Iran's security chief Ali Larijani on Thursday launched into a withering critique of Donald Trump, likening the US President to Hitler and tarring him as a "mere businessman" whose Gaza peace summit Tehran gladly missed.
The scorching comments in a speech delivered by Larijani, a key aide to Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, have few parallels among top officials in recent months even amid a US-Israeli war in June.
Coming after Khamenei addressed Trump directly in a speech on Monday to "keep dreaming" about the president's "nonsense" on destroying Iran's nuclear program, the remarks signal a hardened line among Iran's top decision-makers on their top foe.
"Trump’s statement that he wants to create peace through strength is a strange one — because Hitler said the same thing," Larijani said in a speech at an event in Tehran commemorating an Iranian commander killed in the civil war in Syria in 2015.
Larijani was appointed Secretary of Iran's National Security Council following the summer conflict and is Khamenei's personal representative to the key body.
He dismissed a summit held in the Egyptian resort town of Sharm al-Sheikh on Oct. 12 to formally clinch a US-brokered ceasefire in Gaza as a “Trump show” to which the president arrived late, "spoke only by himself, did not allow anyone to speak and even mocked the heads of the countries present."
Trump had invited Iran to participate in the event and had raised eyebrows in an address to the Israeli Knesset earlier in the day in which he said Washington hoped Tehran could be folded into a broader Mideast peace.
Iranian officials bristled at the attacks by their two top foes, calling them illegal, asserting that its nuclear activities are peaceful and lamenting that the military campaign was launched while Washington and Tehran were in the midst of talks.
The summit “was low-level and had no place for revolutionary Iran," Larijani said.
It was attended by several heads of state from Western and Islamic countries but not those of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates or Israel. A video of Trump shaking a senior Emirati official's hand at the summit and intoning with a smile, "A lot of cash!" circulated widely online.
Trump's relationship with Arab states also came into Larijani's crosshairs, a veteran navigator of the highest echelons of Iran's opaque security and political establishment, who said the property developer turned president exploited his wealthy Mideast allies.
"Trump ... sees the Arabs as money and is merely a businessman," Larijani said.
Iran's top officials have for months held off on direct criticism of Trump or commentary on the US relationship with Arab neighbors as it has pursued a rapprochement with the latter and appeared to weigh dialogue with the West.
An impasse over Iran's nuclear activities has persisted despite the war in June and disagreements have festered since European countries triggered the restoration of UN sanctions last month.
Western states seek the resumption of US-Iran talks and inspections by the UN nuclear watchdog while Tehran has ruled out what they call US demands to rein in its missile program and support for armed Mideast allies.
Hengaw said Javad Naeimi, a resident of Qom and a specialist working at the Natanz site, was hanged at dawn on October 18 in Qom Central Prison “under conditions of total secrecy.”
Iranian state media had earlier reported the execution of an unnamed man for espionage for Israel but did not identify him.
The rights group said Naeimi had been arrested by security forces in February 2024 and sentenced to death after what it described as an opaque judicial process.
It said he was subjected to torture and coerced confessions during interrogation, citing a pattern of forced admissions in Iranian espionage cases.
Iran’s judiciary has not commented publicly on the latest claims.
Earlier reports by the judiciary-linked Mizan news agency said the executed man had “admitted to communicating with Israeli intelligence for personal and professional reasons.”
Hengaw said Naeimi’s burial took place under heavy security at Qom’s Behesht-e Masoumeh cemetery on October 21, and that his family had been warned not to speak publicly about the case.
The execution comes amid an intensified crackdown on alleged Israeli-linked espionage cases following Israel’s June strikes on Iranian nuclear sites.
In August, Tehran executed another scientist, Rouzbeh Vadi, for allegedly passing classified information to Mossad, while in September and October several other men were hanged on similar charges.
Last month, the UN special rapporteur on human rights in Iran said the country had executed 11 individuals on espionage charges this year, with at least nine carried out after Israel's military strike on Iran on June 13. Saturday's execution brings the total to at least 12.
Rights groups, including Amnesty International and Iran Human Rights, have condemned the surge in executions, saying trials for alleged espionage often fail to meet international standards of due process.
Tehran maintains that it is acting within its laws to counter what it calls “organized intelligence infiltration” targeting its nuclear and defense programs.
