AMY GOODMAN: We begin today’s show in Iran. In a televised address, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has rejected President Trump’s calls for unconditional surrender and warned Iran will meet any U.S. military action in Iran with, quote, “irreparable harm.” Trump has directly threatened Khamenei by writing on Truth Social that the U.S. knows where he is, adding, quote, “We are not going to take him out… at least not for now.”

This comes as multiple reports indicate Trump is moving closer to ordering U.S. airstrikes on Iran. On Tuesday, he dismissed findings on Iran by his own intelligence agencies. In March, the Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard told lawmakers the intelligence community, quote, “continues to assess that Iran is not building a nuclear weapon,” unquote. On Tuesday, Trump dismissed Gabbard’s testimony when asked about it by reporters.

KAITLAN COLLINS: Tulsi Gabbard testified in March that the intelligence community said Iran wasn’t building a nuclear weapon.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I don’t care what she said. I think they were very close to having one.

AMY GOODMAN: This all comes as Israel is continuing to attack Iran for a sixth day, forcing thousands of people to flee Tehran. More than 50 Israeli warplanes struck targets inside Iran in the early hours of today. Iran responded by firing ballistic missiles and launching drones at Israel. According to one count, Israeli strikes since Friday have killed at least 585 people across Iran and wounded over 1,300 others. Iranian strikes on Israel that have killed at least 23 people and injured over 630.

On Capitol Hill, Democratic Senator Tim Kaine called for his colleagues to support his War Powers Resolution to prevent a U.S. war with Iran.

SEN. TIM KAINE: I happen to believe that the United States engaging in a war against Iran, a third war in the Middle East since 2001, would be a catastrophic blunder for this country.

AMY GOODMAN: Meanwhile, there’s a growing split within Trump’s MAGA coalition over the prospect of the U.S. attacking Iran. Conservative TV host Tucker Carlson has railed against what he’s called warmongers within the Republican Party. On Tuesday, video went viral of him interviewing the hawkish Texas Republican Senator Ted Cruz.

TUCKER CARLSON: If you don’t know anything about the country — 

SEN. TED CRUZ: I didn’t say I don’t know anything about the country.

TUCKER CARLSON: OK, what’s the ethnic mix of Iran?

SEN. TED CRUZ: They are Persians and predominantly Shia.

TUCKER CARLSON: What percentage?

SEN. TED CRUZ: OK, this is cute.

TUCKER CARLSON: No, there’s — no, it’s not even — 

SEN. TED CRUZ: OK.

TUCKER CARLSON: You don’t know anything about Iran. So, actually, the country —

SEN. TED CRUZ: OK, I am not the Tucker Carlson expert on Iran —

TUCKER CARLSON: No, no, the —

SEN. TED CRUZ: — who says —

TUCKER CARLSON: You’re a senator who’s calling for the overthrow — 

SEN. TED CRUZ: You’re the one who claims —

TUCKER CARLSON: — of the government —

SEN. TED CRUZ: You’re the one who claims —

TUCKER CARLSON: — and you don’t know anything about the country!

AMY GOODMAN: For more, we’re joined by two guests. In Washington, D.C., Akbar Shahid Ahmed is the senior diplomatic correspondent for HuffPost, where his latest pieces are headlined “Israel’s War on Iran Bears the Echo of Past American Mistakes,” and another article, “The Pro-Israel U.S. General Quietly Influencing Trump on Iran.”

But we begin in Tehran with Mohammad Marandi, professor of English literature and Orientalism at the University of Tehran, part of the nuclear deal negotiations in 2015.

We welcome you both back to Democracy Now! Mohammad Marandi, let’s begin with you. You’re in the capital of Iran, in Tehran, the capital where President Trump has said everyone should leave. Can you talk about what’s happening? Describe the scene on the ground. How are people dealing?

MOHAMMAD MARANDI: Well, the administration here has facilitated people leaving Tehran since a few days ago. Many government agencies are now allowing people to work from home or to take vacation. And university and school exams have been canceled for now, so that those who want to leave the city can do so. So, Trump’s warning, which is an act of terror, really didn’t have a huge impact. Many people had already left. People, like myself, are here in Tehran.

