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Getty Images President Donald Trump said Tuesday Iran would suffer consequences if it retaliated for the U.S. killing of a top military leader.
President Donald Trump said Tuesday the U.S. is prepared to act against Iran if it retaliates for the killing of one of its top military leaders, but pulled back on a threat to target the country’s cultural sites.
“If that’s what the law is, I like to obey the law,” Trump told reporters alongside Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis.
Trump made his comments in the Oval Office after saying on Sunday Iran was “allowed to kill our people…And we’re not allowed to touch their cultural sites? It doesn’t work that way.”
An attack on cultural sites would likely be illegal under the laws of armed conflict and the United Nations charter, as the Associated Press has written.
Trump, meanwhile, didn’t let up on a threat to strike other Iranian targets if Tehran takes action the U.S. deems provocative.
“I will say this, if Iran does anything that they shouldn’t be doing, they’re going to be suffering the consequences and very strongly,” Trump said.
The S&P 500 index SPX, -0.28% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA, -0.42% traded lower Tuesday, and U.S. benchmark oil futures CLG20, -1.01% settled down by 0.9% at $62.70 a barrel, pulling back following a jump in prices that had been prompted by fears that the killing of Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani would immediately stoke fresh conflict in the Middle East.
Now read: Oil prices register first loss in 4 sessions as worries about the Mideast ease.
