By Parisa Hafezi and Trevor Hunnicutt
DUBAI/WASHINGTON, April 7 (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump warned Iran on Tuesday that “a whole civilization will die tonight,” threatening a dramatic escalation of the U.S.-Israeli war, as his deadline for Tehran to open the Strait of Hormuz neared.
With just hours to go before the U.S. president’s 8 p.m. EDT (0000 GMT) deadline, Tehran was positively reviewing a request by Pakistan for a two-week ceasefire to give more time for diplomacy, a senior Iranian official told Reuters. The White House said Trump was aware of the proposal and would respond.
Trump’s threat for Iran to end its blockade of Gulf oil or see the U.S. destroy every bridge and power plant in Iran, unprecedented for a U.S. president, drew widespread condemnation, including from the head of the United Nations and Pope Leo.
As the clock ticked down, strikes on Iran intensified, hitting railway and road bridges, an airport and a petrochemical plant. U.S. forces attacked targets on Kharg Island, home to Iran’s main oil export terminal.
Iran responded by declaring it would no longer hold back from hitting its Gulf neighbours’ infrastructure, and said it had carried out fresh strikes on a ship in the Gulf and a huge Saudi petrochemical complex. Booms were heard in Doha late on Tuesday night, according to a Reuters witness in the Qatari capital.
The prime minister of Pakistan, which is mediating between the two sides, said diplomatic efforts had the “potential to lead to substantive results in near future.” Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said in a post on X that Trump should extend his deadline by two weeks and Iran should open the Strait of Hormuz for two weeks as a goodwill gesture.
TRUMP’S THREATS REACH NEW LEVEL
“A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don’t want that to happen, but it probably will,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
“However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS? We will find out tonight, one of the most important moments in the long and complex history of the World.”
An Iranian official told Reuters about five hours before the deadline that the U.S. and Iran were still exchanging messages via mediators, without providing details.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres was “deeply troubled” by Trump’s statement, his spokesperson said.
“There is no military objective that justifies the wholesale destruction of a society’s infrastructure or the deliberate infliction of suffering on civilian populations,” U.N. spokesperson Stephane Dujarric told a regular briefing.
Pope Leo said threats against the population of Iran are “unacceptable.”
Iran’s U.N. ambassador, Amir Saeid Iravani, called Trump’s threat “deeply irresponsible” and “profoundly alarming.” Speaking at a U.N. Security Council meeting where China and Russia vetoed a resolution aimed at protecting commercial shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, Iravani said Trump’s “rhetoric is unfitting of any political leader.”
The Israeli military said there was a possibility of an increase of fire towards Israel as Trump’s ultimatum nears. It said it was ready to operate both “defensively and offensively”.
Iranians were also watching the clock in hope of a reprieve. “I hope it is another bluff by Trump,” Shima, 37, from the central city of Isfahan, told Reuters by phone.
Trump has abruptly called off similar threats over the past several weeks, citing what he has described as productive negotiations with figures in Iran he did not identify. Tehran has denied any such substantive talks have taken place.
Brian Finucane, a former U.S. State Department legal adviser now with the International Crisis Group, said Trump’s remarks “could plausibly be interpreted as a threat to commit genocide” under U.S. and international law.
IRAN SAID TO STAND FIRM ON STRAIT
Ahead of Trump’s deadline, Kuwait’s Interior Ministry asked people to remain home except in urgent situations from midnight to 6 a.m. on Wednesday as a “precautionary measure”.
The U.S. State Department told U.S. citizens in Bahrain to shelter in place, urged Americans in Egypt to exercise caution and encouraged people to reconsider travel to Saudi Arabia.
Iran’s Borna news agency said air defences had been activated over Tehran, with fighter planes flying at low altitude over the city.
Earlier, another senior Iranian source told Reuters that Tehran had rejected a proposal conveyed by intermediaries for a temporary ceasefire.
Any talks on a lasting peace could begin only after the U.S. and Israel stopped bombing, committed not to resume and offered compensation for damage, the source said. Iran would also insist on retaining control of the strait and imposing transit fees.
MARKETS PARALYSED
Global markets were largely paralysed, hesitant to bet on whether Trump would follow through on his threats or call them off as he has in the past. [MKTS/GLOB]
Israel launched fresh attacks on Iranian infrastructure on Tuesday, having warned Iranians in a Persian-language social media post that anyone near railways would be in danger.
Israel targeted train tracks and bridges that were used by Iran’s Revolutionary Guards to transport operatives, weapons and raw materials, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said, without providing evidence to support his claims.
Power was knocked out in parts of Karaj, west of Tehran, by a strike on transmission lines and a substation.
A synagogue in Tehran was destroyed overnight by what Iran said were Israeli air strikes. Footage in Iranian media showed Hebrew texts scattered in the debris.
Israel’s military confirmed the strike, stating that it had targeted a senior commander within the country’s top-level joint military command headquarters, and expressed regret over what it described as the collateral damage to the synagogue.
STRIKE ON SAUDI PETROCHEMICAL SITE
Iran responded to an overnight attack on a major petrochemical site with a strike on Saudi Arabia’s huge downstream oil industry site at Jubail, where Western oil firms operate multi-billion-dollar ventures. Video verified by Reuters showed smoke and flames rising.
“Up to today we have shown great restraint for the sake of good neighbourliness,” Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said in a statement. “But all these restraints have since been removed.”
(Reporting by Reuters bureaus; Writing by Peter Graff, Charlie Devereux and Simon Lewis; Editing by Andrew Cawthorne, Kevin Liffey, Ros Russell, Cynthia Osterman and Deepa Babington)
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