US targets Iranian ballistic missile capabilities in new sanctions

All Republican senators except one, along with 177 GOP representatives, signed the letter warning against any agreement resembling the 2015 nuclear deal brokered under former President Barack Obama.

That accord, they argued, merely delayed Iran’s nuclear ambitions while allowing it to continue enrichment activities under international oversight.

“The United States cannot afford another deal that gives Iran room to maneuver,” the lawmakers wrote. “The regime must be stripped of all enrichment capacity — even for peaceful energy purposes.”

Rand Paul of Kentucky was the only Republican who did not endorse the letter led by Senator Pete Ricketts of Nebraska and Representative August Pfluger of Texas.

Citing what they described as Iran’s expanding nuclear program, the Republicans expressed skepticism over the possibility of verifying any future agreement that permits enrichment.

“The scale of Iran’s nuclear activity today makes verification of any such deal impossible,” the letter said.

The message comes as the fourth round of US-Iran talks concluded without a breakthrough, and Trump is on a diplomatic tour of Iran's Arab neighbors.

The signatories praised Trump’s earlier decision to withdraw from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) and his administration’s “maximum pressure” policy, which reimposed sweeping sanctions on Tehran.

“You have rightly drawn a red line against any deal that permits uranium enrichment,” they wrote. “We stand ready to support your administration with whatever tools are necessary to protect American national security.”

Trump has said that the goal of the negotiations is to achieve "full dismantlement" of Tehran's nuclear program. However, Tehran insists that its enrichment program is not open to negotiation, but it is ready to cap the level of enrichment.

US President Donald Trump was asked on Wednesday whether he was prepared to exert more pressure on Iran.

"Let's see what happens over the next week," he replied aboard Air Force One during his ongoing visit to the Middle East.

Across Persian-language social media, many users were almost in awe, surprised with both the content and tone of Trump’s speech. Even journalists inside Iran couldn’t help risking reprimand by praising a US president.

“It was so intelligent of Trump to highlight issues such as the destruction of monuments and the water mafia,” renowned journalist Sadra Mohaqeq wrote on X. "And what a coincidence that he said all this on the same day he lifted US sanctions on Syria."

In his speech in Riyadh, Trump described the Islamic Republic as a “destructive” force, accusing the rulers in Tehran of “stealing their people’s wealth to fund terror and bloodshed abroad,” just as neighboring Arab leaders were building their countries.

"No one could have described the situation of a plundered country in a few sentences better than Trump," Middle Eastern Studies student Masoud Paydari posted on X.

"He uttered the harshest and most bitter words with complete politeness," a classmate commented under his post.

Trump had no good words for Iran’s supreme leader Ali Khamenei but all the world’s praise for Mohammad Bin Salman. Still, he left the door open for a “better and hopeful future” if Tehran chose to change course.

"He spoke as if he were a fellow Iranian chatting with a friend. His words were so clear. Iran’s officials should die of shame," user Maryamgh wrote on X. Many agreed, suggesting that an Iranian writer may have helped draft the US President’s speech.

Trump’s comments on Iran’s nuclear program were largely overlooked by Iranians on social media. It was his lengthy and detailed remarks about mismanagement, economic waste and cultural neglect that clearly struck a nerve.

"In a country on the southern part of the Persian Gulf, major international investors line up to offer cooperation, while another country on the northern part of the same gulf is left with no trade partners,” a user posting as Cryptosamz wrote on X, “because all its officials, from top to bottom, are thieves."

While social media users reacted with rare openness, Tehran’s major dailies remained conspicuously silent. Under apparent pressure not to credit Trump in Iran's tightly-controlled media landscape, they avoided the speech altogether.

Hardliners largely ignored it as well.

Kayhan, whose chief is appointed by Khamenei, was the only paper to address the speech directly, dismissing it as "reckless" with little elaboration. The IRGC-linked Javan stuck to its combative line. "We won’t negotiate if they insist on zero enrichment," read the headline.

State media covered Trump’s visit without pointing out its economic significance.

The wealth being amassed on the other side of the Persian Gulf was derided as mere "petrodollars," with no words of self-reflection on why they freely sell oil, reinvest profits, and fund global ventures as Iran—sitting on comparable if not superior natural resources—struggles to meet basic needs like water and electricity.

"Standing up against the crimes and barbarism of the Zionist regime in Gaza and the West's support for this bloodshed is a collective duty," Khamenei told a group of Red Crescent Society rescue workers on Monday.

"Today, the world is being run by these human-like beasts, and the Islamic Republic considers it its duty to stand against their savagery and bloodshed," he added, according to a readout of his remarks published by his website on Wednesday.

The remarks were among the sharpest since talks between the United States and Iran began last month, and were published after US President Donald Trump lambasted Tehran's foreign and domestic policy in a Riyadh speech on Tuesday.

"It is precisely this sense of duty that drives enemies—like these well-dressed, cologne-wearing, Western savages in suits—to stand against and show hostility toward the Islamic Republic. If we stop opposing their barbarity, they would have no enmity with us," Khamenei said.

"The main issue of the Western bullies as the Islamic Republic's rejection of their false civilization and said: Falsehood is doomed to decline and destruction," he added.

"The Islamic Republic is not pursuing, and has never pursued, nuclear weaponization," the head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran Mohammad Eslami said on Wednesday.

"Iran will not accept the dismantling of its enrichment program, and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has communicated this position to the United States," he added.