Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has dismissed reports of widespread casualties from the latest wave of anti-government protests across Iran, claiming that foreign-backed “terrorist elements” were responsible for the deaths that occurred. He alleged the violence was part of what he called an “Israeli plot” aimed at provoking mass bloodshed and U.S. intervention.

Appearing Wednesday evening on Fox News’ Special Report with Bret Baier, Araghchi rejected human rights groups’ estimates that put the death toll between 2,500 and 12,000. He insisted the actual number of victims was “in the hundreds,” accusing outside actors of infiltrating the demonstrations.

"When terrorist elements led from outside, entered this, you know, protests and started to shoot, you know, police forces, police officers and security forces,”Araghchi said. “And there were terrorist cells. They came in, they used Daesh-style terrorist operations. They got police officers, burned them alive, they beheaded them, and they started shooting at police officers and also to the people. So as a result, for three days, we had, in fact, fighting against terrorists, and not with the protesters. It was completely a different story."

According to Araghchi, the perpetrators deliberately targeted civilians to provoke U.S. involvement. “They wanted to increase the number of deaths. Why? Because President Trump has said that if there are killings, he would intervene. And they wanted to drag him into this conflict," he claimed. "And that was exactly an Israeli plot. They started to increase the number of deaths by killing ordinary people, by killing police officers, by starting a kind of, you know, fighting inside the different cities."

Araghchi also denied reports that the government plans to execute detained protesters, saying, there is now “a calm.” He downplayed the scale of the ongoing unrest, insisting that the situation is stable and under control, and warning that a “high level of tension…could be disastrous for everybody."