Iran’s Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has said the United States did hit Tehran’s nuclear sites but ‘didn’t achieve much’, decrying what he called Donald Trump’s ‘showmanship’.
The supreme leader also claimed victory over Israel and said his country had ‘delivered a hand slap to America’s face’, in his first public comments since a ceasefire was declared in the war between the two countries.
Khamenei broke his silence on the US strikes in a video broadcast on Iranian state television from his bunker hideout, his first appearance since June 19.
He told viewers that the US had only decided to join the bombing of Iran’s nuclear sites on June 21 because ‘it felt that if it did not intervene, the Zionist regime would be utterly destroyed.’
He vowed that Iran will ‘never surrender’ to the US and declared that America had ‘achieved no gains from this war.
‘The Islamic Republic was victorious and, in retaliation, delivered a hand slap to America’s face,’ he said, in apparent reference to an Iranian missile attack on an American base in Qatar on Monday, which caused no casualties.
Khamenei hasn’t been seen in public since taking shelter in a secret location after the outbreak of the war June 13 when Israel attacked Iranian nuclear facilities and targeted top military commanders and scientists.
Khamenei spoke in a video broadcast on Iranian state television, his first appearance since June 19
Following a massive American attack on June 22 that hit the nuclear sites with bunker-buster bombs, Trump was able to help negotiate a ceasefire that came into effect on Tuesday.
Khamenei did release a video message on June 19 during the war, and Iranian state television and the supreme leader’s own social media pages announced that he would be releasing another video message to Iran on Thursday.
In his first comment posted on X earlier, he offered his ‘congratulations on the victory’ over Israel.
