Iran has increased executions and arrests across the country as the United States continues strikes in the Middle East.
Mooné Rahimi, a student and activist previously arrested by the morality police, said the regime is using fear tactics to hold the nation "hostage."
Rahimi said on "Fox & Friends Weekend" that Iranian civilians view the ongoing war as a desperate "rescue mission" from a regime that uses arrests and executions to maintain its grip on power."
This situation that is happening in Iran, they call it [a] rescue mission, especially the people inside Iran," said Rahimi, who left Iran several years ago and is now studying in the United States.
"This barbaric, brutal regime treats women in a very intense way. If there is a protester, a woman protester, in the street of Iran, they're going to arrest them, and they're going to put them in a jail and, at the end, they're going to hang them as they're doing it like those executions that are happening," she added.
This is an excerpt of an article by Fox News Digital's Madison Colombo
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told Fox News on Sunday that other world leaders should join the U.S. and Israel against Iran, arguing the regime is “putting everyone in their sights” and “trying to blackmail the entire world.”
Netanyahu spoke to Fox News chief foreign correspondent Trey Yingst after an Iranian ballistic missile slammed into a residential area in the southern city of Arad overnight, injuring more than 100 people.
“Israel and the United States are working together for the entire world, and it's time to see the leaders of the rest of the countries join up,” Netanyahu said. “I'm happy to say that I can see some of them beginning to move in that direction, but more is needed.”
The prime minister warned that the regime in the last 48 hours showed “proof that Iran endangers the entire world” with strikes against Israeli civilian areas and firing ballistic missiles toward Diego Garcia, a key U.S.-U.K. military base in the Indian Ocean.
“I've been warning all the time. They have now the capacity to reach deep into Europe. They already have fired on the European country, Cyprus,” Netanyahu said. “They are putting everyone in their sights.”
The prime minister also cited the regime’s stranglehold on the Strait of Hormuz, a critical waterway for oil exporting.
“They're stopping a maritime, international route energy route and trying to blackmail the entire world,” Netanyahu said of the Iranian regime. “What more proof do you need that this regime that threatens the entire world has to be stopped?”
Iran said Sunday that any strike targeting its energy infrastructure would result in retaliatory attacks against U.S. and Israeli energy and infrastructure assets in the region.
“If Iran’s fuel and energy infrastructure is attacked by the enemy, all energy and information technology infrastructure and desalination plants belonging to the United States and the Israeli entity in the region will be targeted,” Iran said in a statement carried by state media and semi-official outlets, citing an Iranian military spokesperson.
President Donald Trump issued a 48-hour ultimatum to Iran in a post on Truth Social on Saturday, warning the U.S. would strike its power plants if the Strait of Hormuz is not reopened.
"If Iran doesn’t FULLY OPEN, WITHOUT THREAT, the Strait of Hormuz, within 48 HOURS from this exact point in time, the United States of America will hit and obliterate their various POWER PLANTS, STARTING WITH THE BIGGEST ONE FIRST!" Trump said.
The Strait of Hormuz is a global chokepoint for oil and gas transport that supplies roughly one-fifth of the world’s crude oil. Traffic through the strait has been largely limited since early March, shortly after the war with Iran began.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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