WASHINGTON/JERUSALEM/CAIRO, April 1 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump said the United States could end its military attacks on Iran within two to three weeks and that Tehran did not have to make a deal as a prerequisite for the conflict winding down.
The remarks underscored the shifting and at times contradictory statements from Washington about how the war, now in its fifth week, might end.
"We'll be leaving very soon," Trump told reporters at the White House on Tuesday, saying the exit could
take place "within two weeks, maybe two weeks, maybe three."
Asked if successful diplomacy with Iran was a prerequisite to the U.S. winding down what it has dubbed "Operation Epic Fury", Trump said it was not.
"Iran doesn't have to make a deal, no," he said. "No, they don't have to make a deal with me."
Earlier on Tuesday, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Trump was willing to make a deal with Iran to end the war that has killed thousands, spread across the region, disrupted energy supplies and threatened to send the global economy into a tailspin.
Talks were ongoing and gaining strength, Hegseth said, but the U.S. was prepared to continue the war if Iran did not comply.
"We have more and more options, and they have less ... in only one month we set the terms, the upcoming days will be decisive," Hegseth said in Washington.
Iran's Revolutionary Guards on Tuesday hit back with a new threat against U.S. companies in the region starting on Wednesday.
It listed 18 businesses including Microsoft, Google, Apple, Intel, IBM, Tesla and Boeing that would be targeted from 8 p.m. Tehran time (1630 GMT).
When asked if he was concerned about threats to the companies, Trump said no. "They don't have much left to threaten," he said of Iran.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said on Tuesday he has been receiving direct messages from U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff but they do not constitute "negotiations", Qatar's Al Jazeera TV cited him as saying.
The messages include threats or exchanged views delivered through "friends," he added.
Trump earlier on Tuesday also criticised countries that have not helped the U.S. war effort, such as Britain.
In a social media post, he said that in response to the global fuel shortage, these countries should buy energy from the U.S. or find "some delayed courage, go to the strait and just TAKE IT".
France and Italy have pushed back against some U.S.-Israeli military operations, sources said, highlighting how divisions between NATO allies have been exposed by the war.
WAR CONTINUES TO RAGE
U.S. General Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters in Washington on Tuesday that the U.S. military was continuing to strike key manufacturing and research sites and had taken out over 150 Iranian naval vessels.
With attacks showing no sign of easing, Pakistan is seeking to mediate in the war. The foreign ministers of China and Pakistan on Tuesday called for an immediate ceasefire, urging peace talks to be held as soon as possible after they met in Beijing.
Iran has remained defiant despite heavy U.S. and Israeli attacks for the past month, as neighbors have been pulled into the conflict.
Heavy strikes were reported in the Lebanese capital of Beirut on Tuesday evening, security sources told Reuters.
Israel's military said it had struck a senior Hezbollah commander and an additional senior fighter in two separate attacks there.
Syrian state television reported that explosions heard in Damascus were the result of Israeli air defences intercepting Iranian missiles.
A weather station's radar and building in the Iranian port of Bushehr were put out of service on Tuesday after being hit twice in U.S.-Israeli attacks, a regional official told state media.
The Mobarakeh steel plant in the central city of Isfahan was attacked for the second time in a week, according to the semi-official Tasnim news agency, and parts of the Sefiddasht Steel Complex in the city of Borujen were targeted, according to the Fars news agency.
Reuters could not immediately verify the battlefield reports.
Higher oil and fuel prices have also started to weigh on U.S. household finances and are a political headache for Trump and his Republican Party before the November midterm elections.
The U.S. national average retail price of gasoline crossed $4 a gallon for the first time in over three years on Monday, data from price-tracking service GasBuddy showed.
Two-thirds of Americans believe the U.S. should work to end its involvement in the Iran war quickly, even if that means not achieving the goals set out by the Trump administration, a Reuters/Ipsos poll found.
(Reporting by Reuters bureaux; Writing by Costas Pitas; Editing by Colleen Jenkins, Cynthia Osterman and Lincoln Feast.)
