Iranian supreme leader says Jewish state must be ‘uprooted,’ US driven from the region; Iranian president says nuclear talks to continue despite American threats
TEHRAN, Iran — Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Saturday said US President Donald Trump was lying about his intentions for the region, and once again called Israel a “cancerous tumor” that must be uprooted.
In his first reaction to Trump’s regional visit, Khamenei said Trump wasn’t truthful when he made claims about creating peace through power and said the Americans must be ousted from the region.
“Trump said that he wanted to use power for peace, he lied. He and the US administration used power for the massacre in Gaza, for waging wars in any place they could,” Khamenei said Saturday during a meeting with teachers broadcast on state television.
The US has provided Israel with 10-ton bombs to “drop on Gaza children, hospitals, houses of people in Lebanon and anywhere else when they can,” Khamenei claimed.
Khamenei, who has the final say on all Iranian state matters, reiterated his traditional stance, calling for the destruction of the Jewish state.
Beyond repeatedly calling for Israel’s destruction, Iran has pumped billions of dollars into funding proxy terror groups like Hezbollah, Hamas and Yemen’s Houthis that threaten and attack Israel.
The remarks from the Iranian supreme leader come a day after Trump concluded a high-profile Gulf tour aimed at strengthening alliances and securing multi-trillion-dollar investments.
On his tour, Trump condemned Iran’s leadership for its role in the region and threatened to cut Iran’s oil exports to zero.
“Iran’s leaders have focused on stealing their people’s wealth to fund terror and bloodshed abroad,” Trump told a Saudi investment forum on Tuesday.
Without referring to specific comments, Khamenei said some of Trump’s remarks are a “source of shame” and “not even worth responding to.”
“The level of those comments is so low that they are a source of shame for the speaker himself and a cause for embarrassment for the American people.”
“Surely this model has failed. With the efforts of the regional nations, the US should leave the region, and it will leave,” Khamenei said.
Iran has long considered the US military presence in the region as a threat on its doorstep, especially after Trump pulled the US out of a 2015 nuclear deal with Iran in 2018 and reimposed crippling sanctions.
“The president of America proposed a model to these Arab countries, a model which, according to his own words, implies that without the United States, these countries would not be able to last for even 10 days.
“Even now, through their dealings, their behavior, and their proposals, the Americans continue to promote and impose this very same model, a model designed to make these countries dependent, so they cannot exist without US support,” Khamenei said.
“This model is undoubtedly a failed one.”
Nuclear talks to go ahead
Despite Khamenei’s rhetoric, Iran’s president said his country will continue talks with the US over its rapidly advancing nuclear program but will not give up its rights because of US threats.
“We are negotiating, and we will negotiate, we are not after war but we do not fear any threat,” President Masoud Pezeshkian said during a speech to navy officials broadcast by state television Saturday.
“It is not like that they think if they threaten us , we will give up our human right and definite right,” Pezeshkian said. “We will not withdraw, we will not easily loose honorable military, scientific, nuclear in all fields.”
The negotiations have reached the “expert” level, meaning the sides are trying to reach an agreement on the details of a possible deal. But a major sticking point remains Iran’s enrichment of uranium, which Tehran insists it must be allowed to do and the Trump administration increasingly insists the Islamic Republic must give up.
Trump has repeatedly threatened to unleash airstrikes targeting Iran’s program if a deal isn’t reached. Iranian officials increasingly warn they could pursue a nuclear weapon with their stockpile of uranium enriched to near weapons-grade levels.
On Friday, Trump said Iran received a proposal during the talks, though he did not elaborate.
During his trip to the region this week, Trump at nearly every event insisted Iran would not be allowed to obtain the bomb.
The US and other Western countries have long accused Iran of pursuing nuclear weapons — a claim Tehran denies, insisting that its atomic program is solely for civilian purposes. But Iran, which openly seeks Israel’s destruction, has ramped up its enrichment of uranium to 60 percent purity, just below weapons-grade, and for which has no peaceful application, and has obstructed international inspectors from checking its nuclear facilities.
Mohammad Eslami, the head of Iran’s atomic organization, asserted the peaceful nature of the program, saying it is under “continuous” monitoring by the UN nuclear watchdog, state TV reported Saturday.
“No country is monitored by the agency like us,” Eslami said, adding that the agency inspected the country’s nuclear facilities more than 450 times in 2024. “Something about 25% of all the agency inspections” in the year.
Israel views Iran — which repeatedly calls for its destruction — as an existential threat and has vowed to prevent Tehran from acquiring nuclear weapons.
