According to a post on its President’s X handle on Tuesday 30 December, 2025, Iran has warned it will respond forcefully to any new military action after US President Donald Trump again raised the prospect of strikes against the country, this time extending the threat beyond nuclear sites to missile facilities.

The warning came on Tuesday from President Masoud Pezeshkian, a day after Trump met Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida. The meeting reinforced Washington’s alignment with Israel’s hardline stance on Iran, a posture that has already reshaped the region over the past year.

In a message posted online, Pezeshkian made it clear that Tehran would not absorb another attack quietly. Iranian officials say the country’s armed forces are stronger now than they were before the 12-day war in June, and they insist any fresh aggression would bring consequences that attackers would regret.

Until recently, US rhetoric had focused largely on Iran’s nuclear programme. Missile development, a long-standing concern for Israel, was not openly framed as a target by Washington. Iran, for its part, maintains that its nuclear activities are strictly civilian and has repeatedly rejected any talks over its missile arsenal.

International assessments have backed part of that claim. Before the June strikes by the US and Israel, neither American intelligence agencies nor the UN’s nuclear watchdog said they had evidence that Iran was actively building an atomic weapon. Still, suspicion and mistrust have continued to dominate the relationship.

The renewed exchange of threats has revived fears of another round of fighting, only months after the summer conflict that killed more than 1,100 people in Iran and left 28 dead in Israel. That war was brief but devastating, and its aftershocks are still being felt across the region.

Trump, speaking to reporters alongside Netanyahu, suggested Iran may be trying to rebuild capabilities damaged earlier this year. “Now I hear that Iran is trying to build up again, and if they are, we’re going to have to knock them down,” he said, adding that the United States would not hesitate to act if Tehran pressed ahead.

He went on to signal that Washington could quickly support new strikes aimed at both nuclear infrastructure and missile facilities, should Iran continue developing long-range weapons.

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