According to The Wall Street Journal, US President Donald Trump is keeping open the option of a ground operation against Iran, but is not moving to launch one at this stage.

The newspaper, citing unnamed officials, reported that Trump wants to bring the conflict to an end as quickly as possible because he is concerned about a rise in US military casualties. The report said he is prepared to authorize the deployment of American troops onto Iranian territory, yet is reluctant to do so, in part because such a move could undermine his goal of ending the confrontation swiftly.

The paper also noted that even people close to the US president see his next steps in the Middle East as difficult to predict. As the conflict intensified, officials said, Trump wavered behind the scenes between a diplomatic track and an escalation of strikes. For now, however, he has instructed the military to keep up the pressure on Tehran.

Earlier, Iranian parliament speaker Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf said Tehran was closely monitoring the deployment of US forces in the Middle East. He said the Iranian military was ready to respond to any threat with all available means and argued that the United States had yet to fully grasp Iran’s capabilities, which, in his view, would be seen on the battlefield.