US 'genocidal taunts' won't end Iran - Zarif

Iran has given a sharp rebuke to Donald Trump’s recent threats, saying the US’ “economic terrorism and genocidal taunts” will do little harm to the country that withstood foreign invasions for quite a long time.

The US President “hopes to achieve what Alexander, Genghis [Khan] & other aggressors failed to do,” Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif proclaimed on Twitter. 

Zarif’s message came as both Iran and the United States ratcheted up their rhetoric. Just recently, Trump added more fuel to the ongoing war of words, writing on Twitter that if Iran wants to fight, “that will be the official end of Iran.”

Also last week, Major General Hossein Salami, commander of Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) reflected on a prospect of war being waged between the two rivals. He said that the Islamic Republic doesn’t want to fight against the US but is ready for any eventuality.

In the meantime, Washington’s leaders “are afraid of war and don’t have the will for it,” Salami said, according to the Fars News Agency. 

Washington and Tehran are at odds since Trump unilaterally walked out from the crucial 2015 nuclear deal, brought back sweeping economic sanctions, and increased diplomatic pressure on Iran. Mounting tensions around Iran and a chain of US military deployments in the Gulf have led to fears of a brewing regional conflict.

But top Iranian officials rejected the possibility of a military confrontation with Iran. “There will be no war because neither we want a war, nor has anyone the idea or illusion that it can confront Iran in the region,” Zarif told IRNA last week.

However, there are hardliners in the White House that “look for pretexts” to set the US on a collision course with Iran, even if Trump himself does not want that scenario to happen, he stated.

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