US President Donald Trump is threatening another attack on Iran after the heaviest fighting in weeks between the countries. Photo / Kawnat Haju, AFP
Iran and the United States traded threats today after some of the heaviest fighting in weeks engulfed the Middle East, deepening the foes’ stalemate six months into the war.
President Donald Trump said US forces staged a “very heavy attack” on Iranian targets overnight and are “prepared to do another
one any time we want”.
Tehran’s security chief warned Iran had adopted a “new strategy” in the war that began in late February with US-Israeli attacks on the Islamic Republic.
“You will soon see that Iran’s new strategy on the battlefield, in diplomacy and in confronting the economic blockade will shatter your foundations,” Supreme National Security Council Secretary Mohsen Rezaei wrote on X.
Washington has vowed to ramp up economic pressure on Iran, threatening its allies with sanctions.
Energy Secretary Chris Wright pledged today that a plan for expanded sanctions targeting Iran’s economic partners would deliver “absolutely maximum pressure”.
Trump also suggested renaming the Strait of Hormuz, the vital oil waterway that Tehran has effectively shut for six months, as “Trump Strait” – although he implied later that he wasn’t serious.
“Now that we have it under U.S.A. control, should we change the name Hormuz Strait to TRUMP STRAIT???” the US President said in a post on Truth Social.
Iran targeted US bases in Jordan, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Bahrain and Iraq’s autonomous Kurdistan region after extensive US bombardment on Wednesday of sites across Iran.
Tehran reacted with fury after the Iranian Red Crescent said a US attack that hit a wedding in Iran’s south killed four people, including a child, and wounded more than 50 people.
“The truth of this unlawful war of choice – and the true face of the war crime – is in Sirik, where a wedding ceremony was brutally bombed as part of America’s desperate struggle to conceal its failure,” foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei posted on X.
The US military did not address the incident directly.
US Central Command spokesman Tim Hawkins said “the US military never targets civilians, unlike the IRGC,” referring to Iran’s Revolutionary Guards.
Iran’s top negotiator Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf lashed out at Washington over the wedding attack, calling the United States “Satan.”
