IRAN’S army chief today threatened pre-emptive military action over the “rhetoric” targeting the Islamic Republic.

Major General Amir Hatami’s comments follow a warning by US President Donald Trump that if Tehran “violently kills peaceful protesters,” the US “will come to their rescue.”

It comes as Iran tries to respond to what it sees as a dual threat posed by Israel and the US, as well as the protests sparked by its economic woes that have grown into a direct challenge to its theocracy.

General Hatami said: “The Islamic Republic considers the intensification of such rhetoric against the Iranian nation as a threat and will not leave its continuation without a response.”

He added: “I can say with confidence that today the readiness of Iran’s armed forces is far greater than before the war. If the enemy commits an error, it will face a more decisive response, and we will cut off the hand of any aggressor.”

Seeking to halt the anger, Iran’s government began Wednesday paying the equivalent of $7 a month (around £5) to subsidise rising costs for dinner-table essentials like rice, meat and pastas. 

Shopkeepers warn prices for items as basic as cooking oil likely will triple under pressure from the collapse of Iran’s rial currency and the end of a preferential subsidised dollar-rial exchange rate for importers and manufacturers, likely fuelling further popular anger.

“More than a week of protests in Iran reflects not only worsening economic conditions, but longstanding anger at government repression and regime policies that have led to Iran’s global isolation,” the New York-based Soufan Centre think tank said.

The US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency said the latest death toll from the protests was now 36, including two members of Iran’s security forces. Demonstrations have reached over 280 locations in 27 of Iran’s 31 provinces.