WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump may have pledged a non-interventionist foreign policy aimed at avoiding American troop deployments in foreign lands, but all bets are off when it comes to employing social media to fire at foreign leaders and their governments.

On Saturday, the US President tweeted in Farsi his support for the Iranian people protesting against the government, drawing return fire from Tehran . "To the brave and suffering Iranian people: I have stood with you since the beginning of my presidency and my government will continue to stand with you. We are following your protests closely. Your courage is inspiring," Trump wrote in a tweet as protests roiled Iran following the disclosure that friendly fire downed an Ukrainian airliners killing many Iranians on board.

Trump's daughter Ivanka claimed it was the most liked Persian tweet in history of Twitter, garnering more than 200,000 likes.

The tweet also invited a needling observation by a troll who took a swipe at Trump’s poor grasp of English — that it was "far more literate than any of the ones in English."

The Iranian government though was enraged by Trump’s trolling in Farsi. "Hands and tongues smeared with threatening, sanctioning and terrorizing the Iranian nation, are not entitled to dishonor the ancient Persian language," Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Abbas Mousavi wrote on Twitter.

Back home in the US, Trump also trained his Twitter gun at the Democratic leadership, retweeting a photo of Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer in Islamic dress under the caption "The corrupted Dems trying their best to come to the Ayatollah's rescue."

The swipe at Pelosi came after the Democratic House Speaker dismissed protests in Tehran against the Iranian leadership saying there were "different reasons why people are in the street."

Trump acolytes have increasingly taken to calling Democrats who don’t subscribe to the administration’s line on Iran as "terrorist sympathisers" – from a playbook increasingly adopted by establishments across the world against dissenters.

Among them was Congressman Doug Collins, a fierce Trump supporter, whose argument on a political talk show that Democrats "are in love with terrorists. We see that they mourn Soleimani more than they mourn our Gold Star families" brought forth a withering takedown from Preet Bharara, a former US Attorney and a Trump critic.

"I realize that you are a politician and that hyperbolic, hyperpartisan claptrap is the unfortunate fashion of the day. But even allowing for the new normal of nastiness in political rhetoric, your casual slur of countless good Americans hits a new bottom. Americans can, in good faith, differ about the legality or efficacy of killing Soleimani. That doesn't make them unpatriotic or lovers of terrorists. It is hostility to differences of opinion that is un-American," Bharara told the lawmaker through an OpEd on CNN, adding, "terrorists do not kill Republicans or Democrats. They kill Americans."

Collins subsequently apologized for his remarks, saying they were made in response to a question about the War Powers Resolution being introduced in the House and House Democrats’ attempt to limit the president’s authority.

While Collins' supporters berated him for backing down and apologizing to liberal Democrats, Trump continued to fire at them even as questions remained over why the President chose to target Qassem Suleimani at this time.

"The Democrats and the Fake News are trying to make terrorist Soleimani into a wonderful guy, only because I did what should have been done for 20 years. Anything I do, whether it’s the economy, military, or anything else, will be scorned by the Rafical Left, Do Nothing Democrats!" he tweeted.

As it turned out, a report in the NewYorker magazine in 2014 revealed that 15 years ago Suleimani was working with the Americans in the fight against Taliban and Al Qaeda. He was cast as the enemy after then President George Bush suddenly and unexpected named Iran as part of an “Axis of Evil”in a State of the Union address -- without any notice even though American interlocutors were working with Suleimani.

