Iran's Supreme Leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, said in a message on Thursday that Iran's enemies, having been defeated on the battlefield, were now seeking to undermine public resilience and sow internal divisions.
Khamenei called for national unity in the face of those threats and said any action that created pessimism or frustration among the public amounted to helping the enemy.
The message was read on his behalf during ceremonies marking the anniversary of the death of the Islamic Republic's founder, Ruhollah Khomeini, as well as a major Shi'ite holiday.
Rubio: Khamenei is increasingly engaged in Iranian gov.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio told lawmakers on Tuesday that Khamenei is increasingly engaged at some level and that Iran retains a large number of drones despite its "conventional shield" being substantially eroded by US-Israeli strikes.
He added that US President Donald Trump's negotiating team has not offered Iran sanctions relief in exchange for reopening the Strait of Hormuz and insisted that any sanctions relief was tied to Tehran giving up its nuclear program.
"Right now, everything that's been discussed with them (Iran) is that… any sanctions relief is condition-based, which means it has to be in return for the reason why those sanctions were put in place in the first place, which is their nuclear program," Rubio told a Senate hearing.