Before press conference: Trump calls Iranians “animals”

The US President has extended an ultimatum given to Tehran several times; it is currently apparently valid until Tuesday 8 p.m. (local time, Wednesday 2 a.m. CEST). On Sunday, the president wrote on his online platform Truth Social: “Open the damn strait you crazy bastards or you will live in hell.”

On Monday, at an Easter party in the White House garden, Trump said: “I’m not worried about that” in response to a journalist’s question about whether attacks on Iran’s energy infrastructure would violate the laws of war because they are “animals.” Rather, it would be a “war crime” to allow Iran to acquire a nuclear weapon. Trump justified the US-Israeli air strikes on Iran, among other things, with the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program.

Trump also claimed that the US had achieved regime change in Iran towards a more moderate leadership in the country. However, observers pointed out that radical forces now had more power with the Revolutionary Guards. After the killing of the Iranian spiritual leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, shortly after the outbreak of the war, they gained greater influence. Khamenei’s son, Mojtaba Khamenei, has officially been appointed as the new spiritual leader. But so far he has rarely appeared.

Trump: There is no support in America for oil plans in Iran

Trump does not see enough support among his own population for his oil ambitions. “Unfortunately, the American people want us to come home,” he said at an Easter event on the White House grounds. If he had his way, they would take over the oil, keep the oil and make a lot of money. But he also wants to make people in his own country happy.

During the Iran War that began at the end of February, Trump repeatedly put forward the idea that the USA could take over Iran’s oil. To take such a step, the US military would probably have to take over the Iranian island of Kharg in the Persian Gulf, through which around 90 percent of the country’s oil exports pass.