Two people were reportedly “shot dead” on Monday during protests in Kenya against a planned Ebola isolation center for Americans at a military installation.
The post Two Killed in Kenyan Protests Against U.S. Ebola Quarantine Center appeared first on Breitbart.
After President Donald Trump suggested this week that Iranians "would fight back" if they had weapons, Iranian dissidents, military analysts and some Republican lawmakers are openly reviving a once-taboo question: should the West move beyond "maximum pressure" on Tehran and actively support armed resistance inside Iran?
"They have to have guns. And I think they’re getting some guns. As soon as they have guns, they’ll fight like, as good as anybody there is," Trump said in an interview with "The Hugh Hewitt Show," while discussing anti-regime unrest and the Iranian government’s crackdown on protesters.
The comments come as the Iranian regime emerges weakened from weeks of war, while frustration continues to simmer among many Iranians after years of failed protests and violent crackdowns by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
Supporters of a more aggressive approach argue sanctions, diplomacy and unarmed demonstrations have failed to produce meaningful change inside Iran and say the current moment may represent the best opportunity in decades to challenge the regime from within. Critics warn that openly discussing armed resistance could endanger protesters, deepen divisions inside the opposition and risk pushing Iran toward civil war.
The idea of armed resistance echoes aspects of the Reagan Doctrine, the Cold War-era strategy in which the U.S. backed anti-Soviet resistance movements around the world, from Afghanistan to Nicaragua.
"We need to give Iranians the tools now, and they’ll finish the job themselves," Brett Velicovich, founder of Powerus and a former U.S. military and intelligence specialist focused on drone warfare, told Fox News Digital.
"It’s their time to do something. There has never been a better chance."
AS AIRSTRIKES RAIN DOWN ON THE IRANIAN REGIME, CAN A FRACTURED OPPOSITION UNITE TO LEAD IF IT FALLS?
Velicovich described the strategy as "Reagan Doctrine 2.0," updated for the age of drones and decentralized warfare.
"Cheap FPV drones, loitering munitions, and small arms let motivated fighters turn Iran’s streets and mountains into a nightmare for the IRGC," he said. "This isn’t fantasy; it’s asymmetric warfare that works."
He argued that modern drone technology has fundamentally changed the balance between governments and insurgent or resistance movements.
"Drones democratize power," Velicovich said. "The regime’s monopoly on violence ends the day the people get eyes in the sky and precision strike capability."
IRANIAN KURDISH FIGHTERS SAY THEY’RE READY TO STRIKE TEHRAN, WAITING FOR OPENING
Still, even some critics of the Iranian regime caution that the comparison to Cold War proxy movements has limits.
Unlike Soviet-controlled Eastern Europe or Afghanistan in the 1980s, Iran is a highly nationalistic country with a fragmented opposition and deep fears of foreign intervention following decades of conflict across the Middle East.
Still, calls for more direct support for anti-regime forces are increasingly moving into mainstream Republican foreign policy discussions.
Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., recently called for what he described as a "Second Amendment solution" inside Iran.
"If I were President Trump and I were Israel, I would load the Iranian people up with weapons so they could go to the streets armed and turn the tide of battle inside Iran," Graham said on "Hannity."
The question of who would actually receive support, however, remains deeply controversial.
Some opposition supporters continue to rally around exiled Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi, whose name has surfaced during anti-regime protests inside Iran and who has urged the international community not to give Tehran "another lifeline."
Another group that has acted in various operations against the regime is the controversial People’s Mujahedin Organization of Iran, or MEK, which has long positioned itself as an organized opposition force against the Islamic Republic. The MEK recently posted videos showing its members targeting "regime centers and symbols of crime and repression," in response to the execution of two of its members last month — Hamed Validi and Mohammad (Nima) Massoum-Shahi.
Others point to existing armed or semi-organized anti-regime groups, including Kurdish organizations, Baloch insurgent networks and underground resistance cells operating inside Iran.
Sardar Pashaei, director of the Hiwa Foundation and a former Iranian wrestling champion now living in the United States, warned that publicly discussing arming protesters could itself put lives at risk.
"I think we must be extremely cautious on this issue, especially publicly, because the regime can use it as a pretext to arrest protesters, fabricate cases and even justify executions," Pashaei told Fox News Digital.
IRAN'S INTERNET BLACKOUT HIDING STRIKE DAMAGE AND SUPPRESSING DISSENT, ISRAELI OFFICIALS SAY
"For decades, the Islamic Republic has used accusations of ties to the United States, Israel, or espionage to target dissidents and political prisoners."
Pashaei argued the better approach is supporting Iranian civil society, restoring internet access and backing democratic opposition groups that reflect Iran’s ethnic and political diversity.
The issue became even more sensitive after Trump said during a phone interview with "Fox News Sunday" in early April that his administration had previously attempted to send firearms to Iranian protesters through Kurdish channels, though the effort failed.
