Nearly a month after Israel’s Operation Rising Lion and the U.S. strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei resurfaced Wednesday with renewed threats toward Israel.
Speaking in Tehran, Khamenei called Israel a “cancerous tumor” and branded the United States a partner in its crimes. He praised the fight against both the U.S. and what he called its “leashed dog,” Israel.
In his address, Khamenei declared that Iran is fully prepared to respond to any renewed military attacks, claiming the country is capable of inflicting a harsher blow than the one delivered during last month’s 12-day conflict. According to him, Israel’s objective in launching the June assault was to destabilize the Iranian regime.
“The attackers aimed to weaken our system by targeting key individuals and sensitive sites, in the hopes of sparking unrest and toppling the government,” Khamenei said. “But the Iranian people—across political lines and religious backgrounds—united to defend the nation. It is everyone’s duty to preserve this national unity.”
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He continued: “Victory belongs to the Iranian people. Iran does not fear the United States—on the contrary, the U.S. fears Iran. Our friends and enemies alike should know that Iran will not be weak. The enemy’s assumptions about aggression toward us were wrong.”
Earlier in the day, Iran’s parliament issued a statement declaring that Tehran should not resume nuclear negotiations with the U.S. until its preconditions are met. “When the U.S. uses negotiations as a cover to deceive Iran and enable surprise military action by the Zionist regime, we cannot conduct talks as before,” the statement read. While no specifics were given, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has recently demanded guarantees that Iran will not be attacked again.
Before last month’s war, Iran and the U.S. had held five rounds of indirect nuclear negotiations brokered by Oman. During those talks, Washington demanded that Iran halt all uranium enrichment. Just last week, Araghchi reiterated Tehran’s position that it will not agree to any deal preventing domestic enrichment and will not discuss unrelated issues such as its ballistic missile program.
President Donald Trump said Tuesday that he is in no rush to resume negotiations with Iran, claiming the country’s nuclear facilities have already been destroyed. However, the U.S. and its European partners—France, Britain and Germany—have agreed that the end of August is their final deadline for reaching a new agreement.
French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot announced that if no deal is struck by then, the three European nations will activate the “snapback” mechanism from the 2015 nuclear deal, reimposing all the sanctions that had been lifted under that agreement.
Meanwhile, China, a permanent member of the U.N. Security Council, emphasized its continued support for Iran’s security, sovereignty and dignity. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told his Iranian counterpart that Beijing values Iran’s commitment not to pursue nuclear weapons and supports its right to peaceful nuclear energy.