TEHRAN – A top Iranian lawmaker says Iran is not interested in a war with the United States, emphasizing that Washington’s empty threats are just a tool to gain more political leverage.

“Of course, the U.S. won’t take this risk to enter a military conflict with Iran since we have strengthened our deterrent ability,” Mojtaba Zonnour, chairman of the Majlis Nuclear Committee, told Mehr news agency on Wednesday.

“If the U.S. wages a military conflict on Iran, it will surely face a response,” Zonnour said, adding that Iran will strike more blows to America than the other way round.  

“We are not the one who starts a war and we are not interested in that. We use our capabilities to avoid any war,” he maintained.

The parliamentarian further pointed to Washington’s cost-benefit analysis of a military action against Tehran, saying the Americans certainly won’t do that for their own benefits.

“Rest assured that there will be no military conflict between Iran and America,” he reiterated.

On Tuesday, Leader of Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Ali Khamenei asserted that there will not be a military confrontation as neither Iran nor the U.S. seeks war because the Americans know that the war will not be beneficial for them.

In recent days, the U.S. reportedly deployed USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier strike group and the bombers into the Persian Gulf in order to counter Tehran.

Tensions have heightened between Tehran and Washington after Trump administration’s decision in May 2018 to withdraw from the nuclear deal, also known as Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), and to re-impose sanctions which were lifted under the JCPOA. 

Washington’s anti-Iran measures are not merely limited to sanctions. The U.S. has also put Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) on its list of foreign terrorist organization.

Iran, in response, has designated the U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) in the Middle East as a terrorist organization. 

Exactly a year after U.S. withdrawal from the JCPOA, Iran announced that it would reduce some of its commitments under the deal, urging other signatories to comply with their own commitments and stand against U.S. unilateralism.

MH/