The Daily Populous Tuesday April 7th, 2026 evening edition
Authored by independent.co.uk and submitted by leondanielstar9999

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President Donald Trump on Tuesday warned that Iran’s millennia-old “civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again” unless Tehran capitulates to his demand to agree to a ceasefire deal and open the Strait of Hormuz by 8 p.m. ET.

“A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don’t want that to happen, but it probably will. However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS?,” Trump wrote on Truth Social Tuesday morning.

The U.S. president has set a Tuesday night deadline for the deal. The president’s latest threat represents a major escalation in his rhetoric against Tehran, which has for weeks included explicit threats to commit war crimes by attacking Iranian civilian infrastructure, including power plants and desalination plants that provide the country’s population of 90 million with fresh water.

open image in gallery The U.S. president has set a Tuesday night deadline for the deal ( AFP/Getty )

“We will find out tonight, one of the most important moments in the long and complex history of the World. 47 years of extortion, corruption, and death, will finally end. God Bless the Great People of Iran,” Trump added.

Striking such infrastructure targets as he has promised to do this evening would almost certainly violate the Geneva Convention’s prohibitions against targeting civilian infrastructure necessary for a population’s survival.

The United States has ratified that 1949 treaty — giving it the same legal force as the U.S. Constitution — and has signed, but not ratified, a 1977 “additional protocol” that prohibits intentional attacks on “the civilian population and civilian objects.” That “additional protocol” has been binding on all U.N. member states since 1993, regardless of whether it has been ratified or merely signed.

Additionally, American criminal law prohibits the commission of war crimes, which it defines as “a grave breach in any of the international conventions signed at Geneva 12 August 1949, or any protocol to such convention to which the United States is a party.” The U.S. criminal code states that any person who commits war crimes can be imprisoned for life or put to death if a war crime results in the death of any victims.

But Trump’s assertion that Iranian “civilization will die” could cross a rhetorical line from threats to commit war crimes by attacking infrastructure to threats to commit what the United Nations defines as genocide against Iran’s population.

open image in gallery Trump has continued to strike Iran during the five-week war — and is threatening more bombings ( AFP/Getty )

According to the U.N. Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, this is defined as any act committed with the intent of “deliberately inflicting” on a “national, ethical, racial or religious group” conditions that are “calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part.”

The convention also states that such acts must be committed with a “proven intent... to physically destroy a national, ethnical, racial or religious group” that is “deliberately targeted.”

On Monday, Trump told reporters he was “not at all” concerned about committing possible war crimes in Iran, after he threatened to strike civilian infrastructure if the regime does not meet his imminent deadline to agree to a deal and reopen the Strait of Hormuz.

“I’m not worried about it,” Trump said during a Monday press conference about the potential of war crimes. “You know the war crime? The war crime is allowing Iran to have a nuclear weapon,” he added.

open image in gallery The damaged interiors of the historic Golestan Palace in Tehran ( AFP/Getty )

Asked again about the issue, he described Iran’s leaders as “animals” who had killed tens of thousands of protesters.

Trump also said that if it were his choice, he would seize Iran’s oil while simultaneously complaining that “unfortunately, the American people would like to see us come home.”

“I’d keep the oil, and I would make plenty of money,” he said.

With less than 12 hours to go until the president’s self-imposed deadline on Tuesday, the U.S. began targeting parts of Iran’s Kharg Island oil export hub, while Israeli military officials warned Iranians to avoid traveling on their country’s rail transportation network.

In response, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said in a statement that Tehran’s response would go “beyond the region” if the U.S. crosses any of its red lines and warned that the US and partners would see oil and gas supplies disrupted “for years” to come.

scheeeeming on April 7th, 2026 at 13:07 UTC »

For a post that starts with such a massive threat, he's basically begging for them to do him a favor and give in. It reads as very desperate and childlike.

> A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again

Scary attention grabbing threat !!

> However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change

This is the out he wants to take so bad. He wants that mission accomplished banner, he just can't because of the Strait. He's saying "please let me use this as an out"

> where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS?

Complimenting them and saying "if you're smart you'll do as I say". Again, childish. Its how my siblings and I would talk when trying to get something from the other. "You're smart, you'll give me it. But also if you don't then big bad thing will happen"

di11deux on April 7th, 2026 at 12:58 UTC »

The guy is posting like he’s an unemployed fentanyl addict that just got word that he’s been ordered by the county to pay back child support payments.

He does this because bluffing is a huge part of his schtick. He wants you to think he’s unpredictable. But he’s so strategically vapid that he doesn’t understand you can’t bluff against someone that physically can’t walk away from the table.

I will never forgive those of you who voted for this man. If you admit you got conned, fine - but anyone still sticking by this guy is doing do out of personal spite, not principle.

rural220558 on April 7th, 2026 at 12:51 UTC »

His statements are so contradictory, without clear goals that it is impossible to take them at face value. But this is obviously alarming… what does ‘a civilisation dying’ refer to? Because that sounds very different to ‘regime change’