US President Donald Trump said Saturday he was approaching a decision on Iran, warning Tehran faced the “easy way or the hard way” as the Pentagon kept military options open amid continued attacks on commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz.
“We have a decision that I’ll make about Iran,” Trump told reporters. “Iran has been decimated, so the only question is it’ll either be the easy way or the hard way.”
Trump also said Iran was “virtually giving up” any plans to obtain a nuclear weapon, while reiterating that Tehran would never be allowed to acquire one.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth gave a clearer indication of what the harder option could involve, saying the Pentagon was working to ensure Trump retained “all the options he needs on the table” if Iran refused to abandon its nuclear ambitions.
“Iran will never, ever, ever have a nuclear weapon,” Hegseth said, describing Trump as “hell-bent and determined” to prevent it.
Pentagon preserves military options
Hegseth declined to say whether the USS Theodore Roosevelt carrier strike group, dispatched from San Diego last week, would be sent to the Middle East, saying his job was to give Trump the widest possible “decision space.”
He said Iran was trying to rebuild missile and other military capabilities damaged by US strikes but argued that damage to its defense industry had slowed that effort.
The military pressure has remained concentrated around the Strait of Hormuz, where Hegseth claimed Washington, rather than Tehran, now controlled the waterway. He described the US blockade as “ironclad” and said traffic was moving back toward pre-war levels.
Commercial vessels, however, continue to face attacks.
Iranian state media reported Saturday that another oil tanker had been hit in the strait. The IRGC-affiliated Fars News identified the vessel as the Ore Vinst and claimed it had been traveling under US escort when it was targeted while heading toward Oman.
The United States has not reacted to the claim yet.
The incident followed a series of attacks on ships transiting Hormuz even as Washington has escorted vessels through the waterway and sought to restore energy flows.
US says pressure campaign is cutting Iran’s revenue
The blockade is also intended to deny Tehran the oil income Washington says it needs to rebuild its military capabilities.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Iran would have no oil shipments at sea this week and therefore no revenue from those cargoes, describing the blockade and subsequent economic isolation as the next stages of a campaign that began with US military strikes.
“We had kinetic [action], we destroyed their navy, their air force, substantially depleted their drone and missile capability,” Bessent said.
“Then we went to what the president calls the Iron Wall and the blockade,” he added. “And now we have Operation Economic Outcast and we are isolating them economically like it’s never happened before.”
White House Communications Director Steven Cheung also said Iranian oil exports had been “stopped completely” and cited a Bloomberg report putting inflation at almost 90%.
Iran’s government has acknowledged increasing economic pressure while rejecting Washington’s claim that its strategy is succeeding.
President Masoud Pezeshkian said Saturday his government had adopted a “new posture” to manage what he described as exceptional conditions.
“The enemy’s plan in recent months has been to cut the country’s vital arteries with the aim of putting pressure on the Iranian people,” he wrote on X.
Pezeshkian said the pressure had increased but argued that government measures and public cooperation had prevented Iran’s adversaries from achieving their objectives.
Diplomatic channel remains open
Trump’s pending decision comes with diplomacy still technically alive but with no clear sign of a breakthrough after the latest contacts between Washington and Tehran.
The conservative Sobh-e No newspaper which is close to Iran’s chief negotiator Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf reported Saturday that Iran was reviewing a US proposal conveyed through Qatar setting out a roadmap and timetable for further negotiations.
The paper said Tehran continued to demand that Washington first meet its commitments, including sanctions relief and the release of frozen Iranian funds, and that Iran’s principal conditions remained unchanged.
Those contacts follow talks in New York that failed to produce an agreement, with the two sides remaining divided over the terms for ending the war and reopening Hormuz.
For now, Trump has continued to present the choice as Iran’s: accept a deal under mounting military and economic pressure or face what he calls the “hard way.”
Haalvsh, which covers developments in Sistan-Baluchestan, said five members of the IRGC-Quds’s Fatemiyoun militia were killed in the Rudmahi area near Zahedan after an explosive device detonated beside their vehicle and gunmen opened fire.
