(AFP) – US President Donald Trump said Thursday that Tehran was likely involved in an attack by a pilot on a flydubai flight to Israel and that Iran would be “hit very hard” if it was. The co-pilot allegedly assaulted the captain before passengers managed to save the plane from crashing. Israel’s prime minister said the man had undergone “Islamist radical indoctrination.”
“I would say the answer, based on what I’m hearing, is yes but we’re working on it right now,” Trump said when asked by reporters at the White House whether Iran was involved in the incident on the flight from Dubai to Tel Aviv.
On whether the United States would retaliate against Iran if it was responsible for the attack, Trump replied: “Oh, they’ll be hit very hard, don’t worry.” The US leader’s threat of retaliation came as he took a harsher tone on the stalled Iran war overall.
Trump was quoted as saying in a Time magazine interview published Thursday that it was “possible” he may resume bombing Iran after US midterm elections next month. Republicans fear they could lose control of Congress in the November 3 election, with Trump’s approval ratings at near-record lows over the Iran war and a surge in the cost of living fueled by high oil prices.
He also reiterated the threat to “annihilate” Iran that he made in his speech to the UN General Assembly last week, despite having previously cast himself as the “president of peace.”
“Yeah, I would do that. It’s possible,” Trump told Time. “Because by annihilating Iran, we’ve created peace in the world. With Iran, I don’t think you could ever have peace.” Iran continues to exert control over the strategic Strait of Hormuz more than seven months after the initial US and Israeli attacks on the Islamic Republic. Trump says the war is about preventing Iran from developing a nuclear weapon.
The United States was meanwhile set to send a third US aircraft carrier and up to 10,000 extra service members to the Middle East by the end of November, the Wall Street Journal reported. It was not immediately clear if the new carrier, the USS Theodore Roosevelt, would replace one of the two carriers already in the region. Trump had told aides he expected to resume bombing by late November, the Journal quoted him as saying.
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