Not finished': Trump signals US strikes on Iran's Pickaxe Mountain site

President Donald Trump says the United States is far from finished with Iran, warning its next military target could be an underground nuclear complex known as Pickaxe Mountain. Donald Trump says the US would hit the Pickaxe Mountain area 'pretty soon' and 'heavily' ( Evelyn Hockstein ) Donald Trump has signalled the US is "not finished" attacking Iran and warned American forces could hit the Pickaxe Mountain area "pretty soon". The site is near to Iran's Natanz uranium enrichment facility.

The US president also suggested the military was prepared to "take care of" Iran-backed Houthi rebels threatening a blockade of Saudi ports. Donald Trump says the US is "not finished" attacking Iran and warns American forces could target Pickaxe Mountain, near Iran's heavily damaged Natanz uranium enrichment facility, "pretty soon". The US president spoke to reporters at the White House on Tuesday, local time, as Tehran continued to step up its strikes across the Middle East.

Pickaxe Mountain is a deeply buried nuclear site near Natanz where Western intelligence suspects Iran is building an undeclared enrichment facility. "We'll be hitting that area pretty soon, and very heavily, Mr Trump said, adding that he would not normally announce targets but "there's not a thing they can do about it". The US leader projected that it would take the Islamic republic more than 20 years to rebuild from damage sustained in the Middle East war, two weeks after fighting between the decades-old foes resumed.

"If we left right now, it would take Iran 20, 25 years to rebuild, he said. "We're not finished at all. we're not leaving right now.

A satellite view shows tunnel entrances at Pickaxe Mountain, of the Natanz nuclear facility, in Iran. ( ) His comments came after Jordan, Kuwait and Bahrain came under attack Tuesday. Yemen's Iran-backed Houthi rebels meanwhile said they would blockade Saudi Arabia's ports, threatening to throw energy markets into chaos after Iran's Strait of Hormuz blockade.

Bahrain said it intercepted Iranian attacks as sirens sounded multiple times in the kingdom, with Kuwait and Jordan also announcing they had intercepted drone and missile strikes. Kuwait has said that Tehran hit multiple power and water desalination plants across the country over the past days, including on Monday, forcing residents to ration energy consumption. Iran's Guards confirmed a strike on Jordan, claiming they had targeted a "complex housing US terrorist forces in the region of Rukban".

The Iranian army had earlier said it targeted US assets in Kuwait and Bahrain, including air defence systems, radar installations and administrative buildings. "With this radar sweep, the enemy should prepare for even more decisive and powerful waves of drone and missile attacks, the Guards said in a statement carried by state news agency IRNA. US President Donald Trump said US forces would "take care of" the Houthi rebels if the Iran-backed militant group followed through on its threatened blockade of Saudi ports.

"You know, we've done that with the Houthis before, and we haven't heard from them in a while since we did what we did originally. Saudi Arabia strongly condemned the threat from what it called the "terrorist Houthi militia" and said it "continues to support the brotherly Yemeni people and their legitimate government". It remains unclear how the Houthis would implement their blockade of Saudi ports, and oil markets eased slightly despite the threat from Iran's ally against the world's biggest crude exporter.

But maritime intelligence provider Vanguard Tech said a Singapore-flagged tanker and a Liberia-flagged tanker both "reversed course" in the Red Sea after loading crude at the Saudi port of Yanbu following the Houthi warning. Should the Houthis make good on their threat to blockade Saudi ports, that would put at risk Riyadh's ability to bypass Hormuz for some of its oil exports and have major repercussions for the global economy. Saudi Arabia and the Houthis traded fire last week for the first time in years, threatening a 2022 truce in their years-long conflict, but the rebels have largely remained on the sidelines since Israel and the US attacked Iran in late February.

The Revolutionary Guards said on Tuesday that two tankers attempting to transit Hormuz "were hit by explosions, resulting in massive fires that brought them to a standstill". The UK Maritime Trade Operations agency (UKMTO) earlier reported that an "unknown projectile" struck a tanker off the coast of Oman. Following the deaths of at least three US soldiers in recent days, the US launched a new round of attacks against Iran on Monday it said was "designed to further degrade Iranian military capabilities used to attack commercial shipping" in the Strait of Hormuz.