Will Trump remove Khamenei, as in Venezuela, and work with insiders in the regime?

What he says

An English translation of the talk, which is in Persian. It was made with AI from YouTube's automatic captions and may contain errors; the Persian transcript is authoritative. Click a timestamp to jump to that part of the video.

0:01 Hello. It is Monday, 15 Dey 1404, January 5, 2026. The ninth day of protests in Iran has passed. HRANA, the Human Rights Activists News Agency, has put together a summary. In brief, over these nine days protests have taken place in 88 cities, in 26 provinces, at a total of 22 locations. According to HRANA, 20 of our brave compatriots have so far lost their lives, killed by the criminal regime, and 100 people have been arrested.

0:57 There have been protests at 17 universities, and at least 21 people have been wounded by birdshot. The regime's crimes and the beatings it inflicts on protesters are now known to the people of Iran and the world, through numerous reports showing how they drag young people into alleys and back streets and beat them, and so on. This is because the regime wants to stay in power through these very methods, as it has done before. In Malekshahi, in Ilam province, they attacked people on Saturday night and reportedly left at least 5 dead and

1:55 30 wounded. But on Sunday night, that is, last night, the regime's savage forces attacked the hospital to take away the wounded, and they met resistance from the patients' companions and from the hospital staff. Attacking a hospital, which counts as a crime against humanity, has happened before, in Aban 1398 [November 2019] and during the Woman, Life, Freedom revolution. As many people have written, if this had happened in Gaza, Khamenei, the regime's hardline loyalists, and a section

2:52 of the Reformists and others would be wailing about the catastrophe and screaming and shouting, yet now they are silent about this savagery by the regime. Another event that is directly relevant to what is happening in Iran is the attack by American special forces on Caracas, the capital of Venezuela. Apparently after four months of planning, they carried out a lightning raid, arrested Maduro, Venezuela's president, along with his wife, and took them to New York. Today was also the first day of Maduro's trial in New York, on charges of

3:48 drug trafficking, concealing weapons, and so on. Mr. Maduro pleaded not guilty in court, as did his wife. He even said, "I am a prisoner of war, and I am the president of Venezuela." But everyone had expected that after Maduro was removed from Venezuela, Ms. Machado would take over. She is a Nobel Peace Prize laureate and was considered one of the best-known leaders of Venezuela's opposition, perhaps the best-known. She had also praised Mr. Trump a great deal and even wanted to give him her prize.

4:43 But Mr. Trump said that Ms. Machado lacks acceptance, does not have the necessary respect, and does not have support. In short, Ms. Rodríguez, who was Maduro's vice president, has been sworn in in his place, and Trump has reportedly spoken with her by phone. This has fueled a great deal of speculation that they have a similar plan for Khamenei in Iran and that Trump is talking with people inside the regime. That is really more guesswork and speculation, and there is no evidence for it. But it should also be said that Mr. Trump again warned

5:41 the Iranian regime, for the second time, that if they shoot at people, that is, if they start killing people, America will not sit idly by. Also in connection with the protests, the regime's crackdown, and these events, an internal report by IRGC Intelligence is very important. The report states that cases have been observed in which neighborhood Basij units, Basij units in government offices, or mosques have joined the people. The report says with alarm that this shows that, in a crisis, a large part of the volunteer Basij forces

6:40 will not be willing to stand alongside the regime. It is true that the Basij has been the infantry of the regime's repression machine. But in recent years, as people turned their backs on Basij members and at times boycotted them, and as the regime's legitimacy and acceptance declined and collapsed, willingness to join the Basij fell. During the Woman, Life, Freedom revolution we saw that they could barely bring out 50,000 people across the whole country, while they had been counting on 250,000. Today, I would say, it has probably

7:31 shrunk much further. Another development that deserves attention, because it will be directly connected to the current protests, is this: according to the government spokeswoman, Ms. Mohajerani, as of today the government has eliminated the 28,500-toman exchange rate, the so-called preferential rate. In itself this is not a wrong move, provided there is a proper plan for it and dozens of other measures are taken alongside it. Of course, a group of rent-seekers made fabulous fortunes by obtaining this currency. In any case, it was used to import food and

8:26 other basic goods. Today, immediately, food prices rose by 20 to 30 percent. Some items, such as cooking oil, went up several times over. The open-market dollar, which had come into the 130,000-toman range, rose to 144,000 tomans, and the dollar traded under government supervision on the exchange floor reached 132,000 tomans. Inflation is forecast to go above 60 percent, and by the end of this year the dollar may even pass 160,000 tomans. The government has said it will give people a monthly subsidy of one million tomans to buy 11

9:21 food items. But in any case, this policy will intensify poverty, hunger, empty tables and empty pots, because the regime has not put in place the other requirements for a transition to a free, market-based economy, above all tackling corruption and the monopolies in the hands of Khamenei himself, the IRGC, and their cronies and supporters. So, putting all of this together, the point is that tactical diversity suited to the conditions must be taken into account. The leadership of the struggle must not show the people the wrong path. For example, calling on people to come into the streets and block the roads, to block the routes.

10:21 Perhaps one could say that cases of this appear in Gene Sharp's book *From Dictatorship to Democracy*, published in 1993, that is, 33 years ago. For the moment when a military coup takes place, Gene Sharp makes recommendations along these lines: in those first few days, use such methods to cut off the coup plotters' communications, create roadblocks, and so on, so that they cannot take power and hold on to it. But in that same book, Gene Sharp's main emphasis is on people power, strikes, and non-cooperation, and these make up a major part of his proposals.

11:15 In any case, the principle in civil resistance is that people's participation should become as widespread as possible. Tactics should be such that ordinary people can also take part, so that their numbers keep growing and they ultimately win by the principle of numbers. In fact, several principles must be kept in mind in leading the struggle and in the proposals made to the people. The first principle is that continuity of the struggle is very important. An attitude as if it will be over in two or three weeks, or two or three months, and we will win, as if we just rush out, hit this and hit that, and it will be over, carries the risk that when people see

12:14 they have not succeeded within a short time, they may become disheartened. The struggle should be envisioned as longer-term, and like the waves of the sea, we should move forward and pull back, achieve a victory, hold on to it and consolidate it, then move on to the next victory, and so on. So continuity of the struggle is the first principle. The second is tactical diversity in the struggle. Relying on a single tactic, street protest, and that too in an offensive form, with clashes, roadblocks, and so on... well, we are facing a regime that does not shrink from killing, and victory cannot necessarily be achieved with this one tactic. Even within the protests themselves, the focus on hunger, alongside the political demands, the overthrow of the regime, and

13:16 the achievements of the Woman, Life, Freedom revolution, must not be lost, because the issue of hunger and poverty has the potential both to draw in all strata of the people and to cause defections from the regime, as we said about the Basij, and as also applies to the police forces and even the IRGC. Another point that must always be kept in mind is that unity is the key to victory. In civil resistance, in the struggle, unity, planning, and maintaining nonviolent discipline are the three minimum principles for victory. Uniting all forces and bringing them into the field, and designing tactics in which different sections of society

14:14 can participate, with tactical diversity for each section, are among the requirements that create this unity in practice. Great leaders have built great coalitions in civil resistance. Therefore, we must resort to such methods, instead of attacking this one and that one and monopolizing the struggle, so that everyone, of every persuasion, can take part in it. We will talk more about these matters on the coming nights. Hoping for the victory of Iran and the Iranian people. Amen.