US President Donald Trump. PHOTO: AFP/ File
TEHRAN/WASHINGTON:
Iran signaled a defiant stance with a senior leader saying he sees no room for diplomacy in the ongoing conflict triggered by joint attacks by the US and Israel, while President Donald Trump insisted the war was largely over.
Iranian officials said cease-fire mediation efforts were irrelevant as long as military confrontations continued, while the leadership insisted the country had no intention of harming ordinary Americans, even as they warned Washington against targeting civilians.
Trump said in an interview with CBS that the US-Israeli war with Iran was “pretty much” over, without giving details. “I think the war is very complete, pretty much. They have no navy, no communications, they have no air force,” Trump told CBS News by phone.
Earlier, Kamal Kharazi, an adviser to the Supreme Leader’s office, said there was no immediate prospect of diplomacy. “I don’t see any room for diplomacy anymore,” Kharazi said in an interview with CNN in Tehran, adding that Iran could sustain the war for a long time.
Kharazi’s remarks came on the heels of the country moving to strengthen its political leadership following the assassination of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei in the initial wave of US-Israeli attacks that began on February 28.
Iran’s Assembly of Experts elected Mojtaba Khamenei, son of the slain leader, as the country’s new supreme leader, signaling continuity in Iran’s political and religious establishment despite the upheaval caused by the conflict.
Iranian officials said their armed forces were carrying out “controlled and gradual offensive operations” across the region. In new attacks on energy installations in the Gulf, Bahrain’s sprawling Al Ma’ameer oil facility was hit, causing fire and damage.
Bahrain later said the fire at the oil facility had been brought under control, but the country’s state-owned energy company Bapco declared force majeure after the strike – the latest Gulf producer to activate the legal clause, following Qatar and Kuwait.
Bahrain said another Iranian drone attack on the island of Sitra injured 32 people overnight. All the injured were Bahraini nationals and there were four “serious cases”, including children, the health ministry said in a statement carried by the state news agency.
Saudi Arabia’s Defense Ministry said the kingdom took down and destroyed two waves of drones headed for the Shaybah oil field in the country’s southeast. NATO said it had intercepted a second ballistic missile fired from Iran into Turkish airspace.
Explosions were also heard Monday both overnight and later in the day in Doha, and emergency sirens sounded in Manama, AFP journalists said. Qatar said it intercepted 17 ballistic missiles and six drones launched from Iran, with no casualties reported.
Kuwaiti authorities announced a missile and drone strike, and the defense ministry said its military was working to intercept the salvo. The UAE said its air defenses detected 15 ballistic missiles, destroyed 12 while three fell into the sea, and intercepted 17 of 18 drones.
Two Emirati soldiers, meanwhile, were killed after their helicopter crashed due to a “technical fault”, Abu Dhabi’s Ministry of Defense said. The plane went down while the crew was performing national duties in the country, it added.
The Emirati deaths bring the death toll in the Gulf to 23 since the war began, including 10 civilians. The latest strikes came after Washington ordered embassy staff to leave Saudi Arabia following a rash of attacks targeting the kingdom.
A US soldier died after sustaining injuries during an attack in Saudi Arabia last week, the military said, bringing the number of US troops killed in the war to seven. Army Sgt Benjamin Pennington, 26, was wounded at Prince Sultan Air Base.
Support for new manager
Meanwhile, thousands of supporters of Khamenei gathered in Enghelab Square in Tehran to pledge allegiance to the new leader. The political establishment also rallied behind Mojtaba Khamenei, pledging support for his leadership at a time of national crisis.
Security chief Ali Larijani said the appointment of the new supreme leader had left the US and Israel in “despair”. Iran’s Revolutionary Guards also pledged their full obedience to the new leader and declared their readiness to follow his orders.
The selection of Mojtaba Khamenei appeared to dampen hopes of an early diplomatic solution, with Iranian officials and advisers indicating that the conflict could continue for an extended period.
Iranian Foreign Minister Seyed Abbas Araghchi said Tehran did not want to harm American civilians during the conflict with the US and Israel, stressing that the Iranian government distinguished between the American public and the political leadership in Washington.
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei said any discussion of ceasefire talks was irrelevant while military operations were underway. “At this particular time, it is irrelevant to talk about any topic other than defending our homeland,” Baghaei said, adding that Iran had not started the conflict but was responding to an imposed war.
He also rejected accusations that Iran had launched attacks against neighboring countries, including Turkey, Cyprus and Azerbaijan, and insisted that no offensives had been launched from Iranian territory against those states.
Baghaei suggested that some incidents may have been staged to create division between Iran and neighboring countries, and warned that such actions could be attempts to undermine regional relations.
