The United States hardens their rhetoric on Iran after Trump's tweet

National Security Advisor

John Bolton

issued a statement reiterating the president's warning.

"I have spoken to the President in recent days, and President Trump has said that if Iran did something negative, it would pay a price as few countries do." have already paid, "he said. White House spokesperson

Sarah Sanders

rejected the suggestions that, with his tweet, the president was inciting conflict with Iran in order to divert the attention of his national political turmoil, including the negative reaction to his relationship with the Russian president

Vladimir Poutine.

"The president is responding to Iran and he is not going to allow them to continue to make threats against America," she told reporters Monday morning. "If someone is pushing for something, look no further than Iran … The president has the ability, unlike many in the media, to focus on more than just". one question at a time. "

to refer to Mr. Rouhani's comments, reported by the semi-official news agency, warning the Trump administration to pursue radical policies against Iran. "America should know that peace with Iran is the mother of all peace, and the war with Iran is the mother of all wars," said Rouhani.

Iranian authorities warned Monday that they would retaliate against any US military action

Amir Hatami

He said that the US and its allies "do not understand any language other than force," as he announced a new line of air-to-air missiles in Tehran

and Mohsen Rezaei, a former commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. Corps, on Twitter, warned Mr Trump that 50,000 US troops are in range of Iranian weapons.

On Monday morning, rhetoric had not prompted the Pentagon to displace US military assets, nor generated a sense of urgency to move the US military posture close to Iran, said the Pentagon officials.

While the United States maintained a group of carrier strikes in the Middle East, there are more. The USS Harry S. Truman aircraft carrier left the area last week and the Navy has no plans to replace it, said two defense officials:

Iranians do not Have committed any dangerous or provocative acts against ships crossing the Strait of Hormuz. the officials said.

million. Trump has withdrawn from the 2015 Iranian nuclear deal in May, and the administration then issued 12 requests for a new deal. Secretary of State

Mike Pompeo

warned at the time that the United States would impose the "harshest sanctions in history" unless Iran accepts it.

Tehran quickly rejected the terms, including a demanding a radical change in its military position in the Middle East, where it supports the groups. fighters in Iraq and Syria.

million. Pompeo on Sunday called Iranian religious leaders "holy men hypocrites" in a speech in California.

The country "is ruled by something that looks more like the mafia than a government," he said, claiming that his rulers took large amounts of wealth at the expense of the country's people . "We are asking all nations that are fed up with the destructive behavior of the Islamic Republic to join our pressure campaign."

Pompeo drew a parallel with the policy of "maximum pressure" of the administration on North Korea, which was subjected to sanctions aimed at forcing it to abandon its nuclear arsenal and its ballistic missiles. In the case of Iran, US measures would include pressure on countries to zero their purchases of Iranian oil, with very few exemptions, made on a case-by-case basis.

Trump's Sunday tweet was similar to a threat he had made to North Korea in front of reporters last August – "fire and fury as the world has never seen it before." ". A month later, the North Korean leader

Kim Jong Un

He replied, "I will surely and definitely tame the mentally deranged American murderer."

The 2015 Iranian nuclear deal negotiated between Iran, the United States and five other world powers was a feature of the Obama administration. He codified a compromise in which Iran agreed to limit its enrichment of uranium in exchange for sanctions.

For months, the Trump administration has begun negotiations with Britain, France and Germany to strengthen the agreement.

European countries earlier this month told Iran that they were exploring activation accounts of the Iranian central bank with their national central banks in an effort to open a financial channel to keep the agreement alive. and hundreds of protests across the country about rising prices, corruption and environmental damage. The value of the country's currency has fallen by almost half since January. Iranians are also increasingly frustrated by the country's lack of political and social freedoms.

The economic crisis has only worsened since the Trump administration has withdrawn from the 2015 agreement:

Minister of Foreign Affairs of the United States. # 39; Iran

Javad Zarif,

called on European countries to introduce measures to mitigate the impact of the withdrawal of the United States from the United States. agreement before US sanctions take effect. The first sanctions are expected to be reinstated on 6 August, followed by measures targeting Iranian oil on 4 November.

Rouhani, who sought to make Iran less isolated by establishing diplomatic relations with the West, is now seeking to preserve its political future by addressing hard-liners who oppose it. previously to his leadership.

Earlier this month, he threatened to disrupt the flow of oil from the Middle East across the Persian Gulf, a transit route for about one third of the world's oil trade by sea. The threat was immediately hailed by the country's military leaders, who disagreed with Mr. Rouhani on his efforts to improve relations with the West.

On Sunday, Mr. Rouhani again noted the strategic position of Iran on the after the words of the official news agency

-Farnaz Fassihi and Sune Engel Rasmussen have contributed to this article

. Write to Jessica Donati at [email protected] and Nancy A. Youssef at [email protected]