In Trump war on Iran, tactical wins and long-term damage to US

Augusta National Golf Club chairman Fred Ridley says the home of the Masters won't create fictional scripted dramas anytime soon but would look "outside the box" to grow the sport.

And he wants distance limitation for elite-level golf balls, saying, "It's time to address this issue" to "protect the integrity of what makes golf so great."

Speaking Wednesday on the eve of the 90th Masters, Ridley noted a 2022 viral collaboration with YouTube's Dude Perfect but admitted the all-sports video left something to be desired.

The video, made weeks before the Masters, featured Dude Perfect using hockey sticks, baseball bats, tennis racquets, pool cues and frisbees through Amen Corner -- the famed 11th, 12th and 13th holes at August National.

"A few years ago we had Dude Perfect playing frisbee at Amen Corner. In retrospect, I like those guys, but that may not have been the best idea," Ridley said.

"But it does point out that we try things every once in a while that are a little bit non-traditional, so we'll continue to look at things.

"We're certainly willing to look outside the box every once in a while."

Ridley indicated Augusta National hadn't pondered fictional shows set around the famed grounds in the way the NFL has embraced certain projects.

"It's not something I think we've considered," he said. "There's no shortage of examples of things that we're looking at. I think the last few years have pointed out we'll try different things."

Ridley noted the tension between respecting tradition and innovation.

"I do think we need to be looking at non-traditional ways of promoting the tournament, but more so promoting golf," he said.

- 'Prodigious distances' -

It's the same fine line involved in limiting golf ball technology, something Ridley and governing bodies support to reduce distance at the elite level.

"Our position is grounded on much more than protecting the Augusta National golf course," Ridley said. "We will continue to make modifications as are necessary to react to driving distances that in some cases exceed 350 yards.

"The game has become much more one-dimensional. As players drive the ball prodigious distances and routinely hit short irons into par-fours and even some par-fives, this issue goes beyond competitive impacts."

Ridley said shot shaping, risk taking and executing under pressure is at the heart of elite greatness, not just distance.

"Regulation of the golf ball is not an attempt to turn back time or stifle progress," he said. "It's an effort to preserve the essence of what makes golf the great game that it is."

Ridley addressed comments by PGA Tour chief executive officer Brian Rolapp that, while majors like the Masters benefit from the tour, the tour has no ownership stake in the majors.

"There are a number of golf organizations, including ours, that make the journey to the PGA Tour possible," Ridley said.

"We really need to look at the entire eco-system to get a full perspective of that issue."

- No idea on gnomes -

Ridley said that after adding six national open champions to Masters qualifiers, the club would consider others.

"I do think there might be other national opens that should be considered," he said.

Asked about reports this might be the last year for the popular collectable "Masters gnome" at the club gift shop, Ridley said even he doesn't have the answer.

"I've been asking that question for several years, and they won't tell me the answer, so I can't help you," Ridley said.

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Launching war on February 28, US President Donald Trump warned that Iran would learn never to challenge the US military and called on the people to rise up against their unpopular cleric-led government.

By the time the adversaries agreed Tuesday to a two-week ceasefire, the Islamic republic appears more entrenched, Tehran's military has wreaked havoc on the region, and Trump declared victory because of the tentative reopening of the vital Strait of Hormuz -- which was only closed because Iran retaliated for being attacked.

Trump launched the war alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whose own goal has primarily been to sow destruction in the country of 90 million people whose government has been Israel's sworn adversary.

Trump's objectives were much less defined. He spoke of degrading Iran's missiles and preventing it from obtaining an atomic bomb, despite saying last year he already "obliterated" Iranian nuclear sites and ongoing diplomacy.

Trump backtracked on talk of "liberating" Iranians and by Tuesday was speaking in what many interpreted as genocidal terms, threatening before the ceasefire that the entire civilization, one of the world's oldest, "will die tonight, never to be brought back again."

"I think the US has lost the narrative war and the information war inside Iran, regionally in the Middle East and internationally, and also in America," said Alireza Nader, a longtime US-based analyst on Iran.

