Reports are that the dead could be OVER 2,500 and rising….
Trump IS jawboning and doing secret calls…..
The Protetsting continue….
There’s been plenty of Iran news in the past 12 hours. All eyes are on the White House to see what action Trump might decide to take against Iran. It has also just ticked past 6am on Wednesday in Tehran, and there are reports Erfan Soltani will be executed in Iran today.
Here’s a summary to bring you up to speed:
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Donald Trump has said the US “will take very strong action” against Iran if the regime starts to execute people as part of their crackdown on the spiralling protests.
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Erfan Soltani, a 26-year-old man arrested in connection with protests in the city of Karaj is scheduled to be executed on Wednesday, according to the Iranian Kurdish rights group, Hengaw. Authorities had told the family that the death sentence was final, Hengaw reported, citing a source close to the family.
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The US president has urged the protests to continue, and again suggested US military action could follow. “Iranian Patriots, keep protesting – take over your institutions!!! … help is on its way,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social on Tuesday, a day after the White House press secretary said airstrikes were among “many, many options” the US president was considering.
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More than 2,500 people have been killed in the protests – more than 90% of whom were demonstrators – and over 18,000 people have been arrested, the US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency said.
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Doctors in Iran have described overwhelmed hospitals and emergency wings overflowing with protesters who had been shot. One ophthalmologist in Tehran has documented more than 400 eye injuriesfrom gunshots in a single hospital.
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The US state department has said US citizens should leave Iran now and “if safe to do so, consider departing Iran by land to Armenia or Türkiye”.
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Trump announced that he was cancelling meetings with Iranian officials “until the senseless killing” stops, signalling a possible breakdown in de-escalation efforts. Trump was expected to receive a briefing on Tuesday night on the scale of casualties in Iran.
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Elon Musk’s SpaceX is offering people in Iran free internet through Starlink’s satellite service, according to Bloomberg News, as the internet blackout in the country surpassed the five-day mark.
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Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff met in secret with Reza Pahlavi, the exiled former Iranian crown prince, last weekend, Axios reported. A senior US official told the outlet the pair discussed the protests. In previous messages that have been blocked by the Iranian government internet shutdown, he has said that he is ready to lead a transition.
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In response to Trump’s social media post that “help is on the way,” Iran’s UN ambassador Amir Saeid Iravani said the US president was inciting violence, threatening the country’s sovereignty and security and seeking to destabilise the government. “The United States and the Israeli regime bear direct and undeniable legal responsibility for the resulting loss of innocent civilian lives, particularly among the youth,” he wrote in a letter to the UN security council.
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Russia on Tuesday condemned “subversive external interference” in Iran’s internal politics, saying any repeat of last year’s US strikes would have “disastrous consequences” for the Middle East and international security.
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Britain, France, Germany and Italy all summoned Iranian ambassadors in protest over the crackdown. “The rising number of casualties in Iran is horrifying,” European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen posted on X.
Trump warns Iran ‘it’s not going to work out good’ if hangings begin
Just coming back to some of Donald Trump’s comments during an interview with CBS on Tuesday night (US time).
The CBS Evening News anchor Tony Dokoupil asked Trump about hangings reportedly set to begin taking place in Iran on Wednesday.
Trump replied: “We will take very strong action. If they do such a thing, we will take very strong action.”
When pressed further about what “strong action” means, Trump mentioned the recent US strikes on Venezuela and the 2019 killing of then Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. The president then turned to Iran:
We don’t want to see what’s happening in Iran happen. And, you know, if they want to have protests, that’s one thing. When they start killing thousands of people. And now you’re telling me about hanging. We’ll see how that works out for them. It’s not going to work out good…..
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ISW….Iran Update, January 12, 2026
- Iranian Protests: CTP-ISW has recorded significantly less protest activity across Iran since January 8. CTP-ISW assesses with low-to-medium confidence that protests are occurring beyond what we have recorded, however, and that the regime has successfully limited the amount of information leaving Iran. The regime’s internet shutdown likely explains, at least partially, the decrease in recorded protest activity since January 8. It is possible that the rate of protest activity across Iran has also decreased due to the regime’s brutal crackdown on the protests.
- Regime Crackdown: Iranian Armed Forces General Staff (AFGS)-affiliated media threatened on January 12 to deploy more IRGC Ground Forces units and specialized forces to suppress protests. The threat indicates that the regime continues to perceive protests as a significant threat to its stability, which is consistent with our assessment that protests are occurring beyond what we have recorded. IRGC Ground Forces units have already deployed to several locations in western Iran, which suggests that the Law Enforcement Command (LEC) and Basij may be struggling to contain protests in these provinces.
- US-Iran Negotiations: The Masoud Pezeshkian administration has expressed willingness to resume nuclear negotiations with the United States in an effort to de-escalate tensions with the United States amid Iranian concerns about potential US strikes on Iran. CTP-ISW has not observed any indications that Iran has softened its red lines for negotiations with the United States.
- SDF-Government Conflict in Aleppo: The Syrian government and the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) reached a ceasefire on January 10 after government forces captured Kurdish-controlled neighborhoods in Aleppo City. Syrian government forces’ capture of Kurdish-controlled neighborhoods in Aleppo City and the Asayish’s withdrawal from the city will prevent the implementation of certain parts of the April 1 agreement.
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Trump says he has many military options on Iran. He doesn’t.
Many of the troops and ships once at the president’s disposal have shifted to the Caribbean.
The Trump administration has insisted it has numerous military options to deploy against Iran if the regime uses force against demonstrators.
But that menu is far more limited than it was even a year ago.
The U.S. troops and ships that were once at the president’s disposal have shifted to the Caribbean. A major American defense system sent to the Middle East last year has returned to South Korea. And administration officials say there are no plans for the movement of major assets.
The president can still order airstrikes that target Iranian leadership or military installations. But his choices are even more reduced than June, when the U.S. took out Iran’s nuclear sites. And he also must contend with lawmakers who, just over a week after Trump ordered the capture of Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro, are questioning whether a strike would draw the U.S. into another war in the region.
“What’s the objective? How does military force get you to that objective?” asked Rhode Island Sen. Jack Reed, the top Democrat on the Armed Services Committee. “They’re certainly repressing their people, but the president has yet to make the case that a military strike will either aid the population or get the government to change dramatically.”
The Trump administration also has been eating away at dwindling U.S. weapons stockpiles with the fast pace of military operations in the Red Sea, Iran and Venezuela.
The bottleneck has become particularly stark for air defense that protects U.S. forces within range of Iran’s weapons. If the administration strikes and Iranians retaliate forcefully, the U.S. may have a limited stockpile of interceptors to defend American forces against Tehran’s formidable rocket and missile arsenal. The Pentagon stations 10,000 U.S. troops at Al-Udeid Air Base in Qatar and smaller groupings in Iraq, Syria and Jordan….
image….People gather during a protest on Thursday in Tehran. Demonstrations have been ongoing for weeks….Getty …
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