Amid the largest U.S. military buildup in the Middle East since the Iraq War in 2003, Iranian civilians staged extensive anti-regime protests at five universities in Tehran and one in Mashhad over the weekend. Meanwhile, the Trump administration is reportedly considering a two-tiered strike on Iran if the Ayatollah’s Islamist regime does not agree to abandon its nuclear program.

The resurgent protests were the first to spring up since the massive protest movement that swept through much of the country last month, which began over record-high inflation and low wages but eventually grew into outright demands for the end of the Ayatollah’s regime. The Islamist regime’s security forces brutally put down the movement by killing an estimated 7,000 protestors and imprisoning at least 53,000 others.

The renewed protests occurred in the shadow of a looming U.S. military strike, as two aircraft carrier groups and dozens of fighter jets, bombers, and other military aircraft have massed in the Middle East within striking distance of Iran. Reports surfaced Monday that U.S. negotiators will meet with their Iranian counterparts in Geneva on Thursday in a last-ditch effort to reach an agreement on the regime’s nuclear plan, which U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff warned could be “a week away” from having “industrial-grade bomb-making material.”

According to a report from The New York Times, President Trump has informed his advisors that if Iran fails to come to terms with the U.S. over their nuclear program, he is leaning toward ordering a precision strike in order to convince the regime to surrender their ability to make nuclear weapons. If that fails, the president has apparently told his advisors that he would “leave open the possibility of a military assault later this year intended to help topple Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.”

At the same time, the NYT also reported that there is a behind-the-scenes proposal “being considered by both sides that could create an off-ramp to military conflict: a very limited nuclear enrichment program that Iran could carry out solely for purposes of medical research and treatments.”

But experts like Michele Bachmann, a former congresswoman who is now the dean of the Robertson School of Government at Regent University, say that Iran cannot be trusted to give up their aspirations for a nuclear weapon.

“They won’t,” she told Family Research Council President Tony Perkins during “This Week on Capitol Hill” over the weekend. “They said overtly, they won’t. For 47 years, they’ve been committed to this outcome. This is the ultimate jihad, and so they have no plan to give this up, and they won’t. … They’ve lied for 47 years. They haven’t upheld anything that they’ve said they were going to do.”

As to who would fill the vacuum if the Ayatollah’s regime were to fall, Bachmann, who was formerly part of the House Intelligence Committee, contended that there is a significant segment of the Iranian population that still remembers the freedoms the country enjoyed before the Islamist regime took power in 1979.

“I think the good news is the Persian people are good people overall … educated people, smart people,” she observed. “For those who are a little bit older, they remember what Iran was like before … [a very] Western-oriented country. And so I think that there [are] enough people that have that memory. [But] the transition … will be very dicey. And whoever they choose for their leader, if they’re allowed to choose … my guess is there’ll be some external help from other sources through this transition. There’s a lot riding on this, and I think we want to ensure that there’s ultimately a positive outcome for Iran.”

Other experts like Lt. Col. (Ret.) Bob Maginnis, who serves as FRC’s senior fellow for National Security, think that the U.S. should be highly wary of using military force against Iran.

“The first principle is simple: we should not launch another Middle East war unless America’s vital national interests are clearly and demonstrably threatened,” he told The Washington Stand. “If Iran is genuinely on the verge of weaponization — not just enrichment, but weaponization — then the administration must present the irrefutable intelligence to the American people. Not selective leaks. Not anonymous briefings. Not worst-case modeling. Hard evidence.”

“We have lived through what happens when intelligence assessments harden into political certainty,” Maginnis continued. “The Iraq War was launched on claims of weapons of mass destruction that proved wrong. That conflict cost thousands of American lives and trillions of dollars. We cannot repeat that mistake.”

Regarding a limited enrichment program that could be on the table for Iran that would allow for 3-5% enrichment, Maginnis noted that it is far below the roughly 90% required for a nuclear weapon. “But the problem is not physics — it’s trust. For decades, Tehran has played cat and mouse with the International Atomic Energy Agency. It has concealed facilities, limited inspections, and pushed boundaries incrementally. The regime has demonstrated that it views negotiations as tactical pauses, not permanent concessions.”

“And the mullahs have learned lessons from Ukraine, Libya, and North Korea,” he explained. “States that abandon nuclear capabilities often become vulnerable. States that retain them deter intervention. That reality shapes Tehran’s strategic thinking. So I remain skeptical — both of claims that Iran is ‘a week away’ from weapons-grade uranium without clear public evidence, and of the idea that Tehran will voluntarily abandon its nuclear ambitions in good faith.”

Maginnis recommended that the administration should first maintain deterrence. “The military buildup in the Gulf is appropriate. It protects American forces and signals seriousness. Second, pursue diplomacy — but from strength. Any limited enrichment deal must include intrusive inspections, immediate consequences for violations, and automatic snapback penalties. No ambiguity. No gray zones. Third — and this is essential — if the president believes kinetic action is necessary, he must explain directly to the American people how Iran threatens our vital national interests. He must present verifiable intelligence that demonstrates immediacy and necessity. No mythological evidence. No rhetorical escalation.”

“If our survival, or that of our treaty allies, is truly at risk, Americans will support decisive action,” Maginnis concluded. “But absent clear proof of an imminent, weaponized threat, launching another war in the Middle East would be a grave mistake.”