Trump: My patience with Iran running out

After slamming Iran's claim that it broke up a CIA spy ring as "more lies and propaganda," President Trump told reporters at the White House on Monday that it's "getting more difficult to deal" with the mullah-led regime.

"Frankly, it's getting harder for me to want to make a deal with Iran, because they've behaved very badly. They're saying bad things," he said in a news conference with Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan.

"And I'll tell you, it could go either way, very easily," he said," without elaboration.

"And I'm OK either way it goes."

On Friday, Tehran, ignoring warnings from a British warship, seized the British-flagged tanker Stena Impero while it passed through the Strait of Hormuz.

Trump described Iran as a "very mixed-up country."

"They don't know whether they're coming or going," he said. "They have tremendous problems economically. Their country is in turmoil. They're having demonstrations all over Iran. Their inflation rate's at 75 percent."

Trump, who enacted tougher sanctions against the regime beginning in May, said he's "just going to sit back and wait, and see what happens."

"We are ready for the absolute worst. And we're ready for sense, too," he said. "But we are really geared up."

On Friday, reacting to the Iran's Revolutionary Guard's seizure of oil tankers, retired U.S. Army Gen. Jack Keane said the move reflects the Islamic regime's desperation in the face of an effective U.S. strategy of political and economic isolation.

The president and his administration, Keane said, are "very much aware that they are playing a winning hand."

"Their strategic campaign to isolate Iran politically and economically is working beyond expectations," he said. "And it's the best thing I've seen in 39 years of any administration pushing against Iran."

'More lies and propaganda'

Iran claimed Monday it had sentenced to death Iranian nationals who were members of a CIA spy ring, presenting photos purported to be of their American "handlers."

An Iranian intelligence ministry official appeared in a state TV documentary asserting 17 Iranian nationals had been recruited by the CIA to steal secrets, reported the U.K.'s Sun newspaper.

However, the details were vague, and the official was identified only as the "director of the counterespionage department of Iran's Intelligence Ministry." Western-looking people alleged to be the spies' handlers were shown, but they were not named.

Trump dismissed the report in a tweet earlier.

"The Report of Iran capturing CIA spies is totally false. Zero truth," he wrote via Twitter. "Just more lies and propaganda (like their shot down drone) put out by a Religious Regime that is Badly Failing and has no idea what to do.

"Their Economy is dead, and will get much worse. Iran is a total mess!"

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told Fox News it's part of the Iranian regime's "nature to lie to the world."

"I would take with a significant grain of salt any Iranian assertion about actions they've taken," he said.

At the news conference Monday, Trump said Iran is the No. 1 terror state in the world, but because of his administration's withdrawal from the nuclear deal negotiated by the Obama administration combined with an isolation policy featuring tough sanctions, Tehran has "pulled back."

He said Iran is "a religious country, and they have religious leaders, but they lie a lot."

As an example, he said, Iran claimed the U.S. didn't shoot down an Iranian drone.

"The proof is on the ocean floor," he said.

"Take your scuba gear and go down there," he told reporters. "One of you would do that, I know."

Ignored warnings

Iran released a photo on Monday showing part of the British ship's 23-member crew on the floor sitting cross-legged under the eye of a Revolutionary Guard member. Previously, Iran aired footage of an Iranian flag being raised over the ship and of the Muslim call to prayer being played from the tanker's speakers.

Iran seized the ship in retaliation for a ship of its own, the Grace 1, being stopped by Britain off the coast of Gibraltar last month.

Britain said the ship was violating EU sanctions.

The Times of London reported the British defense minister, Tobias Ellwood, admitted the Royal Navy is too small to counter the potential threat from Iran.

"The threats we’re facing are changing in front of us, the world is getting more complex," he told the London paper. "If we are wanting to continue to play this influential role on the international stage it will require further funding for our armed forces, not least the Royal Navy. Our Royal Navy is too small to manage our interests across the globe.”

The only army to fight Iran

Meanwhile, an Israeli minister said Sunday he believes Iran will avoid a conflict with the Jewish state because his country is the only one that actually has fought Iran, Agence-France Presse reported.

Regional Cooperation Minister Tzachi Hanegbi was referring to Israeli strikes in neighboring Syria against Iranian and Hezbollah military targets.

The Israeli official accused Iran of seeking to create "chaos" and "harm freedom of navigation."

Asked if he feared that the U.S. would not back Israel in a conflict with Iran, Hanegbi indicated Tehran would avoid such a conflict, because the regime "understand that Israel means business."

"Israel is the only country in the world that has been killing Iranians for two years," he said.

"We strike the Iranians hundreds of times in Syria. Sometimes we acknowledge it and sometimes foreign reports reveal it."

Last week, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told cadets at the nation's national security college that "the only army in the world to fight Iran is the Israeli army."