Democrats blast Trump for Iran ‘war crimes’ threat; Republicans supportive

Several Democrats have condemned Donald Trump after the United States president renewed his threat to destroy Iran’s civilian infrastructure in a profanity-laden message.Democratic legislators questioned the Republican’s mental stability after an Easter Sunday message in which he threatened to bomb Iran’s power plants and bridges, which legal experts said would amount to war crimes.Congresswoman Yassamin Ansari, who is of Iranian descent, called for invoking the 25th Amendment to remove Trump from the presidency, suggesting he is unfit to serve.“The President of the United States is a deranged lunatic, and a national security threat to our country and the rest of the world,” Ansari wrote in a social media post.For more than two weeks, Trump has been threatening to “obliterate” Iran’s civilian infrastructure if Tehran does not open the Strait of Hormuz.But Sunday’s social media post – which coincided with the Easter holiday, included an expletive and invoked the name of Allah – was especially jarring to many of Trump’s critics at home and around the world.“Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran. There will be nothing like it!!!” Trump wrote.“Open the F****n’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell – JUST WATCH! Praise be to Allah.”Hakeem Jeffries, the top Democrat in the House of Representatives, called the message “disgusting and unhinged”.“Something is really wrong with this guy,” Jeffries wrote on X. In the war’s opening US-Israeli strikes on Iran on February 28, an attack on a girls school in the south of the country killed more than 170 people, mostly children.Multiple visual investigations have shown that the strike was likely carried out by a US Tomahawk missile.US-Israeli air raids have also struck several universities across Iran as well as residential buildings and medical centres.International humanitarian law prohibits the targeting of civilians and the destruction of civilian infrastructure as a form of collective punishment.Senator Elissa Slotkin, a centrist Democrat and former CIA operative, said attacks against Iran’s civilian infrastructure would violate the Geneva Conventions and the Pentagon’s own Law of War Manual.“It is both irresponsible and wrong to indiscriminately kill civilians in Iran and destroy civilian infrastructure like bridges and power plants – particularly when the President said this war was to aid the Iranian people,” Slotkin said.Progressive Senator Bernie Sanders called on his fellow lawmakers to stop the war after Trump’s threat.“These are the ravings of a dangerous and mentally unbalanced individual. Congress has got to act NOW. End this war,” he wrote in a social media post.For his part, Senator Jeff Merkley stressed that the US military is legally required to refuse orders to commit war crimes.“President Trump’s profanity-laden Easter threat to attack Iran’s civilian infrastructure – power plants and bridges – are the words of a frustrated and immoral madman,” the Democrat said.Iran has remained defiant against Trump’s threats.Unable to match the firepower of the US and Israel, Tehran has been blocking the Strait of Hormuz to choke off oil supplies globally and raise the cost of the war for Washington.The Iranian military has also been firing missiles and drones against Israel and across the entire region. Trump and his aides have been insisting that Iran’s military capacity has been destroyed with only a “few” missiles left in Tehran’s arsenal.Despite the mounting criticism of the war, the US president’s Republican allies have largely stood behind him.“President Trump is right to insist that any negotiated deal meets our military and strategic objectives. If Iran baulks, he’s right to blow up their crucial infrastructure so they can’t go back to their old ways,” Republican Senator Lindsey Graham said on Monday.Congressman Don Bacon accused the war’s critics of living in a “bubble”, saying the Iranian government has killed about 1,000 Americans since 1979.The number likely refers to US casualties in the Middle East resulting from attacks carried out by groups allied with Iran during US military interventions in the region.“You cannot let a country frequently target Americans and not respond. The Ayatollah and his henchmen had this coming for a long time,” Bacon wrote on X, referring to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, who was killed on the first day of the war.The US-Israel war has killed more than 2,000 people in Iran, according to Iranian officials who said they are mostly civilians.Despite the mounting civilian casualties, Trump said on Monday that Iranians want their country to be bombed.“The Iranian people, when they don’t hear bombs go up, they’re upset. They want to hear bombs because they want to be free,” he said.