Trump: Iran Can Be 'Taken Out in One Night'

President Trump says he's "not at all" concerned about committing war crimes as he continues to threaten the destruction of Iran's bridges and power plants if they don't meet a Tuesday evening deadline to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. "The entire country can be taken out in one night, and that night might be tomorrow night," Trump said at a Monday news conference. He doubled down on his threats to attack infrastructure but said he was still open to a deal, the New York Times reports. Trump refused to say whether any civilian targets would be off limits.

• "Every power plant in Iran will be out of business, burning, exploding and never to be used again," Trump said. "It'll happen over a period of four hours if we want it to." He said "every bridge in Iran will be decimated" by midnight tomorrow, but added: "We don't want that to happen. We may even get involved with helping them rebuild their nation."

• Asked why Iranians would want him to follow up on his threat to blow up the country's infrastructure, Trump said everyday citizens are "willing to suffer ... in order to have freedom," the AP reports. "'Please keep bombing. Do it,'" Trump claimed US officials have heard Iranians say via "intercepts." "And these are people that are living where the bombs are exploding," he said.
• Asked about critics who questioned his mental health following a Truth Social post in which he called Iranians "crazy bastards" and demanded that they open the "F--kin' Strait," Trump said, "I don't care ... I haven't heard that," adding that the US had been "ripped off" for years before he came to office, the Guardian reports.

• Trump also spoke about the operation to rescue an airman from Iran, saying some military personnel opposed it. Not everybody was on board," Trump said. "There were military people that said, 'You just don't do this.'" Referring to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Trump made sure to clarify: "These two were totally on board."
• Hegseth drew parallels between the rescue and the story of Easter. "Shot down on a Friday: Good Friday. Hidden in a cave, a crevice, all of Saturday," Hegseth said, per the Times. "And rescued on Sunday. Flown out of Iran as the sun was rising on Easter Sunday, a pilot reborn. All home and accounted for, a nation rejoicing. God is good."
• Trump threatened to jail the journalist who first reported that US forces were searching for an F-15 weapons officer shot down in Iran, if they don't reveal their sources. "The person that did the story will go to jail if he doesn't say, and that doesn't last long," Trump said. Trump didn't name the journalist or news organization. He said the leak tipped off the Iranians, endangering the officer and his rescuers. He called the leaker "a sick person."