Trump says he was an hour away from decision to strike; hasn’t decided on new deadline; claims war ‘very popular’ despite polls

US President Donald Trump indicates he has not decided how long he will hold off on striking Iran and ending the ceasefire in the US-Israeli war with the Islamic Republic.

Yesterday, he claimed he was planning to launch a major attack on Iran today but that Gulf allies had asked him to hold off for two or three days in light of recent progress made in talks toward a deal to permanently end the war.

Asked how long he’s willing to wait while showing off the construction of the White House ballroom to a group of reporters, Trump gives a vague timeline.

“I’m saying two or three days — maybe Friday, Saturday, Sunday, maybe early next week — a limited period of time,” Trump claims.

“I hope we don’t have to do the war, but we may have to give them another big hit… I’m not sure yet, you’ll know very soon,” he adds, issuing yet another threat against Iran.

Trump claims that yesterday, he was “an hour away from making the decision” to strike Iran today. He then contradicts himself and says he had already “made the decision” to strike when Gulf leaders purportedly reached out to convince him to hold off.

Trump repeats his claim that he has caused regime change through strikes on Iran’s leaders before later calling Tehran’s current leaders “extremely radicalized” and willing to use a nuclear weapon against the US if they obtained one.

“Everyone tells me [the war is] unpopular, but I think it’s very popular,” Trump says in a brief moment of candor. Polls of Americans have routinely shown that most object to the war. A recent New York Times/Siena poll found that 64% of US respondents felt going to war with Iran was the wrong decision.

Trump then claims that opponents of the war change their mind when he asks them if they’d want Iran to have a nuclear weapon.

“When we explain it to people, I don’t really have enough time to explain to people. I’m too busy getting it done,” Trump says amid the banging from the ballroom construction behind him.

“When they understand (the risk of Iran obtaining a nuclear weapon, I think (the war is) frankly very popular,” Trump says.

He repeats that Iran cannot be allowed nuclear weapons: “They would start with Israel. They would blow it up, and they would blow it up fast.” Then, “they go after Saudi Arabia, they go after Kuwait, they go after UAE, they go after Qatar… I think they go after the entire Middle East… It would be [a] nuclear holocaust.”