Nader said that even staunch critics of the Islamic republic began to praise the Revolutionary Guards, the country's premier military force, in outrage over US-Israeli strikes whose targets included universities, bridges and factories.

"It is in the US national security interest to have a long-term positive relationship with Iran and Trump really damaged that possibility for no reason whatsoever," Nader said.

"A lot of people who hate the regime are also outraged at the vast destruction of civilian infrastructure."

- 'Strategically indecisive' -

Negar Mortazavi, a senior fellow at the left-leaning Center for International Policy, said that the attacks fueled greater nationalism and unity among Iranians.

"For the US, they didn't achieve any of their set goals. Nothing changed about the nuclear program. Iran still has missiles to shoot. They still have drones and the state has become more hardline and there has been no regime change," she said.

Michael Singh, who was a top Middle East advisor to former president George W. Bush, said the United States "significantly degraded" Iran's military and short-term capacities -- destroying many of its missiles and drones, devastating its navy and air force and killing senior leaders.

"From a US perspective, I would say the US was operationally brilliant but the conflict was strategically indecisive," said Singh, now managing director at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

Paradoxically, the overwhelming show of force could persuade Iran to rush to build nuclear weapons, Singh said.

"Iran has seen that the US and Israel together have a vastly superior military capability and of course that could create a stronger incentive to pursue nuclear weapons," he said.

- Iran finds leverage -

Iran and the United States are set to begin talks in Pakistan on Saturday on a long-term deal.

A key issue will be the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow waterway into the Gulf through which one-fifth of the world's oil transits -- and where Iran has demonstrated it can exert key leverage.

Iran agreed to safe passage through the strait for the duration of the ceasefire but has also spoken of setting up a toll system, which would allow it to fund its reconstruction.

The United States during the war also for the first time in decades relaxed sanctions on Iranian oil, hoping to ease soaring prices that are politically sensitive for Americans.

If Iran secures assurances from the United States, it can "argue that escalation produced negotiations on terms it could accept," said Ali Vaez, Iran project manager at the International Crisis Group.

"The underlying balance has not fundamentally changed: Iran still retains its enriched uranium, while Washington appears, for now, more focused on preventing wider disruption -- especially in the Strait of Hormuz -- than on fully embracing Israel's preferred course," Vaez said.

"That points both to Trump's appetite for a deal and to the limitations of the strategy pursued so far."

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Argentine MPs on Wednesday were set to begin debating a bill promoted by President Javier Milei which authorizes mining in ecologically sensitive areas of glaciers and permafrost.

The amendment to the so-called Glacier Law, which was approved by the Senate in February, would make it easier to mine for metals such as copper, lithium and silver in permanently frozen parts of the Andes mountains.

Argentina is a major producer of lithium, which is critical to the global tech and green energy sectors.

If adopted by the Chamber of Deputies in a vote expected late Wednesday, it will become law once signed by Milei.

The amendment has outraged environmentalists, who say it will weaken protections for crucial water sources.  

Greenpeace activists scaled a monument in front of Congress at dawn on Wednesday and unfurled a banner urging lawmakers "not to betray the Argentine people." 

Seven people were arrested, AFP reported.

Diego Salas, communications director for Greenpeace Argentina, told AFP that the amendment was not only a "betrayal of Argentines" but "a betrayal of humanity because glaciers protect us, they give us life."

There are more than 16,000 glaciers in Argentina. 

In the northwest of the country, where mining activity is concentrated, glacial reserves have shrunk by 17 percent in the last decade, mainly due to climate change, according to the Argentine Institute of Snow Science, Glaciology and Environmental Sciences.

- Support from governors -

Milei argues the bill is necessary to attract large-scale mining projects.

According to a Central Bank projection, Argentina could triple its mining exports by 2030. 

"Environmentalists would rather see us starve than have anything touched," Milei said when announcing the amendment. 

Supporters of the amendment argue that it will clear up ambiguities in the current law.

"We want legal certainty, we want clear definitions," Michael Meding, director of the Los Azules copper mining project in San Juan, told AFP. 

The reform has the backing of governors from the Andean provinces, who would have greater latitude to green-light mining projects.

