WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump issued a series of warnings to Iran, calling Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei an “easy target” and saying that America’s “patience is wearing thin.”
“We know exactly where the so-called ‘Supreme Leader’ is hiding. He is an easy target but is safe there — We are not going to take him out (kill!), at least not for now. But we don’t want missiles shot at civilians, or American soldiers. Our patience is wearing thin. Thank you for your attention to this matter!” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post.
In a one-line follow-up post, Trump wrote in all caps: “UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER.”
US Vice-President JD Vance says Trump “may decide he needs to take further action” to end Iran’s nuclear programme.
In a social media post, he says Iran has “enriched uranium far above the level necessary for any civilian purpose”, and that the US president “may decide he needs to take further action to end Iranian enrichment”.
Vance praises Trump’s “restraint in keeping our military’s focus” on protecting troops and civilians, and says he is yet to “see a single good argument for why Iran was justified in violating its non-proliferation obligations”.
He ends with an assurance that Trump “is only interested in using the American military to accomplish American people’s goals. “Whatever he does, that is his focus.”
Meanwhile, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar says regime change in Iran is not the objective of the IDF’s military action. It might be a result of it, but it is not the objective, he says.
The comments were made while on a visit to the central Israeli city of Rishon Lezion, which was hit by Iranian strikes.
Sa’ar told reporters gathered there that Israel had three key objectives: “First of all, to severely damage the nuclear programme [of Iran] – we haven’t finished with that.
“We still have targets,” Sa’ar adds, claiming that Israel’s warplanes now have superiority in Iranian air space.
He says Israel’s second objective is to “severely damage the ballistic missile programme of the Iranian regime” and finally to “severely damage the plan to eliminate the state of Israel”. (BBC, CNN)
