Iran reacts to Trump

Iran’s reaction to the president Trump’s State of the Union 2026 It was simple. The Iranian Foreign Ministry accused Trump of repeating “big lies” about the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program and the death toll from its crackdown to end anti-government protests in January.

As the two countries prepare for another round of negotiations on Iran’s questioned uranium enrichment program — with the threat of U.S. military action looming over the talks — Iranian officials dismissed Trump’s claims that they are working to develop a nuclear weapon, accusing him of trying to “repeat a lie often enough until it becomes the truth.”

What did Trump say about Iran in his State of the Union?

During his speech Tuesday night, Trump repeated his claim that the United States “wiped out Iran’s nuclear weapons program” with strikes in June, a claim by the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency, the The IAEA has recently questioned.

“They were warned not to make any future attempts to rebuild their weapons program, and particularly nuclear weapons, but they continue,” Trump said, adding: “They are starting all over again. We eliminated it and they want to start over and right now they are pursuing their sinister ambitions again.”

The president reiterated his promise that he would never allow Iran to build a nuclear weapon.

satellite images Since late January, roofs have been shown built over two of Iran’s nuclear facilities that were damaged by the US attacks last summer, in Natanz and Isfahan, which could indicate efforts by Iran to salvage remaining materials, but the nature of any new work at those sites has not been confirmed.

The president also repeated his claim that Iranian security forces killed 32,000 people with its repression to quell the recent protests against the regime. This is a much higher death toll than previously reported, and magnitudes larger than Tehran officials have publicly admitted.

Iran’s reaction to Trump’s State of the Union claims

“Professional liars are masters at creating the illusion of truth,” a spokesperson for Iran’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement shared Wednesday on social media.

“‘Repeat a lie often enough until it becomes the truth,’ a propaganda maxim coined by Nazi Joseph Goebbels, is now being systematically employed by the US administration and its war profiteers,” the statement said, accusing Trump and his allies in the Israeli government of spreading “big lies” about Iran’s nuclear program, as well as its ballistic missiles and the number of people killed during the January protests.

With the next round of talks on the nuclear program about to begin and Trump’s threat to attack Iran if no deal is reached still on the horizon, Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf told lawmakers on Wednesday that while the country remained “ready for dignified diplomacy,” it was also “ready for a defense that will make the aggressor regret his actions.”

“If you decide to repeat past experiences through deception, lies, erroneous analysis and false information, and launch an attack in the middle of negotiations, you will undoubtedly experience the heavy blow of the Iranian people and the country’s defensive forces,” Ghalibaf said.

What are the chances of reaching a nuclear deal between the United States and Iran to avoid war?

“We have a historic opportunity to reach an unprecedented agreement that addresses mutual concerns and achieves mutual interests,” Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said in a social media post just hours before Trump gave his speech, adding that a deal was “within reach, but only if diplomacy is prioritized.”

While Mr. Trump stated in his statements Although Iran had never ruled out building a nuclear weapon, Araghchi actually promised, not long before the American leader spoke, that Iran would “under no circumstances develop a nuclear weapon.”

Araghchi insisted, however, on the country’s right to “harness the dividends of nuclear technology for peaceful purposes,” hinting at a major potential sticking point in negotiations with the United States.

He did not reiterate the demand in his State of the Union address on Tuesday, but Trump has previously suggested that any new nuclear deal with Iran might need to include a complete abandonment of all domestic enrichment, and that is something Tehran, as Araghchi alluded to in his comments, has never accepted.

Araghchi said Sunday on the News show “Take on the nation with Margaret Brennan“He could not predict whether President Trump intends to attack Iran, “but one fact is that if they want to find a solution for Iran’s peaceful nuclear program, the only way is diplomacy.”

“I think there is still a good chance of achieving a diplomatic solution, one that is based on a win-win game, and the solution is within our reach,” Araghchi told Brennan.

But he added that “enrichment is our right.”

“We are members of the NPT [nuclear non-proliferation treaty] and we have every right to enjoy nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, including enrichment. How do we use this? This right is something that you know relates to us, only enrichment is a sensitive part of our negotiation. “The American team knows our position, we know theirs and we have already exchanged our concerns and I believe a solution can be achieved, but I am not going to negotiate through the media.”

“We are trying to turn it into something that consists of elements that can accommodate the concerns and interests of both sides, and we are working on those elements,” Araghchi said of the nuclear talks set to resume Thursday in Geneva, adding that he believed “we can work on those elements and prepare a good text and reach an agreement quickly.”

But Araghchi also reiterated his country’s warnings that if Trump orders new attacks on Iran, US bases in the region would be the target of any retaliation.

“If the United States attacks us, then we have every right to defend ourselves. If the United States attacks us, that is an act of aggression. What we do in response is an act of self-defense. Therefore, it is justifiable and legitimate. So, our missiles cannot hit American soil, so obviously we have to do something else: we have to attack, you know, the American base in the region.”

For Sanam Vakil, director of the Middle East and North Africa Program at the Chatham House think tank in London, the two sides still seem too far apart. She told News themezone on Wednesday that, in her opinion, a military confrontation is inevitable and soon.

“I think it’s imminent, I mean, it’s a matter of days. War seems inevitable to me because President Trump has not only been assembling a huge arsenal to attack Iran, but also because President Trump has been clearly indicating that he is seeking the submission of the Islamic Republic to terms and conditions that Iran’s leaders currently do not seem willing to accept.”

“The main thing Iran can offer is a commitment not to enrich uranium above a certain grade inside Iran for several years,” Vakil said. “It’s worth mentioning that Iran is no longer enriching uranium and hasn’t done so since last summer’s June War, when the United States struck Iran’s nuclear facilities and buried its enrichment program. So that’s already happening de facto, and Iran can give that concession to President Trump.”

“But what Iran is simultaneously seeking is an assertion of its nuclear rights as a signatory to the non-proliferation treaty,” Vakil said. “Iran does not want to be singled out. Iran wants to be treated like all the other signatories. And so what they are looking for is the ability to enrich uranium to very low levels for medical purposes. And that would be how they would compromise this principle.”