Hardline backlash in Iran grows as emerging US deal faces protests

Hardline and conservative figures in Iran are intensifying their attacks on the emerging agreement with the United States, with protests reported in several cities and public criticism focused on Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and Parliament Speaker Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf, who leads Iran’s negotiating team. The article says some protesters even shouted for the two men to resign, and, in some cases, for their deaths.

According to Fars, a media outlet associated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, dozens demonstrated outside the Foreign Ministry in Mashhad on Saturday evening. Additional demonstrations were documented in Tehran. In televised and online remarks, conservative lawmakers Amir-Hossein Sabati and Mahmoud Nabavian also attacked the deal, with Sabati calling for Araghchi’s removal and Nabavian warning that, under the agreement, “Iran will become a colony of America.”

One of the most prominent hardline voices, Kayhan editor Hussein Shariatmadari, criticized the reported reopening of the Strait of Hormuz. He said Tehran would be surrendering one of its strongest sources of leverage against its adversaries without receiving meaningful gains. In his newspaper column, he asked why Araghchi and Ghalibaf would give up a “decisive” tool that had, in his view, brought Iran’s enemies close to economic strangulation. He rejected the idea of charging transit fees to passing ships as insufficient compensation for the loss of senior military commanders, nuclear scientists, civilians, and the damage Iran has suffered.

The backlash reflects a broader struggle inside Iran’s hardline camp, including the Faidri Front, which traditionally opposes dialogue with the West and supports continued confrontation. The article says this camp has spent weeks organizing protests to undermine public confidence in any deal with Washington, while President Masoud Pezeshkian and other officials accuse them of pushing Iran toward continued conflict with the United States and Israel. Iranian commentator Sharmin Amiri argued that the hardliners attack Araghchi and Ghalibaf because a deal with Washington threatens their power base, which depends on ongoing confrontation.