WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump on Wednesday (Jul 29) said the US military will hit Iran “hard” after a missile attack against US bases in Jordan, Fox News reported.
“We’ll be hitting them hard. They’re going to get a beating,” Fox’s correspondent quoted Trump as saying, adding that the US president used swear words to emphasise his point: “We are going to beat the ‘effing s’ out of them.”
Trump also told Fox that US-Saudi bombing of pro-Iranian militias overnight inside Iraq had been coordinated with the authorities in Baghdad – despite the Iraqi government publicly condemning the attacks.
Trump “says those strikes were coordinated with the Iraqi government”, the Fox correspondent said after talking with the US leader.
The Iraqi presidency said it “denounces the bombing that targeted the Hashed al-Shaabi bases and it considers it an unacceptable attack and a blatant violation of Iraq’s sovereignty, targeting its official institutions”.
It also said it rejected the use of Iraqi territory to launch attacks on neighboring countries.
The sudden flare-up in the now five-month US war against Iran came after earlier insistence by Trump that he wanted to seek a negotiated solution.
Iran said that it had fired missiles at US military facilities in Jordan, while Jordan’s US-backed army said it had intercepted five Iranian missiles.
The joint air operation in Iraq followed attacks by what Saudi Arabia called “terrorist militias loyal to Iran” on its oil facilities. Riyadh had previously reported intercepting drones it said were launched by the groups.
The US military said logistics and weapons sites belonging to an Iran-aligned group were targeted in the Iraq strikes.