Enrique Viale, president of the Argentine Association of Environmental Lawyers, told AFP that the reform threatened the water supply of "70 percent of Argentinians." 

Under the current law, he said, "a scientific body determines the location of glaciers and periglacial environments."

Under the amendment, their location would be "a discretionary decision for each province."

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Brazilian police on Wednesday seized a record 48 tons of marijuana in a favela in Rio de Janeiro, uncovered by chance by a sniffer dog during a regular operation against criminal factions.

During the operation in the Complexo da Mare, a large complex of favelas in the north of the city, a dog named Hulk indicated there was something suspicious under an abandoned water tank.

An officer "discovered a bunker inside where this entire quantity of drugs had been hidden," said Lieutenant Colonel Luciano Pedro Barbosa, commander of the Canine Operations Battalion.

He told AFP the seizure was the largest in Brazil's history and "represents a financial loss of over 50 million reais (almost $10 million) for the criminal faction involved."

"All of this was thanks to the work of the dog. It wasn't based on intelligence."

A military police statement said it took dozens of officers five hours to remove the drugs, which were transported in four trucks.

During the removal, officers came under fire from criminals "triggering a shootout" and leading to the arrest of a suspected gunman.

The previous record for the largest drug seizure in Brazil was in 2021 when highway police seized 36.5 tons in the state of Mato Grosso do Sul.

The police operation, launched Tuesday, involved 250 military police officers, who also seized five rifles, four pistols, and 26 stolen vehicles, including cars and motorcycles.

Large swaths of Rio de Janeiro -- mainly low-income, densely populated communities -- are under the control of criminal factions who engage in drug trafficking and other crimes.

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Buildings in flames, charred cars, ambulance sirens wailing: in an instant, an Israeli strike turned one of Beirut's busiest arteries into a scene of devastation on Wednesday.

Around 2:00 pm local time, a series of Israeli strikes slammed into the Lebanese capital without warning, triggering scenes of panic.

"People started running left and right, and smoke was billowing," said Ali Younes, who was waiting for his wife near Corniche al-Mazraa, one of the areas targeted.

The Israeli strikes on Lebanon, the heaviest since the war began in early March, left "dozens dead and hundreds wounded", according to a preliminary toll from the health ministry.

An AFP journalist saw thick black smoke rise from a building completely blown apart, amid the stench of gunpowder, at the Corniche al-Mazraa site.

Firefighters were trying to extinguish the blazes in the still-smoldering rubble, while rescue workers laboured to pull victims from the debris and bulldozers tried to clear a path.

"We were at work, we had about eight customers and we heard four blasts one after another," Hassan al-Sayed, the owner of a hair salon across the street, told AFP.

"The front of my shop was shattered," he added, standing on a sidewalk covered in broken glass.

– Overwhelmed hospitals –

The health ministry called on residents to urgently clear the roads for ambulances.

"The traffic jams caused by the unprecedented wave of strikes, in both number and intensity, carried out by Israel are hampering rescue operations," it said.

The simultaneous strikes hit several districts of Beirut at rush hour, triggering scenes of panic, according to AFP journalists.

Pedestrians began to run as drivers honked their horns, trying to force a way through.

A woman burst into tears in the middle of the street.

One of the strikes targeted Basta, a working-class neighborhood in the heart of the capital.

"I saw the blast, it was very strong and there were children killed, some with their hands blown off," Yasser Abdallah, who works in an appliance store nearby, told AFP.

Strikes also hit Beirut's southern suburbs, a stronghold for the Iran-backed armed group Hezbollah, after a warning from the Israeli army, as well as several areas in southern and eastern Lebanon.

Outside the American University of Beirut Medical Center, one of the capital's main hospitals, an AFP journalist saw a stream of ambulances.

Relatives of the wounded gathered at the entrance to the emergency department, where a woman wept, leaning on a young man.

"My mother-in-law is dead, my brother-in-law's wife too, and their son," said a man who did not want to give his name, adding that they all lived in the same building.

"We're waiting to find out if my brother-in-law's children are alive," he said.

A medical source who did not wish to be identified told AFP that the hospital was overwhelmed.

