NPR’s Michel Martin talks to Vali Nasr, a professor of Middle East studies at Johns Hopkins University, about how President Trump’s threats against Iran are escalating regional tensions.
MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
President Trump says plans to execute protesters in Iran have stopped after warnings from his administration. He said that information came from, quote, “very important sources on the other side,” unquote. And that was after some U.S. military personnel left an air base in Qatar. The Qatari government said the evacuations of some personnel, quote, “are being undertaken in response to the current regional tensions,” unquote. To help make sense of this, we’ve called Vali Nasr once again. He’s a professor of Middle East studies at Johns Hopkins University. Professor Nasr, thanks for joining us.
VALI NASR: Good to be with you. Thank you.
MARTIN: What do you think these personnel leaving the Qatari base means?
NASR: The United States did this also in June, just ahead of bombing Iran’s nuclear sites. It’s a precautionary move because an attack in – on Iran could lead to a retaliation by Iran on American bases. And perhaps Iran has warned Qatar that if an attack comes from the U.S. on its soil, that it will hit that base in Qatar. So the U.S. is trying to get as many of its personnel and war material out of harm’s way.
MARTIN: And, you know, Iran closed its airspace and then reopened it today. What’s your take on that? What’s significant about that?
NASR: I think Iranians are on high alert. I think after having been surprised by Israel’s attack in June, they calculate that either Israel or the United States may hit at any moment. And what President Trump says is not any guarantee that he’s backed off of a military attack on this at this point. So I think they are expecting that the U.S. will flex its military muscles. And I think they are also trying to send a signal that this time they may respond in a much more serious way than last time, maybe as a way of deterring a U.S. attack.
MARTIN: So let’s go to sort of the issue that’s kind of animating all this. If President Trump is right, the Iranian government is no longer planning on executing protesters. How do you think the regime is going to address continued protests?
NASR: I think the regime is very, very nervous. These protests were extremely significant, and the U.S. intervention on the part of the protesters suggests to Iran that the United States is determined to see through regime change. And it’s no longer just between the protesters and the government but is also about a confrontation between U.S. and Iran. So I think the Iranian government is eager to finish these protests as soon as possible to deny the United States pretext to intervene in Iran and then, if the United States attacks, that there won’t be protesters on the street at that point in time, which might make life much more complicated for the Islamic Republic.
MARTIN: And before we let you go, the economy is the issue that animated these demonstrations in the first place. What – does Iran have any tools to credibly address that?
NASR: Not really. Iran is saddled with enormous amount of economic problems. Some stem from the maximum-pressure sanctions that has created enormous amount of scarcities in Iran’s economy. Some of it comes from mismanagement and corruption. And unless Iran can basically bring more revenue to the country by negotiating some kind of a sanctions relief with the West, it is caught in a very, very difficult economic situation from which it cannot extricate itself easily.
MARTIN: That is Vali Nasr. He’s a professor of Middle East studies at Johns Hopkins University. Professor Nasr, thanks so much for sharing these insights once again.
NASR: Thank you.
(SOUNDBITE OF FABIANO DO NASCIMENTO & SAM GENDEL’S “CORES”)
Copyright © 2026 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information.
Accuracy and availability of NPR transcripts may vary. Transcript text may be revised to correct errors or match updates to audio. Audio on npr.org may be edited after its original broadcast or publication. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.
