\n<\/p>\n
Iran\u2019s President Masoud Pezeshkian said neighbouring countries will no longer be targeted unless an attack originates from there, as the war launched by the United States and Israel, which triggered sustained retaliation from Tehran across the Gulf and beyond, enters its second week.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, President Donald Trump threatened to escalate the bombing of Iran on Saturday.<\/p>\n list of 4 items<\/span>end of list<\/span><\/section>\n \u201cToday Iran will be hit very hard!\u201d Trump posted on his Truth Social media platform.<\/p>\n \u201cUnder serious consideration for complete destruction and certain death, because of Iran\u2019s bad behavior, are areas and groups of people that were not considered for targeting up until this moment in time,\u201d he added, without elaborating.<\/p>\n Trump claimed on Saturday the US \u201cknocked out\u201d 42 Iranian warships in three days. An Iranian army spokesman said \u201cenemy\u201d ships entering the Gulf would end up \u201cat the bottom of the sea\u201d.<\/p>\n Pezeshkian said the Iranian interim leadership council approved the motion to stop attacks on neighbouring nations.\u00a0In remarks carried by Iranian media, the president also apologised to neighbouring countries for the strikes that took place in recent days.<\/p>\n Trump issued a maximalist position on Friday to Iran demanding \u201cunconditional surrender\u201d, but Pezeshkian baulked at the comments.<\/p>\n \u201cThat we surrender unconditionally is a dream that they must take with themselves to the grave. What we adhere to are international laws and humanitarian frameworks,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Iran\u2019s powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) also weighed in.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cFollowing the statements of the president, the armed forces once again declare that they respect the interests and national sovereignty of neighbouring countries and, up to this point, have committed no aggression against them,\u201d an IRGC statement carried by state media said.<\/p>\n \u201cHowever, should the previous hostile actions continue, all military bases and interests of criminal America and the fake Zionist regime on land, at sea, and in the air across the region will be considered primary targets and will come under the powerful and crushing strikes of the mighty armed forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran.\u201d<\/p>\n Pezeshkian later clarified on X that Iran hadn\u2019t in fact attacked any of its neighbours but rather \u201ctargeted US military bases, facilities, and installations in the region\u201d.<\/p>\n Tehran\u2019s commitment to good relations with its neighbours, he said, \u201cdoes not negate Iran\u2019s inherent right to defend itself against military aggression by the United States and the Zionist regime\u201d.<\/p>\n Pezeshkian\u2019s message is overshadowed by the Revolutionary Guard\u2019s dominance, said Al Jazeera\u2019s Resul Serdar.<\/p>\n \u201cPolitical figures in Iran are responsible for running state affairs and \u2018non-strategic\u2019 affairs. But when it comes to strategic affairs, such as the country\u2019s foreign and security policies, politicians don\u2019t have a say including the president, who, according to the constitution, is the number two in charge \u2013 this is a very well-known fact in Iran,\u201d Serdar said.<\/p>\n The centre of power lies with the office of the supreme leader and with the IRGC, even during peacetime, he added.<\/p>\n Now that the country faces what it sees as a war of survival, Pezeshkian is not in a position to stop any attack, and his message to regional countries carries no weight, Serdar said.<\/p>\n \u201cThe IRGC is now in charge fully, and they will decide whether to attack or not,\u201d Serdar said, adding that IRGC chief, Ahmad Vahidi, is considered one of the \u201cmost radical commanders\u201d of the group since its foundation.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t think Pezeshkian or other politicians will have any influence when it comes to security politics,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Bahrain and Oman, all the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) nations have been targeted because of the presence of US assets within and around their borders. Iraq, Jordan, Azerbaijan and Turkiye have also been caught in the crosshairs.<\/p>\n In the Gulf, there have been deaths, damage and major disruption to flights, closure of airspace, and a heavy knock-on impact on oil and gas production reverberating across the world.<\/p>\n Qatar\u2019s Energy Minister Saad al-Kaabi, meanwhile, said exports from the Gulf region could come to a halt \u201cwithin weeks\u201d if the war on Iran\u00a0continues to escalate, throwing global energy markets into turmoil.<\/p>\n Al-Kaabi told The Financial Times newspaper in an interview published on Friday if the war continues for weeks, \u201cGDP growth around the world will be impacted\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cEverybody\u2019s energy price is going to go higher. There will be shortages of some products, and there will be a chain reaction of factories that cannot supply,\u201d al-Kaabi was quoted as saying.<\/p>\n The only US deaths in the war so far came when Iran attacked a US command centre in Kuwait, killing six.<\/p>\n More than 1,200 Iranians have been killed in US-Israeli attacks in the first week of the war.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Iran\u2019s President Masoud Pezeshkian said neighbouring countries will no longer be targeted unless an attack originates from there, as the war launched by the United States and Israel, which triggered sustained retaliation from Tehran across the Gulf and beyond, enters its second week. Meanwhile, President Donald Trump threatened to escalate the bombing of Iran on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14259,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14258","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle-east-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14258","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14258"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14258\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/14259"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14258"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14258"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14258"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Recommended Stories <\/h2>\n
\u2018IRGC now in charge fully\u2019<\/h2>\n
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