The hospital announced on social media that it needed blood of all types. A doctor told AFP he had donated blood himself.

The Israeli army said on Wednesday it had carried out its "largest coordinated strike across Lebanon" since the start of the war on March 2, shortly after the announcement of a truce with Iran.

Israel says the Iranian-American truce announced overnight does not include Lebanon.

"This morning they announced that Lebanon isn't included in the ceasefire deal whatsoever," said 20-year-old Kinda Assad, as she stood watching the smoke rise from a Basta building some 200 metres (650 feet) away.

"They already strike wherever they want and then make the excuse it was a targeted strike" against Hezbollah, she added.

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Only three ships risked crossing the Strait of Hormuz Wednesday, highlighting the extreme caution about using the key waterway even though both the US and Iran have said the strategic chokepoint would reopen.

- Who is taking the risk? -

Apart from the three ships which transited the strait after a two-week ceasefire in the Middle East war was announced overnight, only a handful of other vessels are on course to do the same, according to ship tracking website MarineTraffic.

That does not imply a major change, with an average of eight commodities carriers transiting the strait daily since March 1, according to maritime data provider Kpler.

More than 800 ships are stuck in the Gulf, according to maritime intelligence company Lloyd's List Intelligence, and traffic in the strait has fallen by around 95 percent.

"Everybody on the shipping side is obviously nervous," Lloyd's List editor-in-chief Richard Meade told AFP.

For crews who have been stuck for weeks aboard ships, the agreement between the US and Iran is the first sign of hope. 

"The ceasefire definitely soothes our nerves, hoping it stays this way. The crew is finally taking a breather," an off-duty captain of a ship, whose crew is stranded off Qatar, told AFP.

- Is it safe? -

Leaving the Gulf now "would not be advisable" without coordination with the United States and Iran, Jakob Larsen, chief safety and security officer at shipping association Bimco, told AFP.

He was echoing the advice from other shipping industry voices who say the situation is still too uncertain for any major moves. 

"We still don't know if the area has really become safe to pass through," the Japanese Shipowners' Association told AFP on Wednesday. 

"There's been a lot of reference to Iran's 10-point plan, that needs to be clarified for shipping to be confident enough to go back through those waters", said John Stawpert, principal director marine at the International Chamber of Shipping (ICS). 

He was referring to a proposal presented by Iran as a basis for talks with the US, but which a US official said is not the same set of conditions that were agreed to by the White House. 

The UN's maritime body (IMO) said on Wednesday that it was working on a mechanism to guarantee "safe transit".

Aside from the risk of venturing into the strait at a time of high tension, a disorderly departure from the Gulf also risks causing collisions or grounding, Meade said.

- What about Tehran's 'toll booth'? -

It is still unclear whether Iran's recent system to allow some ships to cross the strait -- dubbed the "Tehran Toll Booth" by Lloyd's List because of reports that ships had to pay for permission to pass -- will remain in place.

The Iranian 10-point plan reportedly includes "maintaining Iranian control over the Strait of Hormuz."

US President Donald Trump said in a social media post that Iran has agreed to the "COMPLETE, IMMEDIATE, and SAFE OPENING of the Strait of Hormuz".

An Iranian diplomatic source told journalists a new mechanism had been organised with Oman "under which there has been and will be a right of passage".

On Wednesday, Oman welcomed the ceasefire without commenting on this issue. 

Tehran is expected to ask for one dollar per barrel of oil passing through the strait, to be paid in cryptocurrencies, according to the Financial Times.

The idea of a partnership with Oman to operate the Strait of Hormuz is a "not a fantasy", Amir Handjari of the US-based Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft argued in an op-ed on Tuesday.

"Oman gets a revenue stream and more strategic relevance. Iran gets legitimacy, cash, and something to show its people it achieved during the war," the blog post said.

- What precedents are there? - 

The effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz is unprecedented. It remained open even during the Iran-Iraq war from 1980 to 1988, though there were some tanker attacks that slowed traffic significantly.

More recently in 2024, attacks by pro-Iranian Houthi militias led to a halving of traffic passing through the Suez Canal and the Bab al-Mandeb Strait, the French economy ministry said. 

