The Times of Israel:

US President Donald Trump said on Wednesday that Iranian opposition figure Reza Pahlavi “seems very nice,” but expressed uncertainty over whether he would be able to muster support within Iran to eventually take over amid anti-regime protests in the country.

In an exclusive Reuters interview in the Oval Office, Trump said there was a chance Iran’s clerical government could collapse, but tried to temper expectations about the timeline in which that might happen and the viability of leadership from the country’s exiled crown prince, the son of the late shah of Iran who was ousted from power in 1979.

The US president has repeatedly threatened to intervene in support of protesters in Iran, where thousands of people have been reported killed in a crackdown on the unrest against clerical rule. But he has conveyed mixed messages about the likelihood that he will order military action to support the protesters or to topple the regime.

“He seems very nice, but I don’t know how he’d play within his own country,” Trump said of Pahlavi. “And we really aren’t up to that point yet.”

“I don’t know whether or not his country would accept his leadership, and certainly if they would, that would be fine with me,” he added.

Trump’s comments went further in questioning Pahlavi’s ability to lead Iran after saying last week that he had no plans to meet with him and that it would not be “appropriate at this point.”

The US-based Pahlavi, 65, has lived outside Iran since before his father was toppled in the 1979 Islamic Revolution, and has become a prominent voice in the protests. Iran’s opposition is fragmented among rival groups and ideological factions, including the monarchists who back Pahlavi, and appears to have little organized presence inside the Islamic Republic.

Trump said it is possible the government in Tehran could fall due to the protests, but that in truth “any regime can fail.”

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