Iran warns 'gambler' Trump: We will end this war

Iran said yesterday the United States' attack on its nuclear sites has expanded the range of legitimate targets for its armed forces, and called US President Donald Trump a "gambler" for joining Israel's military campaign against the Islamic Republic.

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Since Trump joined Israel's campaign by dropping massive bunker-buster bombs on Iranian nuclear sites on Sunday morning, Iran has repeatedly threatened to retaliate.

But while it has continued to fire missiles at Israel, it has yet to take action against the US itself, either by firing at US bases or by targeting the 20 percent of global oil shipments that pass near its coast at the mouth of the Gulf.

"Mr. Trump, the gambler, you may start this war, but we will be the ones to end it," Ebrahim Zolfaqari, spokesman for Iran's Khatam al-Anbiya central military headquarters, said yesterday in English at the end of a recorded video statement.

Iran and Israel traded another wave of air and missile strikes yesterday, as the world braced for Tehran's response.

Trump's administration has repeatedly said that its aim is solely to destroy Iran's nuclear program, not to open a wider war. But in a social media post on Sunday, Trump openly spoke of toppling the hardline clerical rulers who have been Washington's principal foes in the Middle East since Iran's 1979 revolution.

"It's not politically correct to use the term, 'Regime Change,' but if the current Iranian Regime is unable to MAKE IRAN GREAT AGAIN, why wouldn't there be a Regime change??? MIGA!!!" he wrote.

Experts surveying commercial satellite imagery said it appeared that the US attack had severely damaged the site of Iran's Fordow nuclear plant, built inside a mountain, and possibly destroyed it and the uranium-enriching centrifuges it housed, although there was no independent confirmation.

Trump called the strike a "Bullseye!!!" "Monumental Damage was done to all Nuclear sites in Iran," he wrote. "The biggest damage took place far below ground level."

More Israeli strikes

Israel's airstrikes on Iran have met little resistance from Iranian defenses since Israel launched its surprise attack on June 13, killing many of Iran's top commanders.