Toronto's Iranian diaspora 'hoping and praying' for families back home as Trump delays threats

iranian language language Canadians oppose to Trump's threats as his persia deadline looms

Iranian Canadian Simon Memi, who has family back home, says U.S. President Donald Trump's recent threats against Iran are "not right."

He says many in the Iranian diaspora who initially looked to Trump to help oust the regime, are now concerned the war on Iran will ultimately cost civilians.

“I'm really disappointed,” Memi said. “This is not war. War is man to man.” 

“On one hand they say they're going there to help Iranian people with freedom,” he said. “Then [on] the other hand, they're … bombarding their hospitals, all [these] roads, universities … That’s not what Iranian people [were] expecting.”

People in Iran are “scared for their lives,” Memi added.

On Tuesday morning, Trump gave Iran an ultimatum to open the Strait of Hormuz by 8 p.m. ET or else he would destroy every bridge and power plant in Iran within four hours. Iran said it would retaliate against the infrastructure of U.S. Allies in the Gulf, whose desert cities would be uninhabitable without power or water.

Trump, on social media Tuesday, once ​again warned ​Iran to make ​a ⁠deal, saying a "whole ⁠civilization will die ‌tonight" if an agreement ​is ⁠not reached ⁠to ⁠end the blockade on Gulf oil. 

On Tuesday evening, roughly 90 minutes before the 8 p.m. Deadline, Trump said in a social media post he's agreed to back off his threatened attacks on Iranian infrastructure for two weeks if Iran reopens the Strait of Hormuz.

Memi says threats aren't the right way to pressure the Iranian regime. Instead, he says the U.S. And Israel should be at the negotiating table.

Prime Minister Mark Carney, at a domestic policy announcement in Brampton, Ont., said that Canada "expects all parties in this conflict, in any conflict, to respect international laws, the rules of engagement, and that means not targeting, certainly, civilians or civilian infrastructure."

But while many worry about what might come next, others are hopeful this will be the final blow to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and the Iranian regime.

Sam Fayaz says it’s a matter of choice: suffering through a war for the next few months or living with the regime for another 47 years.

“Who knows how it's going to play out.”

Toronto's Iranian community hoping for peaceful resolution in Middle East conflict

“Iranians in the diaspora, at least, we don't want innocent civilians to be killed,” he said. “We're hoping and praying for an end to this.”

Still, Fayaz thinks it’s important to stop the Iranian regime by any means necessary.

“People are tired of extreme radicals running a country with so many brilliant minds, with so much talent, so much potential,” he said. “War comes with a cost, unfortunately."

“In the next 24 hours, the fate of the Islamic regime will be determined, hopefully for the best," he said after Trump's threat. "Hopefully they'll pack their bags and get out and free Iran.”

Iranian Canadian Majid Rabani’s brother and sister still live back home. He says he believes Trump is doing the “right things.”

“It's a false promise and it's wishful thinking to think that anyone could go into a country and just specifically target certain infrastructure without any harm coming to civilians,” she said. 

“[Iranians] have lost their jobs already, their pensions are being threatened and the internet has been out for over a month now. And that means so many little businesses and the economy that depends on that is also suffering.”

Journalist

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