Eye for an Eye, Bridge for a Bridge

Supreme National Security Council-affiliated Nour News Agency downplayed the significance of President Donald J. Trump’s latest address. But an article published in Tabnak News Agency – which is linked to Major General Mohsen Rezaei, a senior military advisor to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei – took a more pointed stance: It identified bridges in Gulf Cooperation Council states and Jordan as potential targets for retaliatory strikes.

• April 2: Nour News Agency commented on President Donald J. Trump’s April 1 address:
  • “What can be inferred from this speech is not the presentation of a new path but rather a reflection of the current situation – a situation that shows Trump does not have the ability to make a meaningful change in the questionable status quo and is instead trying to manage it primarily by stalling and controlling perceptions.”
  • “Continuing this approach without acknowledging existing realities and adapting to them is unlikely to lead to any fundamental change and will merely prolong the current situation. Although the U.S. president has so far shown that he lacks the ability to accept reality, given the current conditions, it seems that the only path ahead for Trump is to alter his current political position; otherwise, no change in the existing situation will occur.”
  • “The two weeks that Trump mentioned in his speech as the possible time frame for ending the war should serve as an opportunity for him to come to terms with himself, accept the cost of his failure, and as soon as possible yield in the futile war he initiated by accepting Iran’s new and undeniable position based on on-the-ground and political realities.”
• April 2: Tabnak News Agency published a list of bridges in Gulf Cooperation Council states and Jordan that, according to the outlet, constitute “legitimate targets” in retaliation for U.S. strikes against the B1 bridge in Karaj, Alborz province.
• April 4: According to Tabnak News Agency, the United Arab Emirates has “officially entered the war against Iran” as “documented by the use of a Chinese drone downed in Shiraz … a drone type not in the possession of the United States or Israel but previously deployed by the UAE in the war in Yemen.”

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