‘There Won’t Be War’ Between Iran, US: Ayatollah Khamenei

Iranian Top Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Tuesday that Tehran does not seek or want war with the United States (U.S) despite mounting tensions between both countries due to the collapse of the nuclear deal and escalating military pressure from the U.S.

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“There won’t be any war. The Iranian nation has chosen the path of resistance,” Khamenei told state media, adding that his country “doesn’t seek war, and they (U.S.) don’t either. They know it’s not in their interests.”

This comes as the U.S. has increased their threat in the region by deploying in the past week, the USS Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group, a bomber task force of B-52s and a Patriot missile defense battery in a bid to intimidate Iran. A U.S. official said the forces "have been ordered to the region as a deterrence."

While U.S. warmongers, among them acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan, updated their military plan for Iran, calling to send up to 120,000 U.S. troops to the Middle East, according to a New York Times report published Monday.

"The pressures by enemies is a war unprecedented in the history of our Islamic revolution ... but I do not despair and have great hope for the future and believe that we can move past these difficult conditions provided that we are united," Iranian President Hassan Rouhani stated Sunday. 

Meanwhile, British Maj. Gen. Chris Ghika told reporters at the Pentagon that the U.S.-led military coalition has not registered recent threats to its troops in Iraq or Syria from forces backed by Iran, in a clear contradiction of Trump administration claims.

Iran's Revolutionary Guard Commander, Major General Hossein Salami, downplayed the warlike posturing stating that the U.S. is using psychological war to pressure the Iranian government. 

President Donald Trump unilaterally pulled out of the 2015 nuclear deal last year and subsequently reimposed tough sanctions on Iran’s oil industry to strangle the country’s economy. On April 22, the measures worsened when Trump decided to eliminate all waivers issued to eight economies which had allowed them to buy Iranian oil, thus imposing third-party sanctions. 

Iran's response will be to restart high-level enrichment of uranium if world powers do not protect its interests from U.S. sanctions, President Hassan Rouhani announced on May 8. Khamenei also reiterated that the Islamic Republic would not negotiate another nuclear deal with the U.S.