As the Iranian people are repressed, Trump evaluates options for attacking the regime of Ayatollah Khamenei

While Iranian repressive forces violently suppress mass protests across the country, President Donald Trump has been briefed in recent days on concrete options for launching military strikes against the regime of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, The New York Times reported, citing multiple U.S. officials with direct knowledge of the talks.

According to the newspaper, Trump did not, for now, make a final decision,but is seriously considering authorizing an attack in response to the Iranian regime's crackdown after dozens of protesters have been killed over the past few weeks.

The options presented to the president include, according to the report, selective strikes even against non-military targets in Tehran, a key fact that marks the character of the scenarios being evaluated, as it would not just be a matter of military deterrence, but of directly punishing the repressive apparatus of the Iranian regime.

Trump has explicitly linked any future military action to the Iranian regime's conduct toward protesters, who have taken to the country's streets due to the high cost of living and lack of freedoms under the Jamenei. In recent remarks, President Trump warned that, if Tehran returns to "killing people like they have in the past," the United States will respond with force.

"We’ll be hitting them very hard where it hurts. And that doesn’t mean boots on the ground, but it means hitting them very, very hard where it hurts. So we don’t want that to happen," Trump said this week.

According to the NYT, U.S. officials stressed to President Trump the need to avoid an escalation that would end up bolstering the Iranian regime, or trigger direct retaliation against U.S. military or diplomatic personnel in the region.

Senior U.S. officials told the outlet that some of the strike options being analyzed are directly linked to Iranian security units involved in suppressing protests. The goal, they said, would be to punish those responsible for the crackdown without generating a backlash or a closing of ranks effect on the Iranian population.

The NYT revelation comes just a week after Trump ordered a massive military operation in Venezuela that culminated inthe capture of dictator Nicolás Maduro. Since then, the Administration has publicly insisted that the president makes good on his threats and that the most powerful army in the world should not be underestimated.

In parallel, Secretary of State Marco Rubio held talks with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in which they also addressed the situation in Iran, Syria, and Gaza, Axios reported.

The immediate precedent is also a clear warning that the U.S. is ready to strike at the Iranian regime. Just over six months ago, Trump ordered direct strikes against Iranian nuclear facilities, an operation that triggered retaliation and reopened forced negotiations. Likewise, in 2020, during his first term, it was Trump who ordereda drone strike in Baghdad, Iraq, that killed Major General Qasem Soleimani, commander of Iran's Quds Force.