The Cuban activist and journalist Iliana Hernández warned that international sanctions do not pose any real threat to the Cuban regime.
In their opinion, the only thing that could intimidate the government would be the certainty of a direct military intervention by the Trump administration.
Hernández stated in an interview with CiberCuba, in which he was direct: "The Cuban communist dictatorship is a mafia, it is a criminal enterprise. You can impose as many sanctions as you want."
His statements come days after the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) imposed sanctions on the Ministry of Tourism and nine other entities of the regime, coinciding with the fifth anniversary of the protests on July 11th.
For Hernández, those measures do not change anything at the top of the power structure. "They don't care about the sanctions. They don't care if people are killed, if the population suffers, or if people live in darkness. They are going to survive," he stated.
The activist argued that the regime has its own resources - she cited a figure of 18 billion dollars - and that no sanction package, no matter how extensive, threatens its survival.
In light of this scenario, Hernández was emphatic about what would indeed instill fear in Havana: "What would truly pose a problem for them is the certainty that Trump, or the administration, Southern Command, or anyone else, would enter Cuba in the same way they did back in '59, with violence."
The activist stated that the regime came to power through force and maintains itself through force, and that this logic will not change due to diplomatic or economic pressure.
"Those people entered Cuba with violence, and they remain in power through violence. They will not leave in any other way. They will leave in a hail of bullets," he stated.
As support for his argument, he quoted Díaz-Canel's own words, who in June shut the door on any political opening, dismissing changes in the system.
"All peaceful means for those people to change have already been exhausted. They will not change unless it is in that way," Hernández concluded.
The activist also conveyed the feelings of Cubans living on the Island who send her messages asking when the intervention will arrive.
"When are these people going to come, when is Papi Trump going to come, when is Pelusa going to come... These are the messages I receive from Guantánamo to Pinar del Río," he recounted.
Hernández, who participated in the historic hunger strike of the San Isidro Movement in November 2020, faced detentions, house arrest, and acts of repudiation due to his political activism.
The government maintained the "regulated" status that prevented him from leaving Cuba until 2022, when he headed to Spain.
Since January 2025, the Trump administration has imposed more than 240 sanctions against Cuba, including the reinstatement on the list of state sponsors of terrorism and the Executive Order 14404 signed on May 1, 2026, which expanded restrictions on foreign financial institutions operating with blocked Cuban entities.
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