US President Donald Trump said Wednesday he was still deciding whether to join Israel’s strikes on Iran, claiming Tehran now wants talks at the White House but may have waited too long.
Trump held his second Situation Room meeting in two days with his national security team as he left the world guessing about his potential order of military action.
“I may do it, I may not do it. I mean, nobody knows what I’m going to do,” Trump told reporters at the unveiling of one of two giant new flagpoles at the White House.
“I can tell you this, that Iran’s got a lot of trouble, and they want to negotiate.”
He added that “the next week is going to be very big” when it comes to determining Iran’s fate.
The White House said Trump would be briefed in the Situation Room again on Thursday, a holiday in the United States.
Trump’s comments came after the Islamic republic’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei rejected his demands for an unconditional surrender and warned the United States of “irreparable damage” if it intervenes.
A day after saying Khamenei was an “easy target,” Trump told AFP in the Oval Office that a change of leadership in Tehran “could happen.”
But Republican Trump, who faces opposition from the isolationist wing of his support base to joining any more foreign wars, insisted that he had not yet made up his mind on whether to take US action.
“I have ideas as to what to do, but I haven’t made a final (decision),” Trump said. “I like to make the final decision one second before it’s due, because things change. Especially with war.”
The Wall Street Journal reported that Trump had told aides on Tuesday he had approved attack plans for Iran but was holding off to see if Iran would give up its nuclear program.
“All options are on the table,” a White House official told AFP when asked about the report.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio will meet Thursday in Washington with British Foreign Secretary David Lammy, the State Department said, for talks expected to focus on Iran.
‘Very Late’
Trump appeared to be in no hurry to reach what would be one of the most consequential decisions of his presidency — spending more than an hour dealing with the installation of his new flagpoles.
He said Iran was reaching out to try to strike a deal on its nuclear program to end the conflict with US ally Israel.
“They want to come to the White House, I may do that,” Trump said. He added however that it was “very late to be talking… There’s a big difference between now and a week ago.”
Iran denied it had offered to send officials to Washington.
“No Iranian official has ever asked to grovel at the gates of the White House,” Iran’s mission to the United Nations posted on X.
Trump had favored a diplomatic route to end Iran’s nuclear program, seeking a deal to replace the agreement he tore up in his first term in 2018.
But since Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu launched strikes on Iran six days ago Trump has moved in behind the key US ally and is now weighing whether to use American military power against Tehran too.
Trump said Wednesday that Iran was “weeks” away from being able to make a nuclear bomb.
He noted that the United States is the only country with “bunker buster” bombs capable of taking out Iran’s Fordow nuclear plant “but that doesn’t mean I’m going to do it.”
The US president said he had told Netanyahu to “keep going” with Israel’s offensive against Iran, adding that they were speaking every day.
Trump however rebuffed Russian President Vladimir Putin‘s offer to mediate in the Israel-Iran conflict, saying Russia should end its own war in Ukraine first.
“He actually offered to help mediate, I said ‘do me a favor, mediate your own. Let’s mediate Russia first, okay? You can worry about this later,’” Trump said.
