Tehran, Iran ? At Hussein Lari’s 68th birthday, his relatives gather in the living room, exchange their warm hellos, then turn quickly to a heated political debate: Is Iran the next target for U.S. military action?

U.S. officials — most recently Secretary of State Colin Powell on Sunday — insist there are no plans to attack Iran.

But with Washington repeatedly lobbing accusations at Iran over nuclear weapons and al-Qaida, the denials have done little to quiet the dread and speculation that dominates talk among Iranians.

Some, weary of Iran’s Islamic government, say they want American intervention.

“If the U.S. helps us get rid of the clerical regime, they are welcome,” argued Lari’s 22-year old nephew Hamid.

U.S. officials have been making accusations that Iran is trying to develop nuclear weapons and harboring al-Qaida terrorists — including leaders who may have planned suicide bombings that killed Americans in Saudi Arabia last month.

Iran denies harboring al-Qaida, saying it has arrested members of the terror network, and it insists its nuclear program is solely for peaceful purposes.

Across Iran, it is mainly the young who are most likely to see a U.S. strike as a way out from under the conservative Muslim clerics they see as anti-democratic and anti-modern.

Young Iranians are eager to see their society open up, and some have lost patience with President Mohammad Khatami, who since taking office in 1997 has promised reforms but lacked the power to stand up to hard-liners who hold sway over the government through unelected bodies.

“My relatives in Los Angeles hope 2003 is the last year clerics are in power in Iran,” Babak Rezazadeh, in his 20s, said in an interview in a Tehran park.

Powell said Sunday that “regime change is not on our list right now” for Iran. He said the United States is encouraging Iranians to bring change from within, and he pointed to the power struggle between Iranian reformers and hard-liners.

“There is a lot of churning taking place inside Iran,” Powell said on CNN’s “Late Edition,” noting “a very young population that realizes that its political and religious leaders are not pointing it in the right direction toward a better future.”

But some Iranians say U.S. intervention would only damage Khatami and other reformers — and that military action in particular would unite Iranians against a common enemy.

“Even those who oppose clerical rule will finally stand up to foreign invasion. If Iran is going to change, the change has to come through Iranians, not foreigners,” political analyst Saeed Leylaz said.