Actually, I’m in the Iranian National Television and Radio buildings, in one of the buildings that’s been evacuated. I’m here because the internet is a bit better, is better than outside. And as you know, the day before yesterday, they bombed the Iranian Radio and Television Network and murdered a number of journalists.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Professor, we have all these reports of the targeted killings or assassinations of key leaders and scientists in Iran. To what degree do you feel that this terror campaign of Israel has destabilized Iran’s top leadership?

MOHAMMAD MARANDI: Actually, these terror attacks have united the country more than ever before, or at least since, in my opinion, when Saddam Hussein invaded Iran. Those assassinations were carried out during the first hours of this unprovoked attack, and they bombed apartment blocks to get people. For example, in one apartment block where they were seeking to murder one or two high-ranking military officials, they killed everyone, 65 people, including over 20 children. So, that was not — and Western media tries to celebrate this and to show how sophisticated such an attack is. It’s not sophisticated. My neighbors know where I am. Their neighbors know that they’re there. There’s nothing sophisticated about slaughtering everyone in a building, in an apartment building, to murder one or two people.

But that’s, of course, what the Israeli regime has done across the board. They destroy apartment blocks in Beirut, and, of course, Western media would call these Hezbollah targets in order to hide the crimes. And we’ve seen what they’ve been doing in Gaza for 21 months, this genocide, this holocaust, where they’re slaughtering everyone everywhere. So, we shouldn’t have any expectations for the Israeli regime to behave any different towards Iranians, because, for them, we are all Amalek.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And also, I noticed that in the last day or so, the Iranian government has urged its people to delete social media platforms like WhatsApp and Instagram. The government claims that these platforms are relaying information to Israel, geolocation information about individual Iranians. This prospect of these media companies actually participating or colluding with Israel, what’s your sense of that?

MOHAMMAD MARANDI: Yes, Meta is actively participating in the attacks on Iran. They are giving locations for academics, university professors. I, too, unfortunately, have WhatsApp. I do not have Instagram. My account was deleted by Instagram a long time ago. But I only have WhatsApp because many journalists are trying to contact me, and I don’t have any other means to stay in contact with some of these people. And, of course, people have asked me to give up my cellphone, but again, I have no option, because if I do, then I cannot conduct interviews. So I have to take this risk. But others are being encouraged to delete Instagram and to delete WhatsApp, and I encourage people across the world to do so, as well.

AMY GOODMAN: I wanted to get your response, Mohammad Marandi, to first the Iran Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei rejecting Trump’s calls for unconditional surrender, warning that Iran will meet any U.S. military action in Iran with “irreparable harm.” The significance of him speaking out and of Trump directly threatening him? We’ve followed this over a few days. Trump has gone back and forth, you know, U.S. officials saying that he stopped Netanyahu from targeting Ali Khamenei, but then threatening Ali Khamenei himself, and, ultimately, most recently writing, “We are not going to take him out… at least not for now.” Can you talk about the significance of all of this and the U.S. fleet moving closer to the Middle East, and Trump now, apparently, moving closer to getting directly involved, the whole issue of whether the U.S. would use something that they haven’t yet given to Israel, which is a bunker-buster bomb in Fordow?

MOHAMMAD MARANDI: Well, Trump and Netanyahu are are two sides of the same coin. They are both genocidal, and they have no red lines. And the Iranians, of course, will ignore their threats and continue to defend the country’s sovereignty against this unprovoked aggression and this war that’s been imposed upon us.

The Iranians have said very clearly that if the United States attacks, Iran will punish it severely. And Iran’s underground drone and missile bases across the Persian Gulf region and the Indian Ocean are prepared for war. And I think those tiny Arab dictatorships in the Persian Gulf that have oil and gas installations, those that host American bases — and all of them do — if there is war, they, these regimes, will be swept away, because those bases are on their territory, and ordinary Iranians believe that they are fully complicit in any aggression against Iran. So, in case of any act of war against Iran by the United States, I think that that will be catastrophic for the global economy. It will bring about a Great Depression worse than the 1930s in the United States.