A shoe was thrown at Iranian President Hassan Rouhani's motorcade as he arrived home to a mixed reception after his historic call with US President Barack Obama.
Iranian newspapers hailed the first contact with a US president in more than three decades as the ending of a long taboo.
The Etemad newspaper carried a front-page photomontage of Rouhani and Obama side by side, with a banner headline reading: "Historic contact on way home."
But Rouhani's 15-minute conversation with the leader of a country long derided as the "Great Satan" was too much for some hardliners.
Nearly 60 gathered outside Tehran's Mehrabad Airport on Saturday, chanting "Death to America" and "Death to Israel" as his motorcade passed.
They were outnumbered by 200 to 300 supporters of the president chanting "Thank you Rouhani," who were separated from the protesters by police.
The shoe was thrown as Rouhani stood up through the sunroof of his car to acknowledge the crowd. It failed to hit its target.
There have been no diplomatic relations between Tehran and Washington since radical students took hostages at the US embassy in the aftermath of the 1979 revolution.
Dubbed the "nest of spies" by the regime, the old embassy site is the scene of annual commemorations which have been the focal point for hardline anti-US sentiment.
Rouhani told reporters at the airport the call had been Obama's initiative.
"I was informed President Obama wanted to speak to me for a few minutes," his office quoted him as saying.
Iranian media later reported that Rouhani had brought home a 2,700-year-old Persian artefact – a silver chalice in the shape of a winged Griffin – given to him as a "special gift" to the Iranian people.
The artefact depicting the mythical eagle-headed lion, worth an estimated one million dollars, was seized by US customs officials from a smuggler in 2003.
Iranian newspapers crowed that Rouhani had caught the world's media off guard by taking Obama's call after coverage of his keenly awaited visit to the United Nations in New York had focused on the lack of a face-to-face meeting.
"The world caught unawares," declared reformist daily Arman. "International media in shock over the telephone call."
The call was approved by supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran's ultimate authority, according to top lawmaker Hossein Naqavi Hosseini, spokesman for the influential foreign policy commission.
