‘Trying to bludgeon reality with words’: Trump calls new strikes on Iran ‘just a love tap’

0:01 We begin this hour with the state

0:01 of confusion over President Trump's war with Iran.

0:04 It appears we'll see what happens is the official

0:07 word from President Trump as the U .S.

0:10 is still waiting for a response from Iran on the U .S.

0:13 proposal for a permanent end to the war, which was expected yesterday.

0:17 That of course has not happened even as the pause

0:21 and hostilities that the White House calls a Spire,

0:23 has been increasingly tested.

0:25 Friday, Central Command said U .S.

0:28 military forces carried out airstrikes hitting and disabling to Iranian-flagged

0:32 oil tankers trying to break the American naval blockade.

0:36 Meanwhile, the United Arab Emirates said Friday

0:39 it intercepted drones and missiles launched by Iran.

0:43 It came a day after the U .S.

0:45 said it intercepted attacks on three Navy ships

0:48 in the Strait of Hormuz and retaliated against Iranian military facilities.

0:53 The president told ABC News' Rachel Scott that the U .S.

0:57 response was, quote, just a love tap, and not a sign the ceasefire was over.

1:02 But amid the impasse and negotiations over an end to the war,

1:07 President Trump's patience running out.

1:09 Our colleague Jonathan Lemire reports in The Atlantic,

1:12 according to an outside advisor, President Trump is growing bored with his war

1:17 in Iran and frustrated with Iran's intransigence.

1:21 Bored, just bored.

1:22 He's been bored for some time.

1:24 It's happening.

1:25 I think the thing that's so interesting is whether

1:28 it's bored or he's trying to move on, what

1:31 he wants people to think is the same thing

1:33 he wants them to think about their gas prices,

1:35 is that the reality on the ground is

1:37 different than the one that they actually see.

1:40 And you can't convince people of that.

1:42 We talk about convincing people of take what's leaving their pockets,

1:45 not being able to convince them of that.

1:47 You also can't convince people of ceasefire where there's

1:49 fire happening on land and sea is a ceasefire.

1:53 Yeah, I mean, again, he the president's been bored for a while

1:56 and he clearly wants to get out of this.

1:58 I mean, more than a month ago,

2:00 a White House official was telling our Jake trailer

2:02 that he's bored and just wants to move on.

2:05 But the question is, how is he going to move on?

2:07 And is he going to just say,

2:10 we've won and leave without actually getting any of the deliverables

2:15 on the enriched uranium or on an actual deal around,

2:20 you know, Iran not having nuclear weapons?

2:23 I mean that, and I feel a little bit like a broken record

2:27 but that's something that my diplomatic

2:29 forces have consistently said that they're fearful

2:31 of, that he is at this point so eager to get to a deal

2:34 that he's going to agree to conditions

2:35 that are not amenable to the regional allies.

2:38 But at this point, he is over two months into the war.

2:41 That's obviously far past the four to six week deadline.

2:44 And The Washington Post had some pretty

2:45 interesting reporting this week that Iran still retains

2:49 75 percent of pre-war inventories of mobile launchers

2:53 and 70 percent of pre-war stockpiles of missiles.

2:57 And this all comes, this news as Trump is waiting

2:59 out this sort of detente in the Strait of Hormuz,

3:04 hence the blockade that the U .S.

3:06 maintains, which again is not a ceasefire,

3:09 potentially a cessation of hostilities at most.

3:12 But as they're waiting for Iran to blink first,

3:15 this Washington Post reporting indicates that they have at least

3:19 three to four months of being able to withstand this blockade.

3:22 Despite Trump saying their weapon is all gone.

3:25 Joining us now to get into all

3:27 of this from Dubai's MSNOW contributor Enzimam Rasheed.

3:31 Enzimam, thank you as always for coming to the weekend.

3:34 Let's start there.

3:35 What are your WHAT IS YOUR IRANIAN SOURCES TELLING YOU

3:39 ABOUT WHETHER OR NOT THEY THINK THIS IS A CEASE-FIRE?

3:42 IT'S HARD FOR I THINK A LOT OF AMERICANS,

3:43 INCLUDING THOSE AROUND THIS TABLE TO UNDERSTAND IF THERE ARE MISSILES FLYING,

3:47 HOW CAN WE BE IN A CEASE-FIRE?

3:51 WELL, I THINK THE PROOF IS IN THE PUDDING, RIGHT?

