The speech in a video broadcast marked Khamenei's first
public comments since a US-brokered ceasefire was declared between the two
countries following 12 days of conflict.
He told viewers that Washington had only intervened in the
fighting because “it felt that if it did not intervene, the Israeli regime
would be utterly destroyed.”
Khamenei said “US has achieved no gains from this war."
“The Islamic Republic was victorious and, in retaliation,
delivered a slap to America’s face,” he said, in apparent reference to an
Iranian missile attack on a US base in Qatar on Monday, which resulted in all
rockets neutralized and no casualties.
Khamenei has not been seen in public since reportedly taking
shelter in a secret location after the outbreak of the conflict on June 13,
when Israel struck multiple military targets and nuclear facilities in Iran.
Following a massive US bombing attack last Sunday that
struck Iran's main nuclear facility, Fordow, with bunker-buster bombs,
Washington and President Donald Trump negotiated a ceasefire that came into
effect on Tuesday.
Khamenei did release a video message last Sunday at the
height of the conflict, and state-run media outlets announced he would make an
appearance in a video message to his compatriots on Thursday.
The ayatollah also congratulated Iran "on the
victory" over Israel in a post on X.
Khamenei downplayed the impact of the US strike on three of the
country's nuclear sites, suggesting they had "failed to achieve anything
significant".
This directly contradicts Donald Trump's claims that the US
had "obliterated" Iran's nuclear program when 125 military aircraft
targeted the sites of Fordo, Natanz and Isfahan.
Speaking
at the Nato summit in the Netherlands on Wednesday, Trump rejected a Pentagon
intelligence report that suggested the US had only set back Iran's program
"by a few months".
Instead,
Trump insisted that the nuclear sites in Iran were "completely
destroyed" and accused the media of "an attempt to demean one of the
most successful military strikes in history".
Standing alongside Trump at the Nato podium, Defense
Secretary Pete Hegseth also dismissed the report, and argued that the evidence
of what had been bombed "is buried under a mountain, devastated and
obliterated".
And this was followed up by CIA director John Radcliffe, who
later said there was "credible intelligence" Iran's nuclear program
had been "severely damaged".
Iran's
supreme leader said the US military action was never about nuclear issues or
nuclear enrichment — but about "surrender".
Khamenei continued, saying that the Iranian people
demonstrated their unity — sending a message "our people are one
voice".
He said
Trump called on Iran to "surrender", but his comments were “too big
for the mouth of the president of the United States”.
"For a great country and nation like Iran, the very
mention of surrender is an insult," Khamenei added.
He said
Trump accidentally revealed a truth — that the Americans have been opposing the
Islamic Republic of Iran from the very beginning.
He said Trump had made an “unusually exaggerated” account of
what had taken place.
It was clear he needed to do it, said Khamenei, adding that
anyone listening could tell the US were overstating things to distort the
truth.
"We attacked one of the US’s key bases in the region,
and here, they tried to downplay it," he said.
Khamenei's
speech came a day after Iran’s parliament approved a bill to suspend
cooperation with the UN’s nuclear watchdog, as politicians unanimously
supported the move against the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA),
according to Iranian state media.
The bill, which states that the Supreme National Security
Council must authorize any future IAEA inspection, will need to be approved by
the unelected Guardian Council to become law.
“The International Atomic Energy Agency, which refused to
even marginally condemn the attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities, put its
international credibility up for auction,” Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher
Ghalibaf said on state television.
“The Atomic Energy Organization of Iran will suspend its
cooperation with the IAEA until the security of our nuclear facilities is
guaranteed,” he added.
Meanwhile, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmail
Baghaei stated on Thursday morning that Tehran has a "right" to
nuclear energy for peaceful purposes.
"Iran has the full right under Article 4 of the Nuclear
Non-Proliferation Treaty to use nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, and it is
determined to uphold that right under any circumstances," Baghaei said.
The US "must be held accountable for the aggression it
committed against Iran in collusion with Israel," he added, claiming that
the bunker buster strikes "destroyed diplomacy".
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