Mojtaba Khamenei

Deal or no deal, ceasefire or no ceasefire, it is an insult to the people of Iran, the people protesting for freedom and dying for it, to pretend that the current leadership is somehow new or better.

Same-sex relations are criminalized and can carry the death penalty in Iran, where the Islamic regime has long been accused of systematic persecution of Iran's LGBTQ+ community.

One of the sources alleged there was no plan to change Iran's nuclear doctrine yet and claimed that the regime had not decided to seek a bomb, despite enriching uranium.

The conflicting statements came as the economic and humanitarian toll of the war mounted, with fuel shortages spreading worldwide, sending companies and countries scrambling to contain the fallout.

A resident of Isfahan told TML that if reports of a deal involving Ghalibaf were true, many Iranians would feel “deceived and abandoned, moving from one dictatorship to another.”

Images online show banners quoting Hitler in Persian as Tehran continues arrests and executions of those accused of aiding Israel.

By the time the talk took place, under 48 hours before the operation began, Trump had already approved the idea of the United States carrying out a military operation against Iran.

Iranian Parliament speaker Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf is leading the talks with the United States, a source told The Jerusalem Post.

“The more likely scenario is that the Revolutionary Guards are controlling him, not the other way around,” one well-informed source stated, adding that “in a few days, we will probably know more.”

Iran appears to be entering a transitional phase in which the relationship between clerical authority and military power is being recalibrated.