Source : the age
Banff, Canada: US President Donald Trump has demanded the “unconditional surrender” of Iran but went to ground after convening a meeting of his national security team, leaving the world and the MAGA universe wondering whether the world’s most powerful military will become directly involved in the Israel-Iran conflict.
As those two countries exchanged missiles again in the early hours of Wednesday, the White House confirmed Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had spoken by phone, but would not divulge details of the call – and Trump unusually refrained from posting about it on social media.
A US Marine stands guard outside the West Wing while Donald Trump meets in the Situation Room on Tuesday.Credit: AP
Israel hammered the Iranian capital, Tehran, in overnight strikes, and Iranian news websites reported Israel was attacking a university identified with the regime’s Revolutionary Guards. The Associated Press reported a major explosion was heard about 5am local time in Tehran, following earlier blasts.
Iran also fired two barrages of missiles, according to The Times of Israel, with 15 rockets in the first batch about 12.40am, and 10 in the second, with no reports of injuries.
While some analysts said Iran could still come to the negotiating table after a frank assessment of its military position, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei showed no such inclination in his public comments, vowing “we will show the Zionists no mercy” and posting in Farsi: “The battle begins.”
Although there is mounting speculation the US will step up its involvement in the conflict, the White House gave no update throughout Tuesday (Wednesday AEST) other than to acknowledge the National Security Council meeting in the Situation Room and the phone call with Netanyahu.
Vice President JD Vance leaves the White House on Tuesday.Credit: AP
Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and special envoy for the Middle East Steve Witkoff were seen leaving the White House after the meeting, as well as the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Dan Caine, and other US military leaders.
Earlier, Trump asserted the US and Israel had “complete and total control of the skies over Iran”. He also posted publicly that “we know exactly where the so-called ‘Supreme Leader’ is hiding”, referring to Iran’s Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
“He is an easy target, but is safe there – we are not going to take him out … at least not for now,” Trump said on social media, clarifying that this meant killing him. “But we don’t want missiles shot at civilians, or American soldiers. Our patience is wearing thin.” Trump also called for Iran’s “unconditional surrender”, in all-caps.
The president is under fresh pressure from some hawkish Republicans to help Israel destroy Iran’s nuclear infrastructure by unleashing so-called “bunker buster” bombs on an underground facility at Fordow, which experts say could quickly enrich uranium from 60 per cent to a weapons-grade 90 per cent.
Republican senator Lindsey Graham told Fox News he had spoken with Trump and suggested the president “believes [Iran’s] nuclear program cannot be ended through diplomacy”.
“They need our help, Israel does, to take out Fordow,” Graham told Fox. “I’m hoping the president will provide Israel the help they need to finish the job of the last nuclear site underground. If we accomplish destroying the Iranian nuclear program, it will be historic for the region and historic for the world.”
Graham added: “If we don’t take our their nuclear program now, we’ll all regret it. We’re very close.”
But that contrasts starkly with the position of large swaths of Trump’s MAGA supporters, who hold staunchly isolationist views on foreign policy and oppose another US mission in the Middle East.
US President Donald Trump speaks to reporters on board Air Force One after leaving the G7 summit in Canada early.Credit: AP
Rifts in the MAGA universe have now exploded into public view. Trump mocked MAGA influencer Tucker Carlson, a former Fox News host, for saying Trump was complicit in an act of war and should “drop Israel”. Carlson was “kooky” and had a small audience, Trump said.
The president also dismissed testimony from his own homeland security secretary, Kristi Noem, who told a hearing in March that the intelligence community did not think Iran was building a nuclear weapon. “I don’t care what she said, I think they were very close to having one,” Trump said.
Former Trump aide Steve Bannon has also used his influential podcast to make the case against a US strike, saying proponents of intervention were “running the Iraq war playbook over again”.
Vance attempted to broker a kind of truce, saying in a lengthy post on X that the president had shown restraint but may decide stronger action was required.
A man watches missiles fired from Iran towards Israel fly over Syrian territory in Damascus, Syria, early on Wednesday.Credit: AP
“I believe the president has earned some trust on this issue,” Vance said. “I can assure you that he is only interested in using the American military to accomplish the American people’s goals.”
Several experts said a diplomatic solution was still possible. Daniel Byman, a director at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, said it was not known how Iran would respond to its predicament, and de-escalation remained a possibility.
“It is plausible to me that they recognise that they’re just overmatched, and that fighting the United States now on top of Israel, with their limited capacity, isn’t going to work,” he told a panel discussion hosted by CSIS. “But it’s also quite plausible to me that they’ll go to various proxies and say: hit whatever you can.”
People in Ramat Gan, near Tel Aviv, take shelter in an underground metro station as a precaution against possible Iranian missile attacks on Tuesday.Credit: AP
Mona Yacoubian, the director of the Middle East program at CSIS, told the same event that although many Iranian proxies such as Hezbollah were degraded from Israeli strikes, the Houthis in Yemen and Iran-backed militias in Iraq were still capable of mounting counter-attacks.
“Iran could try some interesting ways to snarl maritime traffic,” she said, though blocking the crucial Strait of Hormuz was a desperate move and “we’re not at that point” yet.
Yacoubian said she believed Iran was looking for a path back to the negotiating table, “but they can’t do it unconditionally”, and Trump’s rhetoric, such as calling for Iran’s unconditional surrender, “is making this increasingly difficult”.
“In the Iranian culture – frankly in any culture – that’s going to be very, very difficult,” she said. “They would look for some sort of ceasefire, and then they’d start to perhaps negotiate on the nuclear questions and demonstrate more flexibility.”
Trump joins other G7 leaders for the family photo before his departure.Credit: AP
Although Trump said he needed to leave the G7 in Canada early to deal with the Middle East crisis, his public schedule for Wednesday (Thursday AEST) showed he was devoting considerable time to other matters. He will swear in the new US ambassador to Monaco, and have lunch with Pakistan’s army chief of staff.
Trump also posted about two new flag poles he is installing on the White House lawns, to be unveiled on Wednesday, though it was not clear if he would take part in a ceremony.
Back at the G7, world leaders were forced to grapple with the crisis without their most important counterpart. They were also unable to issue a joint statement on the war between Russia and Ukraine, reportedly after the US kiboshed “strong language” supporting Ukraine.
Instead, Canada’s Prime Minister Mark Carney, who was hosting the summit, issued a summary which he said was supported by all leaders, including Trump.
“There would be things that some of us, including Canada, would say above and beyond what was said in the chair’s summary,” Carney conceded.
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