Iran’s Supreme Leader Claims Victory Over U.S., Israel in First Statement Since Strikes on Nuke Facilities

(Office of the Iranian Supreme Leader/AP photo)

The supreme leader of Iran has declared victory over the U.S. and Israel in a series of X posts Thursday — his first public statement since American forces bombarded several nuclear facilities with bunker-busting bombs.

“I offer my congratulations on the victory over the fallacious Zionist regime,” Ayatollah Ali Khamenei posted to X Thursday.

“My congratulations on our dear Iran’s victory over the US regime,” he added. “The US regime entered the war directly because it felt that if it didn’t, the Zionist regime would be completely destroyed. It entered the war in an effort to save that regime but achieved nothing.”

Two more X posts followed:

The posts was Khamenei’s first statements since President Donald Trump ordered airstrikes using 30,000-pound bunker-busting bombs on the nuclear sites in Fordow, Isfahan, and Natanz over the weekend.

Speaking from the NATO summit in the Netherlands Wednesday, Trump compared the attack to the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945.