US PRESIDENT Donald Trump and top Iranian officials exchanged duelling threats today as widening economic protests swept across parts of the Islamic Republic, further escalating tensions between the countries after the US’s unprovoked bombings of Iran in June.

Mr Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform today that if Iran “violently kills peaceful protesters,” then the US “will come to their rescue.”

At least seven people have been killed so far in violence surrounding the demonstrations, sparked in part by the collapse of Iran’s rial currency.

“We are locked and loaded and ready to go,” Mr Trump wrote, without elaborating.

Shortly after, Ali Larijani, a former parliament speaker who serves as the secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, alleged on the social platform X that Israel and the US were stoking the demonstrations.

He offered no evidence to support the allegation, which Iranian officials have repeatedly made during years of protests sweeping the country.

“Trump should know that intervention by the US in the domestic problem corresponds to chaos in the entire region and the destruction of the US’s interests,” Mr Larijani wrote on X, which the Iranian government blocks.

“The people of the US should know that Trump began the adventurism. They should take care of their own soldiers.”

Mr Larijani’s remarks likely referenced the US’s wide military footprint in the region. Iran in June attacked Al Udeid air base in Qatar after the US strikes on three nuclear sites during Israel’s 12-day war on the Islamic Republic.

Ali Shamkhani, an adviser to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei who previously was the council’s secretary for years, warned that “any interventionist hand that gets too close to the security of Iran will be cut.”

“The people of Iran properly know the experience of ‘being rescued’ by Americans: from Iraq and Afghanistan to Gaza,” he said on X.

The current protests, now in their sixth day, 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 demonstrations have yet to be countrywide and have not been as intense as those surrounding the death of Ms Amini, who was detained over not wearing her hijab, or headscarf, to the liking of authorities.

Iran’s civilian government under President Masoud Pezeshkian has been trying to signal it wants to negotiate with protesters.

However, Mr Pezeshkian has acknowledged there is not much he can do as Iran’s rial has rapidly depreciated.

The protests, taking root in economic issues, have heard demonstrators chant against Iran’s theocracy as well.