline bombs.

State television also aired footage of a funeral service attended by hundreds in Qom, a Shiite seminary city just south of Tehran.

Iran’s theocracy cut off the nation from the internet and international telephone calls on Thursday, though it allowed some state-owned and semiofficial media to publish. Qatar’s state-funded Al Jazeera news network reported live from Iran, but they appeared to be the only major foreign outlet able to work.

Iran’s exiled Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi, who called for protests Thursday and Friday, asked in his latest message for demonstrators to take to the streets Saturday and 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.

Online video purported to show protests ongoing Saturday night as well.

The demonstrations began Dec. 28 over the collapse of the Iranian rial currency, which trades at over 1.4 million to $1, 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.

Airlines have canceled some flights into Iran over the demonstrations. Austrian Airlines said Saturday it had decided to suspend its flights to Iran “as a precautionary measure” through Monday. Turkish Airlines earlier announced the cancellation of 17 flights to three cities in Iran.

Meanwhile, concern is growing that the internet shutdown will allow Iran’s security forces to go on a bloody crackdown, as they have in other rounds of demonstrations. Ali Rahmani, the son of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Narges Mohammadi who is imprisoned in Iran, noted that security forces killed hundreds in a 2019 protest “so we can only fear the worst.”

“They are fighting, and losing their lives, against a dictatorial regime,” Rahmani said.

Associated Press writers Oleg Cetinic in Paris and Kirsten Grieshaber in Berlin contributed to this report.

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran signaled Friday that security forces would crack down on protesters, directly challenging U.S. President Donald Trump’s pledge to support those peacefully demonstrating as the death toll rose to at least 62.

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei dismissed Trump as having hands “stained with the blood of Iranians” as supporters shouted “Death to America!” in footage aired by Iranian state television. State media later repeatedly referred to demonstrators as “terrorists,” setting the stage for a violent crackdown like those that followed other nationwide protests in recent years.

Protesters are “ruining their own streets … in order to please the president of the United States,” the 86-year-old Khamenei said to a crowd at his compound in Tehran. “Because he said that he would come to their aid. He should pay attention to the state of his own country instead.”

Iran’s judiciary chief Gholamhossein Mohseni-Ejei separately vowed that punishment for protesters “will be decisive, maximum and without any legal leniency.”

There was no immediate response from Washington, though Trump has repeated his pledge to strike Iran if protesters are killed, a threat that’s taken on greater significance after the U.S. military raid that seized Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro.

Despite Iran’s theocracy cutting off the nation from the internet and international telephone calls, short online videos shared by activists purported to show protesters chanting against Iran’s government around bonfires as debris littered the streets in the capital, Tehran, and other areas into Friday morning.

Iranian state media alleged “terrorist agents” of the U.S. and Israel set fires and sparked violence. It also said there were “casualties,” without elaborating.

The full scope of the demonstrations couldn’t be immediately determined due to the communications blackout, though it represented yet another escalation in protests that began over Iran’s ailing economy and that has morphed into the most significant challenge to the government in several years. The protests have intensified steadily since beginning Dec. 28.

The protests also represented the first test of whether the Iranian public could be swayed by Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi, whose fatally ill father fled Iran just before the country’s 1979 Islamic Revolution. Pahlavi, who called for the protests Thursday night, similarly has called for demonstrations at 8 p.m. Friday.

Demonstrations have included cries in support of the shah, something that could bring a death sentence in the past but now underlines the anger fueling the protests that began over Iran’s ailing economy.

So far, violence around the demonstrations has killed at least 62 people while more than 2,300 others have been detained, said the U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency.

“What turned the tide of the protests was former Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi’s calls for Iranians to take to the streets at 8 p.m. on Thursday and Friday,” said Holly Dagres, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “Per social media posts, it became clear that Iranians had delivered and were taking the call seriously to protest in order to oust the Islamic Republic.”

“This is exactly why the internet was shut down: to prevent the world from seeing the protests. Unfortunately, it also likely provided cover for security forces to kill protesters.”

When the clock struck 8 p.m. Thursday, neighborhoods across Tehran erupted in chanting, witnesses said. The chants included “Death to the dictator!” and “Death to the Islamic Republic!” Others praised the shah, shouting: “This is the last battle! Pahlavi will return!” Thousands could be seen on the streets before all communication to Iran cut out.

“Iranians demanded their freedom tonight. In response, the regime in Iran has cut all lines of communication,” Pahlavi said. “It has shut down the internet. It has cut landlines. It may even attempt to jam satellite signals.”

He went on to call for European leaders to join Trump in promising to “hold the regime to account.”

“I call on them to use all technical, financial, and diplomatic resources available to restore communication to the Iranian people so that their voice and their will can be heard and seen,” he added. “Do not let the voices of my courageous compatriots be silenced.”

Pahlavi had said he would offer further plans depending on the response to his call. His support of and from Israel has drawn criticism in the past — particularly after the 12-day war Israel waged on Iran in June. Demonstrators have shouted in support of the shah in some demonstrations, 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 internet cut also appears to have taken Iran’s state-run and semiofficial news agencies offline. The state TV acknowledgment at 8 a.m. Friday represented the first official word about the demonstrations.

State TV claimed the protests were violent and caused casualties, but did not offer nationwide figures. It said the protests saw “people’s private cars, motorcycles, public places such as the metro, fire trucks and buses set on fire.” State TV later reported that violence overnight killed six people in Hamedan, some 280 kilometers (175 miles) southwest of Tehran, and two security force members in Qom, 125 kilometers (75 miles) south of the capital.

The European Union and Germany condemned the violence targeting demonstrators as new protests were reported in Zahedan in Iran’s restive southwestern Sistan and Baluchestan province.

