Donald Trump is considering a new wave of strikes against Iran amid growing concern that Tehran has rebuilt its military capacity, as both sides traded direct fire for the first time in a month.

Three US officials told Axios that the president is weighing limited strikes in the Strait of Hormuz in a bid to stop Tehran from reconstituting its radar and missile capabilities used to attack ships.

One of the officials framed the plan as “mow[ing] the lawn” to reduce the risk of Iranian attacks on traffic in the waterway, following a recent missile launch targeting an American F-35 fighter jet providing cover to ships.

Trump openly threatened strikes against Iran on Monday after the Islamic Republic attacked two US air bases in Jordan in response to a US attack on Iran’s Larak Island, off the coast of Bandar Abbas, where Washington said it had struck Iranian launchers deploying mines in the strait.

“We’re going to hit them hard,” the US president told Fox News. “There will be a response.”

Trump told reporters in the Oval Office that renewed exchanges with Iran did not signal a return to full-scale war, describing Iran as a “failed nation” with a degraded military.

“That doesn’t mean we won’t smack them,” he insisted, adding: “We’ll see what happens.”

A US official said that American forces struck two Iranian launchers on Larak Island on Sunday after seeing Tehran preparing to launch rockets with sea mines into the Strait of Hormuz.

Three people were killed in the US attack, Iran’s Tasnim news agency reported. The state-affiliated Nournews said two of them had been identified as members of the Revolutionary Guards Navy.

The latest escalation came just days after secretary of state Marco Rubio told allies that the US was moving away from strikes and towards imposing economic pressure on Iran through sanctions, according to Axios.

The US has been trying to gain leverage and unsettle Tehran’s hold on shipping through Hormuz after an interim deal to end the fighting broke down in June.

The conflict, now in its seventh month, has cost the US military billions of dollars already without resolving any stated objectives, while voters have been turned off by rising energy prices inflicted by Iran’s closure of the strait.

In a message to his base, President Trump posted an AI video on his Truth Social platform on Monday captioned “Kharg Island being blown to smithereens!!!” The false video showed missiles raining down on port infrastructure.

The clip forced the Pentagon to deny that the US had struck Iran’s main petroleum export hub, and invited ridicule from the head of the national Iranian oil company, Hamid Bovard, who said the post was “laughable” and insisted Kharg’s terminals were still fully operational.

With pressure mounting on the Trump administration to end the war, president Trump took to social media again to insist that Iran was suffering under the weight of the war.

“They have no Navy, they have no Air Force, they have no currency, they are not paying their soldiers or police, Inflation is at 300%, and their leadership is in total disarray and incapable of properly representing the country,” he said.

“The only thing they have is FAKE NEWS from the USA, a willingness to kill their protesters … and a good line of ‘BULLS***’”

Trump’s press secretary admitted last week that there are no negotiations currently taking place to end the war, despite Washington stepping up efforts to pressure Tehran with new economic sanctions.

US treasury secretary Scott Bessent said Iran was now “lashing out” because sanctions were taking a toll on its economy. He told Reuters on Sunday that new secondary sanctions are likely to be rolled out weekly in order to ramp up pressure on Iran, with an initial focus on banks.