TEHRAN -- President Masoud Pezeshkian said Thursday Iran would not “bow to any bully” in response to U.S. President Donald Trump’s criticism of Tehran during his Persian Gulf tour.
“He (Trump) thinks he can come here, chant slogans, and scare us. For us, martyrdom is far sweeter than dying in bed. You came to frighten us? We will not bow to any bully,” he said.
The president dismissed Trump’s accusations that Iran was destabilizing West Asia. 
“Did we kill sixty thousand women and children in Gaza within a year, under bombs and missiles? Did we cut off water, bread, and medicine from those poor people? Are we the threat?” he asked in a speech in Kermanshah in western Iran.
Referring to U.S. arms sales to Iran’s Arab neighbors, Pezeshkian said, “When they boast of having missiles and bombs beyond imagination, is it us who are causing war and bloodshed—or is it them, who flood this region with weapons and ammunition?”
“You want the countries of this region to turn on each other by handing out bombs and missiles, and then you say you are peace-seekers?” he added.
Pezeshkian also reminded Trump that he was the one who ordered the assassination of Iran’s top military commander Gen. Qassem Soleimani in 2020, saying, “Soleimani was the man who stood against Daesh—the same group you trained, supported, and nurtured. And now you claim you defeated them?”
“If they martyr our great figures, hundreds more will rise from this land to build this nation,” Pezeshkian said.
Responding directly to Trump’s comments about Iran’s internal struggles, Pezeshkian said, “Trump is doing everything he can to sow seeds of division, despair and conflict among the Iranian people. He can only dream of that. All Iranians will stand up for their country with all their might.”
On Iran’s domestic resilience, the president said the Islamic Republic has withstood more than four decades of pressure. 
“For 47 years, they’ve used all their power to try to bring this system and this people to their knees—and they couldn’t. And they won’t be able to,” he said.
“The kind of pressure they’ve put on Iran—if it had been put on any other country, it wouldn’t have lasted 24 hours.”