US President Donald Trump says he is not ready to agree a deal to end the war with Iran, as Israel launches new strikes and Tehran threatens its leader.
WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump has warned he is not ready to seek a deal to end the war with Iran.
In an interview with NBC News, Trump said he believed Tehran was keen to come to the table but that Washington would fight on for better terms.
The US president suggested US forces might bomb targets on Iran’s oil hub Kharg Island once again “just for fun”.
More than two weeks into the US-Israeli war against the Islamic republic, neither side is moderating its rhetoric.
This comes despite a mounting death toll and economic damage from soaring oil prices caused by the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz.
“Iran wants to make a deal, and I don’t want to make it because the terms aren’t good enough yet,” Trump told NBC News.
He warned that US forces would step up strikes on the Iranian coast north of the strait to clear a path for oil shipments to resume.
Iran’s new supreme leader, Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, has vowed in a written statement to keep Hormuz closed.
Trump dismissed this and suggested his foe might not even be in control.
“I don’t know if he’s even alive. So far, nobody has been able to show him,” he said.
Iran said on Saturday that “there is no problem with the new supreme leader”, even though he has yet to appear in public.
The Israeli military announced a wave of strikes against targets in Western Iran.
This followed a vow from Iran’s Revolutionary Guards to pursue and kill Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whom they branded a criminal.
Despite the hardline talk, citizens of Tehran experienced their most normal atmosphere since the war began on February 28.
Traffic was busier than last week and some cafes and restaurants had reopened.
One resident whizzed down the street on an electric hoverboard in the capital.
More than a third of stalls in the popular Tajrish bazaar had reopened five days before Nowruz, the Persian New Year.
Trump has suggested an international naval operation could escort oil tankers through the Strait of Hormuz.
“Hopefully China, France, Japan, South Korea, the UK, and others, that are affected by this artificial constraint, will send Ships to the area,” Trump said in a social media post.
Asked about this, the UK ministry of defence was non-committal in its response.
South Korea said it was “closely monitoring President Trump’s remarks on social media”.
The policy chief of Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s ruling party said the bar for sending Japanese navy ships was “extremely high”.
Bahrain and Saudi Arabia said separately they had intercepted renewed barrages of projectiles.
US forces struck Iran’s Kharg Island on Friday, from which nearly all of Iran’s oil exports flow.
Both sides confirmed the strikes only took out military defences and left the oil export terminals intact.
More than 1,200 people have been killed by US and Israeli strikes, according to Iranian health ministry figures.
The UN refugee agency says up to 3.2 million people have been displaced in Iran.
The Pentagon says more than 15,000 targets in Iran have been hit by US and Israeli forces.
US media reported the Pentagon has dispatched the amphibious assault ship USS Tripoli and around 2,500 Marines to the region.
The Sun Malaysia
