Article content continued

Hours earlier, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo repeated Trump’s offer to chat to try to sort out differences. The U.S. has claimed, with no details, that Iran has been mobilizing proxies in Iraq and Syria to attack its forces, and its new deployments have stirred talk of war.

“The Americans know that no other war will bring about their defeat to such an extent and that’s why there won’t be a war, because war is not part of the U.S. strategy,” Heshmatollah Falahatpishe, the head of Iran’s parliamentary commission for national security and foreign affairs, said in a speech before lawmakers, according to ISNA.

“Nobody is going to call Trump, and eventually the Americans will be forced to raise the issue of negotiations with Iran in a serious way,” he added.

Trump has made confronting Iran the linchpin of his Middle East policy, and his withdrawal from the nuclear deal and reimposition of sanctions meant to choke off Iranian oil exports and access to international banks has pounded the Islamic Republic’s economy. Tehran responded to the U.S. removal of sanctions waivers and the new military deployments by threatening to stop abiding by the nuclear deal’s limitations on uranium enrichment if Europe doesn’t remove obstacles to foreign investment into Iran and ease the flow of Iranian oil within 60 days.