The leader of a Paris-based Iranian opposition group said after a ceasefire in the air war between Iran and Israel was declared that the Iranian people must now overthrow Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei's system, Reuters reported, BTA reported.
Mariam Rajavi, elected chairwoman of Iran's National Council of Resistance, spoke a day after the last heir to the Iranian monarchy called on Western countries to accept that "regime change" was needed to achieve lasting peace and regional stability.
Her comments came before Defense Minister Israel Katz said he had ordered the Israeli military to strike Tehran after Iran fired missiles in violation of truce.
"The ceasefire and cessation of war proposal is a step forward for the third option: neither war nor appeasement," Rajavi said in a statement after US President Donald Trump said there was now a ceasefire in the air war between Israel and Iran that began on June 13.
"Let the people of Iran themselves, in a fateful battle, overthrow Khamenei and the dictatorship."
She added: "We seek a democratic, non-nuclear republic, with the separation of religion and state, gender equality, and also autonomy for Iranian nationalities."
After the US bombed Iranian nuclear facilities on Saturday, Trump raised the possibility of overthrowing Iran's hardline clerical rulers, but his administration said the goal was solely to destroy Iran's nuclear program.
The authorities in Tehran have not yet commented on Rajavi's statement.