{"id":197041,"date":"2026-01-15T22:57:45","date_gmt":"2026-01-15T22:57:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/trump-says-we-saved-a-lot-of-lives-as-iran-signals-it-wont-execute-protesters-nbc-news\/"},"modified":"2026-01-15T22:57:45","modified_gmt":"2026-01-15T22:57:45","slug":"trump-says-we-saved-a-lot-of-lives-as-iran-signals-it-wont-execute-protesters-nbc-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/trump-says-we-saved-a-lot-of-lives-as-iran-signals-it-wont-execute-protesters-nbc-news\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump says 'we saved a lot of lives' as Iran signals it won't execute protesters – NBC News"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Iran signaled it would not move ahead with executing protesters and reopened its airspace Thursday, as President Donald Trump left it unclear whether he would take military action<\/a> over the regime’s deadly crackdown.
The United States began evacuating key personnel from its largest military base in the Middle East<\/a> on Wednesday as the prospect of an American strike loomed, and activists said the death toll in Iran had passed 2,500.
But speaking by phone to NBC News on Thursday, Trump said \u201cwe saved a lot of lives yesterday,\u201d an apparent reference to his claim that the Iranian regime has stopped killing protesters and halted some planned executions, which he had previously warned could trigger a U.S. military response.
Trump did not say whether he has decided to take action on Iran, responding: \u201cI\u2019m not going to tell you that.\u201d
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said at a daily news briefing Thursday that \u201cthe president understands 800 executions that were scheduled and supposed to take place yesterday were halted,\u201d though she did not detail the source for the figure.
She said Trump had made it clear to Iran that “if the killing continues, there will be grave consequences,” adding that “all options remain on the table.”
Iran’s judiciary said Thursday that a man feared to be facing the first execution would not face the death penalty.
Erfan Soltani, 26, was expected to be the first protester to face execution, according to the State Department and human rights groups.
Iran’s judiciary said that he had not been sentenced to capital punishment. Soltani’s charge of “colluding against the country’s internal security and propaganda activities against the regime” did not carry the death penalty but he remained behind bars, state media reported.
The Norway-based Hengaw Organization for Human Rights said<\/a> his execution had been “postponed,” citing information from Soltani’s relatives. Amnesty International said the same, citing a source.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi also appeared to step back from official calls for rapid justice by telling Fox News that there would not be “any hanging today or tomorrow or whatever.\u201d He said, \u201cI\u2019m confident about that. There is no plan for hanging at all.\u201d
But Iran\u2019s defense minister, Brig. Gen. Aziz Nasirzadeh, told state media Thursday that Iran would use all its capabilities to \u201csuppress armed savage terrorists.\u201d
Earlier in the day, Trump said in the Oval Office, \u201cIt\u2019s stopped. It\u2019s stopping, and there\u2019s no plan for executions.\u201d
Discussing the response from security forces, Trump said that \u201cpeople were shooting at them with guns, and they were shooting back.\u201d He added: \u201cAnd you know, it\u2019s one of those things.\u201d
Trump is ready to follow through on his repeated promises to protesters that the U.S. would intervene militarily to support them, but has told his advisers he would want any action to deliver a swift and decisive blow to the regime, according to a U.S. official, two people familiar with the discussions and a person close to the White House.
They have so far not been able to give him that guarantee, the sources said.
With the world watching for potential signs of U.S. action, Iran closed its airspace for nearly five hours overnight into Thursday, issuing a “NOTAM” \u2014 or “notice to all airmen” \u2014 that all flights were banned except ones to and from Tehran that had been given special permission.
During that time, FlightRadar24 and other tracking websites showed no planes over the country, which lies along key East-West aviation routes. That notice was valid for around two hours and nearly five hours, later some planes were seeing making their way toward Tehran, FlightRadar24 showed.
Iran closed its airspace during its 12-day aerial conflict with Israel in June.
Despite the resumed air traffic and calmer rhetoric, the country is still reeling from the crackdown on the unrest that rocked the Islamic Republic, according to activists and analysts.
The U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency said Wednesday<\/a> that it had confirmed more than 2,600 deaths \u2014 including 150 security personnel \u2014 and more than 18,000 arrests in protests that were sparked by skyrocketing inflation and the crash of the Iranian rial against the U.S. dollar.
Protests kicked off in the capital, Tehran, but had spread to 187 cities around the country, according to HRANA.
The advocacy group says it relies on supporters in Iran cross-checking information and that its data goes through \u201cmultiple internal checks.\u201d HRANA attributed a dramatic rise in its death toll this week to Iranians\u2019 ability to make their first calls to the outside world in days since an internet and phone blackout. Authorities have not released an official death toll.
There have been harsh crackdowns on protests in the past but the level of violence in recent days indicated security forces had \u201cwaged their deadliest crackdown yet,\u201d Amnesty International said in a report<\/a> Wednesday.
The ruling clergy has not indicated that it will back off the ongoing crackdown to maintain the Islamic Republic, analysts say.
\u201cWhatever political legitimacy it had is long gone,\u201d Ali Vaez, Iran project director at the International Crisis Group, told NBC News in a text message response to questions. \u201cIt still has a repressive capacity and dwindling base of support, but its long twilight keeps getting darker.\u201d
Babak Dehghanpisheh is an NBC News Digital international editor based in New York.
Alexander Smith is a senior reporter for\u00a0NBC News Digital based in London.
Kristen Welker is the moderator of "Meet the Press."
© 2026 NBCUniversal Media, LLC<\/p>\n

source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

news AlertsThere are no new alerts at this timeIran signaled it would not move ahead with executing protesters and reopened its airspace Thursday, as President Donald Trump left it unclear whether he would take military action over the regime’s deadly crackdown.The United States began evacuating key personnel from its largest military base in the Middle […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":197042,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-197041","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-us","8":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197041","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=197041"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197041\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/197042"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=197041"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=197041"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=197041"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}