ERBIL, Kurdistan Region of Iraq – US President Donald Trump said Wednesday that the US-Iran peace deal “is over,” referring to Iranian authorities as “sick” and “scum” after overnight exchanges of fire between the two sides, coming merely 21 days since the agreement was signed.

“To me, I think it's over. I don't wanna deal with them [Iran] anymore; they are scum,” Trump said, talking reporters at Ankara’s NATO summit.

The US president further described Iranian authorities as “sick people,” noting they are “vicious, violent people, and if they had a nuclear weapon, they'd use it.”

The US-Israeli war on Iran began in late February, with Washington seeking to put an end to the Iranian nuclear program and set limits on the country’s missile capabilities.

“As far as I'm concerned it's over,” Trump said of the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) that he and his Iranian counterpart Masoud Pezeshkian signed digitally on June 17.

The developments come as in the early hours of Wednesday, the US and Iran exchanged fire, with the attacks targeting ports in southern Iran as well as US bases in Kuwait and Bahrain, as Washington and Tehran accused each other of violating the peace deal.

“We attacked very powerfully last night the dangerous people from Iran, they’re sick, there’s something wrong with them,” Trump said.

The president had previously said that Washington would give Iran a “break” as funeral processions were being held for the late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, but he told reporters on Wednesday that “instead, they started firing rockets at ships yesterday. So we hit them very hard last night.”

The remarks were referring to Iran’s Tuesday attack on a Saudi- and Qatari-flagged oil tanker in the Strait of Hormuz.

Tehran has repeatedly maintained that vessels using the Strait of Hormuz must travel through shipping lanes approved by Iranian authorities and provide prior notification before transiting the waterway.

“It's just a waste of time dealing with them,” Trump said.

Following the signing of the MoU, both sides agreed to negotiate a final settlement within 60 days.

During the 60-day period, the US Treasury agreed to lift restrictions on Iranian oil exports, a move that was reversed on Tuesday amid the heightened tensions and stagnating peace process. Iran's foreign ministry termed the reversal “a gross violation” of the peace deal and dubbed it “another sign of the ill intentions, instability and unreliability of the US ruling establishment.”

Tehran also stressed earlier that a key provision of the deal was for the US to withdraw its forces from around Iran and refrain from increasing its military presence in the region.

A round of US-Iran talks in Switzerland in July was held, aimed at implementing the memorandum of understanding and finding a permanent resolution to the war in the Middle East.

Indirect talks between Iran and the US were halted because of the funeral ceremony for the late supreme leader and were set to resume afterward.