IRAN REGIME FACES 'BEGINNING OF THE END' AS EXILED CROWN PRINCE SEES 'GOLDEN OPPORTUNITY'
"We sent guns to the protesters, a lot of them. We sent them through the Kurds. And I think the Kurds took the guns," Trump said.
Several Kurdish groups have denied receiving such shipments.
Pashaei warned that claims of foreign weapons support could deepen divisions inside the opposition while also exposing Kurdish groups to further retaliation from Tehran.
"During the so-called ceasefire period, Kurdish opposition groups were targeted more than 30 times with drone and missile attacks," he said, adding that four young Kurdish Peshmerga fighters were killed, including 19-year-old Ghazal Mowlan.
One source familiar with discussions surrounding Iranian opposition strategy said supporters of a more aggressive approach increasingly believe the current moment presents a rare opportunity to identify, train and support local resistance networks capable of protecting protesters and challenging the regime from within.
The source argued that while Iran spent decades building and cultivating proxy networks across the Middle East, Western governments largely avoided investing in organized anti-regime infrastructure inside Iran itself.
Others warn that empowering armed factions could trigger ethnic fragmentation, civil war or a Syria-style conflict inside Iran.
According to the source, supporters of a more aggressive approach increasingly believe the current moment presents a rare opportunity to identify, train and support local resistance networks capable of protecting protesters and challenging the regime from within.
Whether Washington is willing to move beyond pressure campaigns and sanctions toward something closer to a modernized Reagan Doctrine remains unclear.
For now, Trump’s comments have pushed a once-theoretical conversation into the open, while some argue the current moment may represent the best opportunity in decades to challenge the regime.
May Day demonstrations across Europe and Asia on Friday revealed how International Workers’ Day is increasingly transforming from a traditional labor rights event into a broader political battleground, where demands over wages, inflation and worker protections are now frequently intertwined with anti-war activism, anti-Israel rhetoric and wider ideological struggles over global power.
From Paris to Istanbul, Madrid, Manila and Seoul, protests often expanded far beyond workplace grievances, with demonstrators linking rising living costs and social inequality to war in the Middle East, U.S. foreign policy and broader anti-capitalist narratives.
Nile Gardiner, senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation, told Fox News Digital that the demonstrations reflected what he described as a ‘troubling moral inversion’.
600 GROUPS WITH $2B IN REVENUE MOBILIZE 3,000 MAY DAY PROTESTS IN ‘RED-BLUE’ ALLIANCE, PROBE FINDS
"These May Day protesters should be demonstrating against the brutal tyranny in Tehran instead of protesting against U.S. military action, and this is an illustration of the complete moral vacuum that exists in Europe today," Gardiner said.
In Paris, May Day protests reportedly escalated into clashes as police used tear gas grenades and forceful arrests after projectiles were thrown during demonstrations, according to publicly circulated social media footage.
Earlier, French labor leaders had focused on inflation, wages and social protections, but parts of the protests also featured anti-war slogans, Palestinian symbolism and criticism of military spending.
In Madrid, thousands marched under banners reading "Capitalism should pay the cost of their war," while demonstrators protested stagnant wages, housing shortages and militarism. Placards targeting President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu highlighted how international conflict featured prominently alongside domestic labor concerns.
Germany also saw unrest in Munich, where publicly circulated reporter footage showed riot police using batons to disperse radical leftist protesters after pyrotechnics were repeatedly ignited during a revolutionary May Day demonstration.
Emma Schubart, Research Fellow at the Henry Jackson Society, a London-based think tank, warned that May Day demonstrations increasingly serve as platforms for ideological movements extending beyond labor activism.
"The May Day demonstrations across Europe increasingly feature Islamist elements. Militant anti-war, anti-capitalist rhetoric is now routinely accompanied by Palestinian flags and explicit anti-Israel slogans," Schubart said, adding that far-left activism and Islamist-linked networks are increasingly converging under broader anti-Western narratives.
In Istanbul, police blocked leftist groups from marching to the banned Taksim Square, the historic center of Turkey’s labor movement, where demonstrations have long carried symbolic political weight. Protesters attempted to break through barricades and clashed with police as authorities detained some of the protesters.
MORE KEY US ALLIES BLOCK MILITARY FLIGHTS AS IRAN WAR RIFT WIDENS WITH TRUMP
Outside Europe, similar themes emerged across Asia.
In Manila, workers clashed with police near the U.S. Embassy while protesting higher fuel and commodity prices, demanding wage increases and calling for an end to war in the Middle East.
A left-wing labor group paraded a giant effigy depicting Trump, Netanyahu and Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. as a three-headed monster, symbolically tying domestic hardship to both local and international political leadership.
In South Korea, thousands gathered near Seoul’s Gwanghwamun Square for major labor rallies centered on collective bargaining and worker rights, but speeches also incorporated broader geopolitical messaging.
Korea Confederation of Trade Unions Chairman Yang Kyung-soo called on demonstrators to "unite with the Iranian and Palestinian workers and people suffering from American imperialist aggression," explicitly connecting labor solidarity to anti-American and Middle East political narratives.
