TEHRAN: Iran’s Supre­­me Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei accused Dona­­ld Trump on Saturday of lying when the US president said during his Gulf tour this week that he wa­­nted peace in the region.

On the contrary, said Khamenei, the United States uses its power to give “10-ton bombs to the Zionist (Israeli) regime to drop on the heads of Gaza’s children”.

Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One after departing the United Arab Emirates on Friday that Iran had to move quickly on a US proposal for its nuclear programme or “something bad’s going to happen”.

His remarks, said Khamenei, “aren’t even worth responding to”. They are an “embarrassment to the speaker and the American people,” Khamenei added.

“Undoubtedly, the source of corruption, war, and conflict in this region is the Zionist regime a dangerous, deadly cancerous tumour that must be uprooted; it will be uprooted,” he said at an event at a religious centre in Tehran, according to state media.

Earlier on Saturday, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said Trump speaks about peace while simultaneously making threats.

“Which should we believe?” Pezeshkian said at a naval event in Tehran.

“On the one hand, he speaks of peace and on the other, he threatens with the most advanced tools of mass killing.”

Tehran would continue Iran-US nuclear talks but is not afraid of threats. “We are not seeking war,” Pezeshkian said.

While Trump said on Friday that Iran had a US proposal about its nuclear programme, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi in a post on X said Tehran had not received any such proposal. “There is no scenario in which Iran abandons its hard-earned right to (uranium) enrichment for peaceful purposes...” he said.

Published in Dawn, May 18th, 2025