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(The Center Square) – The city of Port Washington approved a referendum Tuesday that would require future projects worth more than $10 million to be approved by taxpayers before being added to a tax increment district.

The initiative, in response to a large-scale AI data center in the city, passed with 2,710 votes of approval compared to 1,371 in opposition.

The initiative came in response to an $8 billion data center project that is expected to receive more than $450 million in property tax breaks along with not paying state sales tax on everything from construction to the servers inside to electricity at the site, which is estimated to require as much electricity as the city of Los Angeles once fully operational.

“Tonight, democracy worked the way it’s supposed to,” said Great Lakes Neighbors Incorporated member Christine Le Jeune in a statement. “Over 1,000 residents signed the petition that put this measure on the ballot, and tonight Port Washington voters spoke with one clear voice. The people deserve a seat at the table when their tax dollars are on the line.”

Data centers have shown to be unpopular with voters as 69% of Wisconsin voters in a recent Marquette poll said that they believe that the cost of data centers outweigh the benefits.

Republican candidate for governor and Congressman Tom Tiffany vowed to “end subsidies for data centers in Wisconsin” if he becomes governor.

Wisconsin comedian Charlie Berens has also been outspoken about the secrecy and impact of data centers, especially the Port Washington project and process. Berens testified in support of a bill to block non-disclosure agreements at data centers that did not pass the Legislature before session closed.

Le Jeune and two others from Great Lakes Neighbors United were removed from a public meeting on the Port Washington project in December by police when, after her allotted three minutes to speak in public comment, she shouted “shame” and “recall” as she headed to her seat.

Video from the meeting then showed a police officer approaching Le Jeune in the audience and asking her to leave.

Le Jeune would not leave and then a second officer approached and then began pulling on her arms to remove her from the meeting. Le Jeune and two others were then taken to the floor in the meeting room and handcuffed before being removed from the building.

(The Center Square) – A Republican super PAC announced a significant investment in Michigan’s open U.S. Senate race, underscoring the state’s status as a key battleground in the 2026 election cycle.

The Senate Leadership Fund said this week it is committing $45 million to back former U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers.

On Election Day 2026, Michigan voters will elect one member to the U.S. Senate on Election Day 2026. The primary is scheduled for Aug. 4, with a filing deadline of April 21.

The seat is currently held by U.S. Sen. Gary Peters, who announced in January 2025 he will not seek reelection. Peters, a Democrat, said at the time that after decades in public office, he was ready to step aside and “turn over the reins.”

The election for the open seat is expected to draw national attention. Michigan remains one of the most closely divided states politically, and is often seen as a bellwether for election outcomes nationally.

In 2024, the state’s U.S. Senate race was decided by less than half a percentage point, with U.S. Sen. Elissa Slotkin narrowly defeating Rogers.

On the Republican side, the party leadership and funding is rallying around Rogers, who is seeking a return to Washington after previously serving in the U.S. House.

Democrat candidates include former gubernatorial candidate Abdul El-Sayed, state Sen. Mallory McMorrow, and U.S. Rep. Haley Stevens.

In announcing the investment, the Senate Leadership Fund said its $45 million commitment is part of a broader $342 million nationwide strategy targeting eight competitive Senate races. The group said the funding will support advertising and voter outreach efforts, including television, radio, digital platforms, and direct voter contact.

The outcome of Michigan’s Senate race will play a role in determining which party controls the 120th Congress. Of the 100 seats in the U.S. Senate, 33 are up for regular election in 2026, along with two special elections. Democrats currently hold 13 of the seats on the ballot, while Republicans hold 22.

According to 270toWin, the most-recent polls show Stevens leading the Democrat primary. In a general election showdown between Rogers and Stevens, polling from January shows the Democrat candidate winning by 2.5%.

The Senate Leadership Fund expressed optimism about Rogers’ chances, pointing to his 2024 performance, when he came within roughly 19,000 votes of winning the seat, and arguing that Michigan represents a top pickup opportunity for Republicans.