3:54 BECAUSE WHY HAVE WE NOT HAD AN IRANIAN RESPONSE YET TO THE U .S.

3:57 PROPOSAL THAT WAS GIVEN MANY DAYS AGO NOW,

4:00 WE WERE SUPPOSED TO HEAR A RESPONSE ON THURSDAY.

4:03 WE DIDN'T.

4:04 WE WERE THEN PRETTY CONFIDENT WE'D GET A RESPONSE YESTERDAY.

4:06 MARCO RUBIO SAID THAT HE WAS EXPECTING A RESPONSE FROM THE IRANIANS YESTERDAY.

4:11 WE DIDN'T GET one.

4:12 And so now we're in three days and Iran still hasn't replied to this U .S.

4:17 proposal to bring a conclusive ending to this conflict.

4:21 And I think the fact that we have seen fighting in the Straits of Hormuz.

4:25 We have seen attacks onto the coastline of Iran over the last couple of days,

4:31 and we've seen obviously an Iranian retaliation, not just to U .S.

4:36 warships in Straits of Hormuz, but to the UAE particularly as well,

4:40 then that's why we're not moving forward in this peace proposal,

4:45 in these negotiations.

4:46 And remember this latest proposal that the U .S.

4:49 has put forward, which essentially suggests that within 30 days,

4:53 we will come to a conclusive ending of this conflict.

4:57 In it, there is discussions around lifting

4:58 the blockade gradually of the straight-up Hormuz.

5:02 There will be discussions around how Iran's

5:04 sanctions would be released and their assets unfrozen.

5:09 There's also talk about how Iran would

5:12 lift their blockade of the straight-up Hormuz, and critically AS WELL,

5:16 ABOUT THEIR NUCLEAR PROGRAM AND VERY

5:19 SPECIFIC DETAILS ABOUT THEIR NUCLEAR PROGRAM,

5:21 WHICH THEY'LL GET INTO IF THE TWO SIDES ACTUALLY GET AROUND THE TABLE.

5:25 THAT FIRST WILL ONLY BE DONE if this initial pre-proposal gets agreed.

5:30 And right now, Iran is pretty much staying quiet.

5:32 In fact, due to the fighting that we've seen in the Straits of Hormuz,

5:36 they said that Washington is a vermin like nocturnal scheming that was

5:43 from Iran's foreign ministry and they

5:45 warned against adventurism and roguish behavior.

5:48 This was after a U .S.

5:50 jet fired on two oil tankers,

5:53 which were heading towards an Iranian port in the straits of Hormuz.

5:57 And those two tankers were disabled as a result as part of the U .S.

6:02 blockade inside that waterway.

6:05 So we're in a situation right now where all eyes are on Iran.

6:08 The ball is seemingly in their courts to come back with a response to this deal,

6:14 but I think this military action that we've seen extensively over the last

6:19 few days now just doesn't help us getting to some form of peace proposal.

6:23 And I just also must mention is that even if they do come back with a response,

6:28 which won't be completely TO APPLY WITH WHAT THE U .S.

6:32 HAS SAID, THIS WOULD JUST BE THE INITIAL STEP TO THEN GETTING TO THE TABLE,

6:36 TO THEN HAVING NEGOTIATIONS.

6:38 ANY SORT OF PEACE AGREEMENT AND DEAL IS STILL VERY FAR

6:49 We are joined now by Alan Eyre, former senior U .S.

6:52 diplomat and distinguished diplomatic fellow at the Middle East Institute.

6:55 He was a senior member of the Obama

6:57 administration's negotiating team for the 2015 Iran nuclear deal.

7:03 Alan, thank you so much for coming back to the table this morning.

7:06 I want to stick with these social

7:07 media posts that we're seeing from the Iranians.

7:10 You had Abbas Arachi, the foreign minister,

7:12 post on X earlier this week that the U .S.

7:15 is opting for a reckless military adventure over diplomacy.

7:18 He said that every time diplomatic solutions on the table, the U .S.

7:21 opts for a reckless military adventure,

7:23 is it a crude pressure tactic or the result

7:26 of a spoiler once again duping POTUS into another quagmire?

7:30 Whatever the cause is, outcome is the same.

7:32 Iranians never bow to pressure.

7:35 What is your assessment of the state of play right now?

