Iran said Tuesday it has had enough of President Trump’s crippling economic sanctions, declared a “permanent closure” of diplomacy with the U.S. and said it will withdraw from more of its international commitments on nuclear development.
In an angry TV speech, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani also lobbed insults at Trump, saying the White House suffers from “mental illness” and calling Trump’s latest round of sanctions, including restrictions on Iran’s supreme leader Ali Khamenei, “outrageous and idiotic.”
“Other Iranian officials have described the White House as ‘mentally retarded,’ reports the New York Times, “but Mr. Rouhani’s slinging of insults was significant because, in the context of the Iranian political system, he has been regarded as a moderate relatively open to negotiations with Washington.”
Trump announced the tightened sanctions Monday in response to Iran’s downing of a U.S. drone over the Straight of Hormuz last week. They include “a near-total embargo on Iran’s economy, including its oil, shipping, manufacturing and banking industries,” says the Washington Post.
In a tweet, Trump leveled a threat at Tehran: “Any attack by Iran on anything American will be met with great and overwhelming force. In some areas, overwhelming will mean obliteration.”
White House national security adviser John Bolton, a noted hawk regarding Iran, made his own hardline stance clear, speaking with reporters after a Jerusalem summit with his counterparts from Israel and Russia — which has been critical of the U.S. posture toward Iran.
“They’ll either get the point or … we will simply enhance the maximum-pressure campaign further,” Bolton said. He predicted that “the combination of sanctions and other pressure” would “bring Iran to the table,” Reuters reported.
The news service also quoted U.S. disarmament ambassador Robert Wood as saying the U.S. “will not initiate a conflict against Iran, nor do we intend to deny Iran the right to defend its airspace, but if Iran continues to attack us, our response will be decisive.”
Trump says he decided at the last minute to call off a military strike against Iran when he was told that perhaps 150 Iranians would die, because the attack would not be “proportionate” to the drone shootdown.
“Trump has said that he is willing to speak to Iran with no preconditions, but U.S. officials said this week that there is currently no back channel between the U.S. and Iranian governments,” says the Post. “And planned sanctions against Iran’s chief diplomat undermined the administration’s message that it seeks unconditional talks with Iranian officials.”