Iran's Revolutionary Guards gave a different account, confirming a roadside bombing in the province but saying one fighter was killed. The IRGC Ground Force said what it described as "terrorists" had planted a bomb along a road in Sistan-Baluchestan and carried out an indiscriminate attack.
The Guards did not identify the person killed, mention Fatemiyoun or give a precise location for the incident.
Conflicting accounts of Zahedan attack
Haalvsh said the attack took place at about 6:30 a.m. as the men were patrolling the Kaleh-Pedeh route in the Rudmahi area in a Land Cruiser equipped with a DShK heavy machine gun.
Citing eyewitnesses, the outlet said an explosive device was detonated as the vehicle passed and that gunmen opened fire after the blast destroyed the vehicle.
The identities of those reported killed have not been released.
Haalvsh said local sources continued to put the death toll at five and identified all of those killed as Fatemiyoun members, but said it had not been able to independently verify the precise number of deaths.
Fatemiyoun is a militia linked to the IRGC's Quds Force and made up largely of Afghan Shiites. It was formed with Iranian support and fought alongside forces loyal to Bashar al-Assad during Syria's civil war. The United States sanctioned the group in 2019.
Haalvsh said Friday's incident was the second deadly attack on forces it identified as Fatemiyoun in Rudmahi in less than a month. It reported in September that four members deployed in the area by the IRGC were killed when gunmen attacked them during a patrol.
The outlet has also reported the deployment of hundreds of Fatemiyoun members to several parts of Sistan-Baluchestan, including areas around Zahedan, Mirjaveh, Rask, Saravan, Zabol, Chabahar, Konarak and Iranshahr.
Hours of fighting in Rask
The violence on Friday was not limited to Zahedan.
Haalvsh said Iranian military and security forces moved in Rask county at about 5:30 a.m., triggering fighting with armed men that lasted more than six hours.
Heavy gunfire and explosions were heard during the confrontation, according to the outlet, which said reinforcements and additional military equipment were sent to the area.
Armored vehicles, pickup trucks and civilian cars with private license plates were seen at the scene, while a vehicle carrying a heavy weapon was also deployed, Haalvsh reported.
Local sources cited by the outlet said reconnaissance quadcopters and explosive drones were used during the operation.
Haalvsh said the identity and affiliation of the gunmen remained unknown and that no reliable information had emerged about casualties or damage.
IRGC-linked Fars news agency, citing an unnamed source, said security forces had begun an operation against armed groups in Rask on Friday morning and that "a number" of gunmen had been killed. Fars said the operation was continuing.
Intelligence facility targeted
An intelligence ministry facility in Nokabad, the administrative center of Taftan county, was also attacked by gunmen early Friday, according to the Baloch Human Rights Documentation Network.
The group said the attackers fired at the building. Local sources also reported an explosion and said a grenade may have been used.
No casualties or damage were immediately reported, and no individual or group had taken responsibility for the attack.
Fighting follows deadly clash a day earlier
Friday's incidents came a day after another hours-long confrontation near Zahedan.
On Thursday, the IRGC said six gunmen were killed during fighting with security forces in the Manzelab area. The Guards' Quds regional headquarters said its forces had identified and "destroyed" what it described as an armed "terrorist-Takfiri" cell that had been preparing an attack.
Haalvsh said that clash began at about 6 a.m. and continued for several hours, with heavy gunfire and rocket-propelled grenade fire heard in the area.
The IRGC said explosive devices were recovered but did not identify the armed group or name those killed.
A police officer, Alireza Sanchouli, was also killed in a separate armed attack on a checkpoint at the entrance to Rask, according to Iranian reports.
At least one person was killed earlier in the week during another confrontation with security forces in Iranshahr.
Last month, a roughly nine-hour battle in the Bakhshan area of Saravan killed three IRGC members and four gunmen. Reports at the time linked the armed side to the People's Fighters Front, an alliance formed in late 2025 that includes several Baluch armed groups, among them Jaish al-Adl.
Iranian authorities regularly describe armed groups operating in Sistan-Baluchestan as terrorist organizations. The southeastern province has seen repeated armed attacks, insurgent activity and clashes between security forces and gunmen in recent weeks.
