“The people of Iran are finally acting against the brutal and corrupt Iranian regime. All of the money that President Obama so foolishly gave them went into terrorism and into their ‘pockets,’” President Donald Trump tweeted. | Evan Vucci/AP As protests rage in Iran, Trump backs demonstrators, blames Obama 'All of the money that President Obama so foolishly gave them went into terrorism and into their ‘pockets,’' the president tweets.

President Donald Trump’s administration backed anti-government protesters in Iran on Tuesday, seizing an opportunity to criticize not just a foreign government that the White House has framed as a chief foe but also the administration of Barack Obama.

Trump tweeted that “the U.S. is watching” the ongoing anti-government demonstrations across Iran, blaming the nuclear deal struck with the support of former President Obama for, he said, lining the pockets of the Iranian government.


“The people of Iran are finally acting against the brutal and corrupt Iranian regime. All of the money that President Obama so foolishly gave them went into terrorism and into their ‘pockets,’” the president wrote on Twitter. “The people have little food, big inflation and no human rights. The U.S. is watching!”

U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said the U.S. would call for emergency sessions of the U.N. security and human rights councils in New York and Geneva, respectively, to address the Iranian government’s crackdown on protesters. She said the Islamic Republic’s suggestion that the protests had been fueled by outside influences was “complete nonsense.”

“This is the precise picture of a long-oppressed people rising up against their dictators. The international community has a role to play on this,” Haley said at a news conference at the U.N. in New York. “If the Iranian dictatorship’s history is any guide, we can expect more outrageous abuses in the days to come. … The people of Iran are crying out for freedom. All freedom-loving people must stand with their cause.”

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Tuesday marked the sixth day of protests in Iran, where a flagging economy and an uptick in food prices have prompted demonstrators to chant anti-government slogans. The Associated Press reported Tuesday that at least nine people had been killed overnight, including a member of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, raising the overall death toll from the protests to at least 20.

In Tehran, the Iranian capital, 450 protesters have been arrested since demonstrations began, the AP reported.

The protests are the largest in Iran since 2009, when the disputed reelection of Iran’s then-President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad sparked anti-government demonstrations. In what seemed a veiled criticism of the Obama administration’s response to those demonstrations, Haley said Tuesday that “the international community made the mistake of failing” to support Iranian protesters in 2009. “We must not make that mistake again.”

At Tuesday’s news briefing, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders echoed Haley’s warning, telling reporters that “the international community cannot sit silent as it did” in 2009. She stopped short of saying that the president would like to see regime change in Iran, instead listing Trump’s priorities as “basic human rights” for the Iranian people and an end to Iran’s support for groups deemed by the U.S. government to be terrorist organizations.

“The Iranian people are angry at the rising tide of corruption in their daily lives. The people are tired of paying the price for their violent and corrupt rulers,” Sanders said. “The citizens of Iran have paid a heavy price for the violence and extremism of their leaders, and the Iranian people long to reclaim their country’s proud history, its culture, its civilization and its cooperation with its neighbors.”

Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif took a shot on Twitter at Trump and U.S. foreign policy, writing that “Iran’s security and stability depend on its own people, who — unlike the peoples of Trumps [sic] regional ‘bffs’ — have the right to vote and to protest. These hard-earned rights will be protected, and infiltrators will not be allowed to sabotage them through violence and destruction.”

U.S. Undersecretary of State Steve Goldstein on Tuesday called on Iran, however, to stop blocking social media sites, including Instagram and the messaging service Telegram, calling them "legitimate avenues for communication," according to an Associated Press report. The U.S. has an obligation "not to stand by," Goldstein said, and will "encourage the protesters to continue to fight for what's right."

Trump’s Tuesday tweet echoed sentiments he had expressed online over the previous three days. He has long been critical of the landmark nuclear deal negotiated in part by the Obama administration, taking steps last year to imperil it without yet making good on his campaign promise to remove the U.S. from it entirely.

Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei hinted that outside influence may be playing a role in the unrest in his nation, suggesting via a statement on his official website that “in the recent days' incidents, enemies of Iran utilized various means — including money, weapon, politics and intelligence apparatuses — to create problems for the Islamic system.”

