{"id":35865,"date":"2026-01-13T18:04:14","date_gmt":"2026-01-13T18:04:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=35865"},"modified":"2026-01-13T18:04:14","modified_gmt":"2026-01-13T18:04:14","slug":"qatar-warns-any-us-iran-escalation-would-be-catastrophic-for-region","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=35865","title":{"rendered":"Qatar warns any US-Iran escalation would be &#8216;catastrophic&#8217; for region"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>A military escalation between the United States and Iran would have grave consequences for the region, Qatar said Tuesday after Washington threatened strikes in response to a government crackdown on protests in the Islamic republic.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We know that any escalation&#8230; would have catastrophic results in the region and beyond, and therefore we want to avoid that as much as possible,&#8221; Qatar&#8217;s foreign ministry spokesman Majed al-Ansari said at a press conference in Doha.<\/p>\n<p>In June, Iran targeted the United States&#8217; Al Udeid military base in Qatar in response to earlier American strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities.<\/p>\n<p>Doha was able to leverage the unprecedented attack on its soil to help deliver a speedy truce between Washington and Tehran.<\/p>\n<p>Mass protests in Iran since Thursday have posed one of the biggest challenges to the clerical leadership since the 1979 Islamic revolution ousted the shah.<\/p>\n<p>Read More: Trump tells Iranians to keep protesting, says \u2018help is on its way\u2019<\/p>\n<p>The White House repeated on Monday that US President Donald Trump is considering air strikes on Iran to stop a crackdown on protesters.<\/p>\n<p>Rights groups have reported a growing death toll in the Islamic republic, with information continuing to trickle out of Iran despite a days-long internet shutdown.<\/p>\n<p>In response to Trump&#8217;s repeated threats to intervene, Iran&#8217;s parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf said Iran would hit back, calling the US military and shipping &#8220;legitimate targets&#8221; in comments broadcast by state TV.<\/p>\n<p>The Norway-based NGO Iran Human Rights (IHR) said it had confirmed 648 people were killed during the protests, including nine minors, but warned the death toll was likely much higher &#8212; &#8220;according to some estimates more than 6,000&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Washington has also said a channel for diplomacy remains open, with Iran taking a &#8220;far different tone&#8221; in private discussions with Trump&#8217;s special envoy Steve Witkoff.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We are still at a state right now where we believe that the diplomatic resolution can come out of this,&#8221; Ansari said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We are involved in talking to all parties, obviously with our neighbours and our partners in the region to find a diplomatic solution,&#8221; he added.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A military escalation between the United States and Iran would have grave consequences for the region, Qatar said Tuesday after Washington threatened strikes in response to a government crackdown on protests in the Islamic republic. &#8220;We know that any escalation&#8230; would have catastrophic results in the region and beyond, and therefore we want to avoid [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-35865","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35865","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=35865"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35865\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=35865"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=35865"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=35865"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}