Iran has faced rounds of nationwide protests in recent years. As sanctions tightened and Iran struggled after the 12-day war, its rial currency collapsed in December, reaching 1.4 million to $1. Protests began soon after, with demonstrators chanting against Iran’s theocracy.

It remains unclear why Iranian officials have yet to crack down harder on the demonstrators. Trump warned last week that if Tehran “violently kills peaceful protesters,” America “will come to their rescue.”

In an interview with talk show host Hugh Hewitt aired Thursday, Trump reiterated his pledge.

Iran has “been told very strongly, even more strongly than I’m speaking to you right now, that if they do that, they’re going to have to pay hell,” Trump said.

He demurred when asked if he’d meet with Pahlavi.

“I’m not sure that it would be appropriate at this point to do that as president,” Trump said. “I think that we should let everybody go out there, and we see who emerges.”

Speaking in an interview with Sean Hannity aired Thursday night on Fox News, Trump went as far as to suggest Khamenei may want to leave Iran.

“He’s looking to go someplace,” Trump said. “It’s getting very bad.”

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran’s supreme leader insisted Saturday that “rioters must be put in their place” after a week of protests that have shaken the Islamic Republic, likely giving security forces a green light to aggressively put down the demonstrations.

The first comments by 86-year-old Ayatollah Ali Khamenei come as violence surrounding the demonstrations sparked by Iran’s ailing economy has killed at least 15 people, according to human rights activists. The protests show no sign of stopping and follow U.S. President Donald Trump warning Iran on Friday that if Tehran “violently kills peaceful protesters,” the United States “will come to their rescue.”

While it remains unclear how and if Trump will intervene, his comments sparked an immediate, angry response, with officials within the theocracy threatening to target American troops in the Mideast. They also take on new importance after Trump said Saturday that the U.S. military captured Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, a longtime ally of Tehran.

The protests, have become the biggest in Iran since 2022, when the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in police custody triggered nationwide demonstrations. However, the protests have yet to be as widespread and intense as those surrounding the death of Amini, who was detained over not wearing her hijab, or headscarf, to the liking of authorities.

State television aired remarks by Khamenei to an audience in Tehran that sought to separate the concerns of protesting Iranians upset about the rial’s collapse from “rioters.”

“We talk to protesters, the officials must talk to them,” Khamenei said. “But there is no benefit to talking to rioters. Rioters must be put in their place.”

He also reiterated a claim constantly made by officials in Iran that foreign powers like Israel or the United States were pushing the protests, without offering any evidence. He also blamed “the enemy” for Iran’s collapsing rial.

“A bunch of people incited or hired by the enemy are getting behind the tradesmen and shopkeepers and chanting slogans against Islam, Iran and the Islamic Republic,” he said. “This is what matters most.”

Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard ranks include the all-volunteer Basij force, whose motorcycling-riding members have violently put down protests like the 2009 Green Movement and the 2022 demonstrations. The Guard answers only to Khamenei.

Hard-line officials within the country are believed to have been pushing for a more-aggressive response to the demonstrations as President Masoud Pezeshkian has sought talks to address protesters’ demands.

But bloody security crackdowns often follow such protests. Protests over a gasoline price hike in 2019 reportedly saw over 300 people killed. A crackdown on the Amini protests of 2022, which lasted for months, killed more than 500 people and saw over 22,000 detained.

“Iran has no organized domestic opposition; protesters are likely acting spontaneously,” the Eurasia Group said in an analysis Friday. “While protests could continue or grow larger (particularly as Iran’s economic outlook remains dire), the regime retains a large security apparatus and would likely suppress such dissent without losing control of the country.”

Two deaths overnight into Saturday involved a new level of violence. In Qom, home to the country’s major Shiite seminaries, a grenade exploded, killing a man there, the state-owned IRAN newspaper reported. It quoted security officials alleging the man was carrying the grenade to attack people in the city, some 130 kilometers (80 miles) south of the capital, Tehran.

Online videos from Qom purportedly showed fires in the street overnight.

The second death happened in the town of Harsin, some 370 kilometers (230 miles) southwest of Tehran. There, the newspaper said, a member of the Basij, the all-volunteer arm of Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, died in a gun and knife attack in the town in Kermanshah province.

Demonstrations have reached over 170 locations in 25 of Iran’s 31 provinces, the U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency reported early Sunday. The death toll had reached at least 15 killed, it added, with over 580 arrests. The group, which relies on an activist network inside of Iran for its reporting, has been accurate in past unrest.

The state-run IRNA news agency separately reported on what it described as violence in Malekshahi County in Iran’s Ilam province, some 515 kilometers (320 miles) southwest of Tehran. It offered no specific details.

Hengaw, a Kurdish human rights group, and the Oslo-based group Iran Human Rights put the death toll at four in the violence there. Both groups accused Iranian security forces of opening fire on demonstrators.

The semiofficial Fars news agency, believed to be close to the Revolutionary Guard, alleged without offering evidence that demonstrators carried firearms and grenades. Firearms are more prevalent in western Iran, along the border with Iraq, but there’s been no clear evidence provided by the government to support allegations of demonstrators being armed.

The protests, taking root in economic issues, have heard demonstrators chant against Iran’s theocracy as well. Tehran has had little luck in propping up its economy in the months since its June war with Israel in which the U.S. also bombed Iranian nuclear sites in Iran.

Iran recently said it was no longer enriching uranium at any site in the country, trying to signal to the West that it remains open to potential negotiations over its atomic program to ease sanctions. However, those talks have yet to happen as Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have warned Tehran against reconstituting its atomic program.