7:39 And obviously we've talked a lot about,

7:41 and the president has said this time and time again,

7:44 that, you know, what the Iranians say publicly needs to be verified,

7:48 can't necessarily be trusted in full.

7:50 But I don't know.

7:52 I mean, what Araji is saying makes a lot

7:53 of sense to me and seems to square with the landscape.

7:56 What do you make of it?

7:57 Well, I mean, both sides are necessarily

7:59 when they to communicate with the media,

8:02 they're not trying to impart information.

8:04 They're trying to spin and influence the course of events.

8:06 That's to be expected.

8:07 But yeah, the reality is there's a very fragile ceasefire.

8:10 Both sides are interested in flexing.

8:12 Iran wants to show that it's still controlling

8:14 traffic through the strait, and the U .S.

8:17 is trying to show that it's still trying to blockade Iran's ports.

8:21 So against that backdrop, the negotiations are still very anemic,

8:27 neither side is really interested in serious and sustained negotiations yet.

8:31 The pain hasn't become so much so that they're saying,

8:35 yeah, we really need to focus on negotiations.

8:37 Alan, I have been stuck, as these two can ATTEST ON OUR CALLS THIS WEEK

8:42 ON THE IDEA OF WHETHER OR NOT WE'RE IN A CEASE-FIRE.

8:45 THE PRESIDENT JUST LAST FRIDAY IN FLORIDA WAS DESCRIBING THIS AS A WAR.

8:50 NOW HE'S DESCRIBING IT AS SOMETHING A LITTLE bit different over the last week.

8:55 Let's listen.

8:57 We're in a, I call it a mini war because that's all they are.

9:00 We're in a little skirmish military.

9:02 I call it a skirmish because Iran has no chance.

9:07 I call it a skirmish because that's what it is,

9:10 it's a skirmish and we're doing unbelievably well.

9:14 After these strikes, is the ceasefire with Iran still on?

9:18 Yeah, it is, it THEY TRIFLED WITH US TODAY.

9:22 WE BLEW THEM AWAY, THEY TRIFLED.

9:24 I CALL THAT A TRIFLE.

9:27 HE SOUNDS LIKE ME TRYING TO CONVINCE MYSELF OF SOMETHING THAT IS

9:30 NOT FULLY TRUE AND that I want everyone else to believe and myself.

9:34 Does that seem like the right read to you?

9:36 Because we're clearly continuing to attack them.

9:38 We're attacking them at land and sea now over the last couple of days.

9:41 And I don't know if a trifle is the word that I would use.

9:45 Well, yeah, it's clear the U .S.

9:47 administration keeps trying to bludgeon reality with words,

9:50 hoping to align it with what it wants to be.

9:53 It's a war.

9:54 Okay?

9:54 Is the ceasefire still existing?

9:56 To an extent.

9:58 I I mean, President Trump has a vested interest in saying the ceasefire is

10:01 holding because he knows the markets will

10:03 start spinning if he says there's a war.

10:05 Plus, he's heading to China very shortly,

10:07 and he wants to at least have the patina

10:09 of a solution in place before he goes to those important meetings.

10:13 So, yes, it's a war.

10:15 It's a ceasefire, but it's incredibly fragile.

10:18 And again, as I said, the key reality here is that neither side wants to play

10:22 with each other yet in terms of negotiating and good faith.

10:25 I want to double down on that last thing that the president said,

10:28 which was he was talking about strikes on on American

10:32 service members and describing them as a trifle

10:34 when he was talking about the strikes that were

10:37 taken by Iran against the U this week have you and your experience and your past

10:41 work for the Obama administration I mean ever I

10:46 mean the fact that an American president is

10:49 saying that in describing it in that that way,

10:51 do you think any other president could have

10:54 described it that way and gotten away with it?

10:55 No, and that's a great question.

10:56 It plays into a larger issue, which is President Trump keeps sabotaging

11:00 whatever progress there is by these statements.

11:04 He's not content to let diplomacy take its course.

11:07 He issues these inflammatory statements, he says it's a trifle,

11:10 of course it's not a trifle.

11:11 When the UAE gets attacked by Iran,

11:13 he says it's a nothing more or less which alienates the United Arab Emirates.

11:17 So if this administration could just have some message discipline and allow...

11:22 Oh, Alan.

11:25 I'm an eternal optimist.

11:27 Then we might have a chance at a negotiated solution

11:29 but as it is we just keep shooting ourselves in the foot.