“Senate Leadership Fund’s historic investment is a testament to the strength of Mike Rogers and our commitment to flipping Michigan red in November,” said SLF Executive Director Alex Latcham. “Mike is a trusted leader who will fight for Michigan’s working families and auto industry, and we are confident he will be the next United States Senator from Michigan.”

A ceasefire between the United States and Iran has left Israel's principal war objectives largely unmet, analysts say, with Israeli opposition figures quick to denounce a major "strategic failure".

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had set the elimination or at least severe degradation of Iran's nuclear programme as a central goal in the conflict, having described it for years as an "existential threat" to Israel.

He had also called for the dismantling of Iran's ballistic missile capabilities, and the weakening or potentially toppling of the Iranian regime.

"On all three, objectively, he's failed," Mairav Zonszein, a senior Israel analyst with the International Crisis Group, told AFP on Wednesday, just hours after Israel announced its support for the US-Iran truce.

"The uranium is still in Iran, the ballistic missiles, Iran can still fire even when it had US and Israeli airstrikes for over a month... and the regime is still very much intact," she added.

Yossi Mekelberg, a Middle East expert at London-based think-tank Chatham House, said that Iran's ballistic missile capabilities had undoubtedly been diminished compared to before the war, but its clerical leadership remained intact.

"Regime change hasn't happened," Mekelberg told AFP.

"Some of the people in the regime changed because they were killed... But regime change definitely didn't happen."

As for Iran's nuclear programme, Mekelberg cautioned it was too early to draw conclusions.

- 'Deeply troubling' -

For Danny Citrinowicz, a senior Iran researcher at Israel's Institute for National Security Studies, the initial picture was "deeply troubling".

"The regime is still firmly in power. Its missile capabilities are damaged but still intact. It still holds roughly 440 kg of uranium enriched to 60 percent," he wrote on X.

After agreeing to a two-week truce to halt the war which began with US-Israeli strikes on Iran on February 28, Iran and the US will enter talks in Pakistan on Friday.

While Tehran has agreed to temporarily reopen the Strait of Hormuz, its demands over future control of the vital waterway, uranium enrichment and sanctions, are at deep odds with the US. 

"At the very least, one has to hope that the negotiations in Islamabad will produce a different outcome on the nuclear issue," Citrinowicz said.

"Otherwise, we risk emerging from this war worse off than when it began." 

Appearing to contradict the terms set out by mediator Pakistan, Israel has insisted the ceasefire does not include Lebanon, where its forces are fighting Iran-backed Hezbollah for the second time in less than two years.

"That's already a point of conflict," in the fragile truce, Zonszein explained.

"We'll have to see how much (US President Donald) Trump is going to step in," she said, adding that Israel would want to continue fighting in Lebanon and separate that front from the war in Iran.

"I think Israel is adamant that the Lebanon issue is not done," Mekelberg of Chatham House agreed.

Israel on Wednesday launched its "largest coordinated" strikes against Hezbollah since the start of the war.

- 'Victory narrative' -

Analysts suggested it was too early to tell the impact of the war on Israel's relationship with Gulf countries, and Netanyahu's desire to expand the Abraham Accords.

Both Zonszein and Mekelberg said the war had exposed the Gulf countries' vulnerabilities as well as Iran's willingness to attack regional neighbours, forcing them to reassess their security frameworks.

A raft of Israeli opposition politicians have criticised the ceasefire with Iran, slamming it as a major failure that would take years to recover from.

"There has never been a political disaster like this in our entire history," the country's main opposition leader Yair Lapid wrote on X.

But Zonszein said that Netanyahu would try to spin the war as a victory, particularly playing on the close cooperation between US and Israeli forces fighting their longtime arch-foe.

"The minute that the war began as a joint US-Israeli operation, that was already the victory that Netanyahu needed and wanted and whatever happened was secondary," she said.

"I think Netanyahu will use that still as his victory narrative that 'we degraded the Iranian regime. They are weaker now. It's not the same Iran.'"

With Israeli parliamentary elections due by the end of October, Netanyahu's fate will soon be decided at the ballot box. 

Israelis would feel "immediate relief" following the ceasefire, but "there will be real discussion if this was all worth it," Mekelberg said.

