No peace until US moves out of Persian Gulf – senior Iranian official

Mohsen Rezaee, a member of the Expediency Discernment Council, has said preconditions include reparations and security guarantees

For the ongoing conflict between Iran and the US to conclude, the latter must withdraw its military forces from the Persian Gulf, according to a member of the advisory board of Iran’s supreme leader.

Mohsen Rezaee, a retired major general and former commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), added that Tehran would also seek full restitution for the damage done and ironclad security guarantees from Washington.

In an interview with Iran’s SNN TV broadcaster published on Saturday, the member of the Expediency Discernment Council said that the “presence of the US in the Persian Gulf has been the main cause of insecurity over the past 50 years.”

“The end of the war is also in our hands,” Rezaee claimed, naming the “US withdrawal from the Persian Gulf” among the key prerequisites. Additionally, Iran expects to receive reparations from the US, he added.

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According to Rezaee, the Islamic Republic has managed to “shatter America’s prestige,” and will eventually emerge from the ongoing conflict as a power with “greater stature in the region.”

In a post on X on Wednesday, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian similarly wrote that the “only way to end this war… is recognizing Iran’s legitimate rights, payment of reparations, and firm [international] guarantees against future aggression.”

The following day, Iranian media released the first public address of the newly appointed supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, in which he, too, vowed to “extract reparations from the enemy.”

Meanwhile, in a post on his Truth Social platform last Friday, US President Donald Trump stated that “there will be no deal with Iran except UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER.”

READ MORE: Imminent collapse or primed for a long war? The experts weigh in on Iran’s prospects

The US and Israeli militaries launched massive airstrikes on Iran on February 28, killing Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and several senior commanders.

On the first days of the military campaign, a suspected US Tomahawk cruise missile razed the Shajarah Tayyebeh girls’ school, killing at least 175 people, most of them children. According to Iranian authorities, more than 1,300 civilians have lost their lives in the US-Israeli strikes.