I think a more likely outcome is Iran comes out the other end of this on Monday morning with 5000 dead.

Maybe, but the resulting ruling regime will eventually be similar. There will be a lot of talk about getting a democratic government in place and maybe there will be one for a bit but ultimately a dictator like government will rule. It turns out that democracy is hard and people have to be willing to constantly fight to keep it. One man rule seems to be the default government that most people get.