Israel Iran conflict
U.S. President Donald Trump said Monday that the war against Iran could be short-lived, but he left open the possibility of an escalation in fighting if global oil supplies are disrupted by the Islamic Republic, which chose a new hard-line supreme leader.
Oil prices briefly shot to their highest level since 2022 a day after Iran selected Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei to succeed his late father as Iran’s supreme leader. Investors saw it as a signal that Iran was digging in 10 days into the war launched by the United States and Israel.
But prices later fell and U.S. stocks rose on hopes that the war with Iran may not last much longer.
“We took a little excursion” to the Middle East “to get rid of some evil. And, I think you’ll see it’s going to be a short-term excursion,” Trump told Republican lawmakers at his golf club near Miami.
Hours later, Trump posted on social media: “If Iran does anything that stops the flow of Oil within the Strait of Hormuz, they will be hit by the United States of America TWENTY TIMES HARDER than they have been hit thus far.”
In an apparent response to Trump’s remarks published in Iranian state media, a spokesperson for the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, Ali Mohammad Naini, said “Iran will determine when the war ends.”
The war has choked off major supplies of oil and gas to world markets and sent fuel prices rising across the U.S. The fighting has also led foreigners to flee from business hubs and prompted millions to seek shelter as bombs hit military bases, government buildings, oil and water installations, hotels and at least one school.
Trump also had a call Monday with Russian President Vladimir Putin to discuss the war and other issues. Putin’s foreign affairs adviser, Yuri Ushakov, said Putin “voiced a few ideas regarding a quick political and diplomatic settlement” of the conflict following his conversations with Gulf leaders and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian.
Khamenei, a secretive 56-year-old cleric, is only the third supreme leader in the history of the Islamic Republic. He has close ties to the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, which has been firing missiles and drones at Israel and Gulf Arab states since his father, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who had ruled since 1989, was killed during the war’s opening salvo.
Iran vows to fight ‘as long as needed’
Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Tuesday his country would keep fighting as long as necessary, casting doubt on US President Donald Trump’s insistence that the conflict would be over “soon.”
The remarks from one of Iran’s top leaders, who also ruled out negotiations with Washington, came as Tehran launched a new wave of attacks on US-allied Gulf nations hours after Trump’s assurances of a swift end to the rapidly widening conflict.
Trump’s comments helped reverse the stock market slumps and oil price jumps of a day earlier, with markets in Tokyo and Seoul opening strongly, and oil prices down as much as five percent, a day after benchmark crude rocketed past $100 a barrel.
“It’s going to be ended soon, and if it starts up again they’ll be hit even harder,” Trump told a news conference in Florida on Monday, after telling lawmakers that the campaign would be a “short-term excursion.”
“We’ve already won in many ways, but we haven’t won enough,” Trump said.
He threatened an attack of “incalculable” size if Tehran blocks oil supplies.
“We will hit them so hard that it will not be possible for them or anybody else helping them to ever recover that section of the world, if they do anything.”
However, in an interview Araghchi told PBS News “the firings continues, and we are prepared. We are well prepared to continue attacking them with our missiles as long as needed and as long as it takes.”
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards also responded to Trump that they would “determine the end of the war”.
And Araghchi effectively ruled out negotiations with Washington, saying Tehran had “a very bitter experience of talking with Americans.”
Recalling previous US attacks during earlier negotiations, he said: “I don’t think talking with Americans anymore would be on our agenda.”
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