President Donald Trump delivered his first national address on the Iran war, during which he addressed petrol prices surging to a four-year high
President Donald Trump addressed the nation on Wednesday evening, discussing the successful elimination of Iran’s nuclear capabilities and improvements to the U.S. economy.
For the first time in four years, the average cost of a gallon of petrol has exceeded $4 across the U.S. In the UK, that has translated to petrol prices of 152.8p a litre, a 20p increase since the Iran war began. While, some pumps across the country are now even advertising diesel for as much as 200p. Trump described the price rise as a “short term increase”
He said: “The United States has never been better prepared economically to confront this threat. You all know that we built the strongest economy in history. We’re going through it right now, the strongest in history.”
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On petrol and diesel prices Trump said: “The short term increase has been entirely the result of the Iranian regime launching deranged terror attacks against commercial oil tankers in neighbouring countries that have nothing to do with the conflict,” the president said, reports the Mirror US.
During Wednesday night’s address, the president expressed gratitude to the country’s allies Israel, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the UAE, Kuwait and Bahrain. The president stated that the U.S. must “finish the job” to honour the 13 U.S. military soldiers who lost their lives during the conflict.
“We salute them, and now we must honour them by completing the mission for which they gave their lives. And every single one of the people, their loved ones said ‘please, sir, please finish the job,’ every one of them. And we are going to finish the job,” Trump said. The address represented the first occasion the president delivered a national speech about the US and Israel-led war on Iran, which commenced on 28 February, when the two nations launched strikes and killed Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
His son, 56 year old Mojtaba Khamenei, was promptly declared the next and third supreme leader of the country.
On Tuesday, the president told the press that he expects the war against Iran to conclude in “two or three weeks.” Trump said: “We’ll be leaving very soon.” Trump’s plan to end the war would also mean Iran does not have to make a deal with the U.S. to end the war.
From the Oval Office, the president also revealed that the objective was to remove nuclear weapons from Iran, not enact regime change. Trump said: “That goal has been attained. They do not have nuclear weapons. Regime change was not a goal.”
According to the death toll tracker from Al Jazeera, over 1,900 have been killed in Iran from US and Israel-led strikes. Those strikes also killed over 1,200 in Lebanon and 106 in Iraq. The tracker shows Iran-led strikes killed 27 in total in Gulf nations Oman, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Qatar, and Kuwait.
Meanwhile, Iran-led strikes have killed four in Syria, 24 in Israel, and four in Palestine. Thirteen US military personnel have been killed in Iran-led strikes.
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