Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has insisted the U.S “gained no achievements” from strikes on its nuclear facilities, in his first public address since a ceasefire with Israel was agreed on Tuesday this week.
Khamenei said the strikes did not “accomplish anything significant” to disrupt Iran’s nuclear programme, and described Iran’s retaliation against an American air base in Qatar as dealing a “heavy blow”.
It came as Washington doubled down on its assessment that the U.S strikes had severely undermined Iran’s nuclear ambitions.
U.S Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth said intelligence gathered by the U.S and Israel indicated the operation “significantly damaged the nuclear programme, setting it back by years”.
Previously, U.S President Donald Trump said the strikes against three key nuclear sites inside Iran “totally obliterated” them, and has responded furiously to reports citing unnamed American officials suggesting the damage may have been less extensive than anticipated.
Speaking alongside senior general Dan Caine at a Pentagon press conference on Thursday morning, June 26, Hegseth said the mission was a “historic success” that had “rendered [Iranian] enrichment facilities inoperable”.
During an at times combative exchange with reporters, Hegseth also said the U.S was “not aware of any intelligence” which indicated the enriched uranium had moved out of Fordow – the deeply buried facility which the U.S targeted with powerful so-called buster bombs – prior to the strikes.
Khamenei, who had been largely out of public view since direct conflict with Israel broke out on 13 June, released a televised address on Thursday morning, ending a week-long public silence.
The supreme leader has reportedly been sheltering in a bunker and limiting communications, which has sparked speculation about his whereabouts.
Iranian authorities did not disclose where he was speaking from on Thursday, though a senior official acknowledged he was in a safe place earlier this week.
Khamenei used Thursday’s video address to threaten to carry out more strikes on U.S bases in the Middle East if Iran was attacked again, and declared victory over both Israel and the U.S.
Khamenei said Trump had “exaggerated” the impact of the nuclear site strikes, adding: “They couldn’t accomplish anything and did not achieve their objective.”
Referencing the attack on the U.S air base in Qatar, Khamenei said: “This incident is also repeatable in the future, and should any attack take place, the cost for the enemy and the aggressor will undoubtedly be very high.”
No one was killed during that attack, which Trump said had been flagged before it was launched. The U.S says the base was not damaged.
