Iranians Welcome President With Protest TEHRAN - Dozens of protesters hurled eggs and at least one shoe at President Hassan Rouhani as he returned to Tehran on Saturday after a groundbreaking phone call with President Obama and other outreach to the West at an annual gathering of world leaders at the United Nations. The protest - coming even as supporters gathered at the airport to cheer his diplomatic outreach - quickly laid bare the political fissures in Iran over whether to engage with the United States, and the challenges Mr. Rouhani and his aides face as they try to have international sanctions over the country's nuclear program lifted. Mr. Rouhani was standing in his car, waving through the sunroof as he passed supporters when opponents began to pelt the vehicle. Security guards scrambled to shield the president with an umbrella as other protesters blocked the road by praying on the pavement. "Long live Rouhani, man of change!" the president's backers shouted, as a small police contingent struggled to control the crowd of about 200 that seemed mostly to be Rouhani supporters. The hard-liners responded by shouting, "Our people are awake and hate America!" Security guards eventually pulled Mr. Rouhani back inside his car as it sped off, leaving supporters and opponents behind, some pushing and shoving one another. One protester was almost run over after he threw himself in front of Mr. Rouhani's car. Iranians hoping for changes to end their country's isolation have expressed excitement over the sudden turn of events last week, as Mr. Rouhani and his aides became the talk of the General Assembly. The president's more open stance is widely believed to have the support of the country's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei - at least for now - but it remains unclear if powerful hard-line factions are ready for better relations with the United States after decades of animosity. Analysts expressed surprise that the protest at the airport was allowed, given tight controls over public gatherings, and it raised the possibility that some in the country's opaque political hierarchy were sending a message of displeasure over last week's sudden turn of events. "This shows that those factions that do not want diplomatic flexibility and normalized relations with the world have started to organize themselves," said Farshad Ghorbanpour, a political analyst close to the government. The demonstrators said their protest was spontaneous, but such gatherings are often orchestrated in Iran and the number of police and plainclothes security guards sent to control the crowd on Saturday was unusually small. The phone call with Mr. Obama came just days after Mr. Rouhani skipped a luncheon at the United Nations where the two leaders had been expected to shake hands. But a meeting on Thursday between Secretary of State John Kerry and his Iranian counterpart, Mohammad Javad Zarif, was described as constructive and led Iranian officials to contact the White House on Friday to suggest the phone call, American officials said. Mr. Rouhani received the phone call from Mr. Obama as he was on his way to Kennedy Airport on Friday; it was the first contact between American and Iranian presidents since before the hostage crisis more than 30 years ago. In comments after his arrival in Tehran, Mr. Rouhani elaborated on the call. "Yesterday as we were getting ready to head to the airport, the White House called and expressed willingness to set up a phone call between the American president and me," the semiofficial Fars News agency quoted Mr. Rouhani as saying. "A call was made to our ambassador's cellphone," Mr. Rouhani said. The conversation mostly focused on the nuclear issue. The Iranian president also addressed the question of why he had not met in person with Mr. Obama. "A meeting between the two presidents needs some preparation, and since the ground was not prepared, this meeting did not take place," Fars quoted Mr. Rouhani as saying.