PRESIDENT Donald Trump has said the United States could stop attacking Iran within two to three weeks and that a deal is not necessary to end a war that has disrupted energy supplies and shaken the global economy.
His comments came as Iranian Minister of Foreign Affairs Abbas Araghchi told Al Jazeera on Tuesday that no negotiations are going on with Washington despite direct and indirect exchanges of messages, nearly five weeks after the US and Israel began attacking Iran.
Trump, who previously claimed that Iran was engaged in negotiations and “begging” for a deal, appeared to change his tune on Tuesday on the alleged diplomatic drive.
“Iran doesn’t have to make a deal, no,” he said when asked by reporters at the White House if successful diplomacy was a prerequisite for the US to wind down the conflict. He said the US would be “leaving very soon … maybe two weeks, maybe three.”
“When we feel that they are, for a long period of time, put into the Stone Ages and they won’t be able to come up with a nuclear weapon, then we’ll leave,” he said.
Iran has always maintained that its nuclear activities are peaceful and that it has never sought to produce a nuclear weapon.
Trita Parsi, a foreign policy expert on Iran at the Quincy Institute, told Al Jazeera that Trump’s statements should be treated with caution. He noted that it would not be “as easy for Trump to just walk out” of a conflict that has spread across the region and killed thousands of people – mostly in Iran and Lebanon, where Israel has launched a ground invasion in conjunction with aerial bombardment – including many civilians.
“Remember, at first they said that this war would be over in four days. Then, three weeks ago, they said it would take three weeks. Three weeks have passed, and now we hear that it’s two to three weeks,” Parsi said.
“The timeline just keeps on being extended because, at the end of the day, the United States is no longer in control of this war”, which has now turned into a “debacle”, he added.
“It would be much better for Trump to just end it as quickly as possible through real negotiations. Not these types of coercive measures that have been tried so far. Otherwise, three weeks from now, we’re likely going to hear that it’s going to take another three weeks.”
Trump’s comments came as domestic petrol prices jumped past an average of $4 a gallon (3.8 litres) as a result of Iran’s attacks on Gulf oil facilities and its continued squeezing of fuel supplies through the Strait of Hormuz, a vital waterway through which one-fifth of the world’s oil and liquified natural gas passes.
But with the war hitting new levels of intensity, Trump has continued to lash out at allied countries that have refused calls for military help to secure freedom of navigation through the Strait of Hormuz.
In a post on Truth Social, the US president took aim at countries, “like the United Kingdom”, which have “refused to get involved in the decapitation of Iran”, telling them to either buy US fuel or get involved in the rapidly escalating war.
“You’ll have to start learning how to fight for yourself, the U.S.A. won’t be there to help you anymore, just like you weren’t there for us. Iran has been, essentially, decimated. The hard part is done. Go get your own oil!” he said.
Earlier, US defence chief Pete Hegseth also highlighted the UK’s reticence about joining the war, saying that “last time I checked, there was supposed to be a big, bad Royal Navy that could be prepared to do things like that as well”.