On Tuesday, the director of the US National Counterterrorism Center, Joe Kent, resigned over the war in Iran, urging Trump to “reverse course”.
In a letter, Kent argued that Iran posed no imminent threat to the US, despite the administration’s repeated claims to the contrary.
Kent’s boss, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, defended the president in a social media post.
She said Trump had carefully reviewed the intelligence and concluded that Tehran did pose an imminent threat.
Meanwhile, retaliatory strikes launched by Iran and its allied militias continued.
Israeli officials said two people had been killed near Tel Aviv by an Iranian ballistic missile, while sites in the United Arab Emirates, Iraq, Qatar and Kuwait were also targeted.
In his first policy meeting since his appointment as Iran’s new supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei said there were no ceasefire plans, a senior Iranian official told Reuters news agency.
Khamenei said it was not “the right time for peace until the United States and Israel are brought to their knees, accept defeat, and pay compensation”, the official said.
It was unclear whether Khamenei could have attended the meeting in person or remotely. He has not been seen in public since he was reportedly injured in last month’s air strikes that killed his father, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.
On Tuesday, Iran officials also acknowledged the deaths of security chief Ali Larijani and Basij militia head Gholamreza Soleimani.
