Iran’s foreign minister: If Trump ‘seeks escalation’ that’s ‘what he will get’ 

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi on Saturday reupped his warning about retaliation against the U.S. as conflict in the Middle East persists after last week’s strikes.

“If [President Trump] seeks escalation, it is precisely what our Powerful Armed Forces have long been prepared for, and what he will get,” Aragchi said in a statement shared on social platform X.

“Responsibility for any intensification of Iran’s exercise of self-defense will lie squarely with the U.S. administration,” he added.

The foreign minister previously said Iranian troops were “waiting” for the U.S. to launch a ground invasion in the country. 

“We are confident that we can confront them, and it will be a big disaster for them,” Araghchi told NBC News’s Tom Llamas on Thursday.

Since the U.S. launched joint military strikes with Israel on Iran last Saturday, Trump has not ruled out ground operations. The president in a post on Truth Social said that Iran will be “hit very hard.” 

The country already lost its supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, during the initial operation. The Iranian military retaliated, launching counterstrikes on U.S. bases stationed in neighboring countries.

Iranian drone strikes also killed six U.S. service members in Kuwait last weekend. 

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian apologized for attacks on its neighbors but also maintained that his country would not meet Trump’s demands for an “unconditional surrender.”

Araghchi said Saturday that Trump has underestimated the Iranian military. 

“President Pezeshkian’s openness to de-escalation within our region — provided that our neighbors’ airspace, territory, and waters are not used to attack the Iranian People — was almost immediately killed by President Trump’s misinterpretation of our capabilities, determination and intent,” the foreign minister said. 

Additionally, the Iranian leader criticized the U.S.’s involvement in “costly quagmires in the Middle East” with Israel. 

“This is a war of choice pursued by a small cabal of ‘Israel Firsters,’ and ‘Israel First’ always means ‘America Last,’” he said.