Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has set-aside U.S. President Donald Trump’s warnings to Iran aimed at trying to stop them from continuing their missile tests.
Speaking with his military commanders in Tehran, the Supreme leader was quoted by his official website as saying “No enemy can paralyse the Iranian nation.”
The Ayotallah has further asked the Iranian people to rise against the “threats” issued by the American President, and has asked them to respond to Trump when Iran celebrates the February 10 anniversary of its 1979 revolution this Friday. “[Trump] says ‘you should be afraid of me’. No! The Iranian people will respond to his words on Feb 10, (the anniversary of revolution) and will show their stance against such threats,” the Supreme leader reportedly said.
The back-and-forth between the two countries comes in the wake of increasing tensions ever since Donald Trump has entered the White House. The period of relative calm after the Obama administration signed a Nuclear deal with Iran is seemingly at an end as the Trump administrations seems to be determined at ripping apart the carefully crafted peace.
President Trump has been a vocal opponent of the deal struck between the two nations under his predecessor, describing it as “the worst” agreement ever negotiated.
READ MORE: Iran a terrorist state, nuclear deal worst agreement ever negotiated, says Trump
Immediately after entering office, the President had declared he would develop a “state of the art” missile defense system to protect the US against Iran. The statements seem to be part of a general campaign towards turning the international view of Iran towards a harsher direction. Recently, the US Secretary of Defense James Mattis had called Iran “the biggest sponsor of state terrorism in the world.”
Iran’s response had been equally provocative as they had almost immediately conducted Ballistic missile tests after the Trump administration took hold of the reigns from the Obama administration. The test had been one of the pretexts behind newly employed sanctions against Iran.
Earlier, Iran had been part of a travel ban implemented by an executive order signed by President Trump. The Iranian foreign ministry had responded by saying it will ban Americans from entering the country in response to the President’s “insulting” order restricting arrivals from Iran and six other Muslim states.