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President Donald Trump promised "regime change" in Iran but the Islamic republic has emerged intact from the US-Israeli war, leaving opponents and activists disappointed and frightened.

With Iranian officials hailing the last-minute ceasefire as a triumph for the system that took power in the 1979 Islamic revolution, rights groups now fear emboldened authorities will launch a mass new domestic crackdown.

"This feels like unfinished business. I think eventually it's going to be war again," said a Tehran resident, 40, a broker on the Iranian stock exchange, asking not to be named for fear of reprisals.

"Ending in a situation where the Islamic republic feels victorious isn't really a good thing," he told AFP in Paris from Tehran.

"They have more self esteem. They kill more people. They keep the internet shut down. Everything is going to be way worse."

Simin, 48, a teacher in Tehran, expressed relief over the ceasefire after being "terrified to our core" over the last five weeks.

But she said: "At the same time, the continuation of the Islamic republic is just as frightening."

"I am happy for a few seconds thinking about relief from bombs but I am afraid of news of executions that is no easier than the bombs to deal with."

Armin, 34, said that if the war ended and the Islamic republic remained "there is no benefit for the people".

"The Islamic republic will make the people pay for all the losses they sustained during the war," he said.

Supreme leader Ali Khamenei was killed on the first day of the war along with an echelon of top officials. 

But key figures have survived, Khamenei was replaced by his son, while Iran's war machine kept fighting.

Even during the conflict, the Islamic republic kept up executions which rights activists see as a tool of repression aimed at instilling fear in society.

- 'Witch hunt' -

Since the war began on February 28, Iran has hanged seven people in connection with January protests, six convicted of membership of banned opposition group the People's Mujahedin of Iran (MEK) and a dual Iranian-Swedish citizen on charges of spying for Israel.

Two of those hanged in connection with the protests were teenagers aged 18 and 19. Hundreds of people have also been arrested, with many subjected to what rights groups term forced confessions on TV.

Severe wartime internet restrictions have now lasted 40 days according to monitor Netblocks which says Iranians have suffered a "near-total disconnection from the outside world".

"The regime has shown us that repression is the only weapon it has against its people," Raphael Chenuil-Hazan, executive director of Paris-based NGO Together Against the Death Penalty (ECPM), told AFP.

"The death penalty is their instrument of fear... We deeply fear a witch hunt," he said, warning that posting a photo on social media "can turn an ordinary citizen into a 'spy' who is liable for the death penalty".

During mass anti-government protests in January, Trump had promised to send help and had demanded action on human rights and in particular an end to executions.

But the ceasefire deal does not address any prospects for changing the theocratic system set up after the Islamic revolution.

"People in Iran have increasingly realised that this was never a war about them or their rights," said Mahmood-Amiry Moghaddam, director of Norway-based NGO Iran Human Rights (IHR).

"The escalation of repression and executions will continue regardless of war, because the authorities see their own people as the main threat," he told AFP.

- 'Going to be worse' -

Exiled political groups have also expressed disappointment.

Reza Pahlavi, the son of the ousted shah, has yet to comment but his aide Saeed Ghasseminejad, who had been leading a process to find members of a transitional body, wrote on X that the "ceasefire is unnecessary and harmful to US national interests".

Maryam Rajavi, leader of the MEK, said in a statement she welcomed the ceasefire but warned a "lasting peace... can only be achieved through the overthrow of the terrorist and warmongering dictatorship".

Thomas Juneau, professor at the University of Ottawa, said while authorities were claiming victory the country was weaker economically "and it is a matter of when, not if, popular protests resume".

Protests initially sparked by economic grievances peaked on January 8-9 when people poured into the streets nationwide to denounce the Islamic republic but were met by a crackdown that according to rights groups left thousands of people dead.

"The regime will repress them as brutally as ever," Juneau said, adding that "the domestic crackdown will be brutal" and authorities will also seek to target dissidents abroad.

The Tehran resident who works on the stock exchange said: "They (the United States and Israel) hit nuclear and missile sites and bought some time for themselves. But in reality nothing changed for the people in Iran."

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