{"id":767115,"date":"2026-07-16T22:23:11","date_gmt":"2026-07-16T22:23:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/767115\/"},"modified":"2026-07-16T22:23:11","modified_gmt":"2026-07-16T22:23:11","slug":"trump-renews-threat-to-hit-iranian-power-plants-iran-prepares-to-retaliate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/767115\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump renews threat to hit Iranian power plants, Iran prepares to retaliate"},"content":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON (TNND) \u2014 Throughout the Middle East, there were more signs Thursday that the United States and Iran are back to engaging in all-out war. U.S. Central Command announced a sixth<\/a> consecutive night of strikes following a day of Iranian strikes on Gulf state targets.<\/p>\n

Throughout the Middle East Thursday were more signs the United States and Iran are back to engaging in all-out war. U.S. Central Command announced a sixth consecutive night of strikes following a day of Iranian strikes on Gulf state targets. (TNND)<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

It’s unclear whether President Donald Trump is willing to pause fighting to give diplomacy another chance. In an interview Tuesday, Trump said he didn’t want to negotiate with Iran.<\/p>\n

“I said, let’s not negotiate,” he told Fox News. <\/p>\n

In that same interview, Trump threatened to strike Iran’s infrastructure if they refused to negotiate. <\/p>\n

\u201cNext week comes the bridges. We\u2019re going to knock out all of their power plants. We\u2019ll knock out all of their bridges unless they get to the table and negotiate,” Trump said. <\/p>\n

Trump has made this threat four times before \u2013 once in March and three times in April\u2013 but never followed through.<\/p>\n

Reuters first reported that Iran instructed Houthis in Yemen to prepare to close the Bab el-Mandeb Strait in the Red Sea if Trump follows through this time. Some oil exporters have turned to this route while the Strait of Hormuz<\/a> is effectively closed. A simultaneous closure of both straits would deal an unprecedented blow to global oil supply at a time when prices have already rebounded<\/a> and strategic reserves \u2013 including the United States’ \u2013 are running low. Between Wednesday and Thursday, the national average gas price rose by five cents to $3.94, according to AAA.<\/p>\n

Tehran’s willingness to retaliate doesn’t stop there. <\/p>\n

An Iranian military spokesperson said, \u201cEverything that has so far remained intact because of Iran\u2019s restraint \u2013 namely, all infrastructure across the region \u2013 will be crushed beneath the iron blows of the powerful armed forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran.\u201d <\/p>\n

In a separate interview, Vice President JD Vance criticized those who argue the United States should not negotiate with Iran<\/a>. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe people who are like, you cannot negotiate with the Iranians, the reason why that\u2019s fundamentally idiotic is because so long as you have some person who\u2019s willing to fire off a few cheap drones, you\u2019re going to have some ship captains who say, \u2018No, no, no, we\u2019re not willing to do this.\u2019 So, we got to kind of use all tools at our disposal. The military is one tool but diplomacy is another tool,” Vance said. <\/p>\n

When asked about the president and vice president’s contradicting statements, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said the administration is on the same page and is open to negotiations with Iran. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WASHINGTON (TNND) \u2014 Throughout the Middle East, there were more signs Thursday that the United States and Iran…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":767116,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":["post-767115","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-news","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767115","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=767115"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767115\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/767116"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=767115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=767115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=767115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}