While local priorities varied, from wages in France to labor rights in Seoul, May Day 2026 demonstrated a growing global pattern: labor demonstrations are increasingly becoming arenas for broader ideological and geopolitical confrontation.
"The United States is fighting to defend the free world against tyranny, and yet across Europe and beyond we are seeing protesters direct their outrage at America and its allies instead of the brutal regimes driving so much of this global instability," Gardiner said. "That should deeply concern anyone who cares about the future of Western civilization."
Reuters and the Associated Press contributed to this report.
President Donald Trump said Wednesday that Iran will no longer execute eight women linked to anti-regime protests after he urged their release a day earlier.
"Very good news! I have just been informed that the eight women protestors who were going to be executed tonight in Iran will no longer be killed," Trump said in a post on Truth Social.
Four of the women will reportedly be released immediately, while the remaining four will serve one-month prison sentences.
The president thanked Iran for halting the executions, saying, "I very much appreciate that Iran, and its leaders, respected my request."
FREED IRANIAN PRISONER SAYS ‘IN TRUMP, THE ISLAMIC REPUBLIC HAS MET ITS MATCH’
Trump previously said on social media Tuesday that releasing the women could work in Iran’s favor during negotiations scheduled later that day, when he ultimately announced an extension of a two-week ceasefire.
"To the Iranian leaders, who will soon be in negotiations with my representatives: I would greatly appreciate the release of these women," Trump said Tuesday, responding to an activist’s post on X that included photos of eight unidentified women.
"I am sure that they will respect the fact that you did so. Please do them no harm! Would be a great start to our negotiations!!!"
Iran’s judiciary, however, quickly responded to Trump’s claims, denying that the women ever faced execution, according to Middle East-focused media outlet New Arab.
"Trump was misled once again by fake news," the judiciary's official Mizan Online website said. "The women who were claimed to be on the verge of execution, some of them have been released, while others face charges that, if convictions are upheld, would at most result in imprisonment."
IRAN TO EXECUTE FIRST FEMALE PROTESTER TIED TO ANTI-REGIME UNREST
According to human rights groups, Iran reportedly last week scheduled the execution of a female protester linked to the January uprising, marking Tehran’s first publicly reported death penalty case involving a woman.
She was identified as Bita Hemmati and is among the eight women Trump said will no longer face capital punishment.
Hemmati was originally sentenced in a collective case alongside her husband and neighbors, the National Council of Resistance of Iran said.
On Jan. 8 and Jan. 9, the group allegedly threw objects such as concrete blocks and incendiary materials from rooftops, injured security forces and engaged in anti-regime "propaganda" in an effort to undermine security, according to federal authorities.
One Iranian journalist reported the identities of the other women in a post on X, claiming the defendants are as young as 16 years old.
One victim in particular, identified as Mahboubeh Shabani, 33, was accused of providing assistance to demonstrators injured during January’s uprising, according to the Norway-based Hengaw rights group.
The women’s rulings are among the latest in a series of punishments issued amid a broader government crackdown on dissent.
Rights groups say thousands of protesters may have been killed since demonstrations erupted earlier this year.
First: The answer is yes, I fully admit I talked Aaron into participating in another one of my wacky ideas.
Second: We worked with the same small American business owner who helped @CanaryCryRadio make a special coffee to support their podcast to bring you a protest coffee to go along with the theme of “Liminality” and help support our upcoming film. Proceeds go toward producing the movie by bartering coffee to keep the production team ( which is us) caffeinated, but this coffee also serves a dual purpose as well.
Just over 250 years ago, the crown attempted to tell the colonists what tea they had no choice but to drink by giving the East India Tea Co. a monopoly via The Tea Act — attempting to force the American colonists to exclusively buy and drink East India tea. In protest, the women in the colonies started a boycott of tea, knocking doors and getting other women to sign pledges promising their households would agree to buy and drink coffee instead. The tea boycott obviously culminated in the famous (or infamous, if you happen to be part of the British hereditary monarchy system hellbent on owning the colonists to the point of telling them what they were allowed to buy and drink as “loyal obedient subjects”) Tea Party. Coffee ultimately became the American drink of choice over tea, and the rest, as they say, is American Revolutionary history.
We thought if people were drinking protest/boycott coffee in the 250th anniversary window of this nation’s founding when the colonists would have also been drinking it, it would mean the right thing (especially right now) and who knows, maybe lend us a little 1776 energy around here… God knows we could really use it.
The wise Catherine Austin Fitts (@solari_the) once told us the currency of the future would be relationships built upon real trust. If we want to live in a better society (and a better world for that matter), we have to start trying to actually make this place better. We felt like working with a small American business to try and support the film (since we have to get this film supported and coffee fuels Aaron’s writing and my edits) while doing something that actually means the right thing on all the levels we could think of is a step in the right direction.
And we have tried this coffee. We’re kinda snobby about coffee sometimes, but this is actually really good coffee. I designed all the labels based on actual engravings of the tea party, and we made this commercial ourselves.
In love and liberty,
Aaron and Melissa
Truthstream Media
