Israeli officials have been pushing the United States to join the fray and use its huge bunker-busting bomb to crush Iran’s nuclear capabilities.

Shapiro served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for the Middle East until January—charged with, among other things, considering scenarios in which tensions between Israel and Iran escalated into all-out war and preparing U.

Whether the U.S. gets more involved than it already is, some members of Congress from both parties argue, should not be up to the President.

More detail: Trump has said for days that Iran should make a nuclear deal with the U.S. But his message became more dire as he warned the Iranian capital's roughly 10 million residents to flee in the dead of night.

President Donald Trump is under fierce pressure from inside Israel and his own MAGA base as he ponders the most fateful national security decision of either of his presidencies — whether to attempt a killer blow against Iran’s nuclear program.

Syria was once among the closest allies of the Islamic republic, but the new government resents Tehran’s support for the Assad regime and has pledged not to allow attacks on Israel from its territory.

President Donald Trump denied early on Tuesday having had contact with leaders in Iran, saying he hadn't reached out about a potential ceasefire and that he was "not too much in the mood" to negotiate with Iran.

When Israel launched its series of strikes against Iran last week, it also issued a number of dire warnings about the country’s nuclear program, suggesting Iran was fast approaching a point of no return in its quest to obtain nuclear weapons and that the strikes were necessary to preempt that outcome.

President Donald Trump said the United will come down on Iran “at levels never seen before” if the Middle Eastern country attacks.

Iran, since Trump pulled out of an earlier nuclear deal in 2018, has ramped up uranium enrichment but not yet at levels to create an atomic bomb.