Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said the economy, rather than the battlefield, has become the central front in Iran's confrontation with the United States and Israel, and called unity the country's most urgent need, state media reported on July 20.

Speaking to Iran's Supreme Judicial Council in Tehran, Pezeshkian said military pressure alone had failed to force Iran into submission after last year's conflict, and that economic strain now posed the bigger risk to public support for the government.

He said officials had to accept the costs of continuing to resist Western pressure while also addressing the cost of living, warning that economic hardship could erode the public backing the government had built up.

Pezeshkian defended a 14-point understanding reached with the United States, saying Iran had ceded no rights, principles or national interests in any of its provisions and that the balance of the deal favoured Tehran. He did not specify the contents of the agreement in his remarks.

The president said wartime conditions required faster decision-making and less rigid adherence to normal bureaucratic procedure, echoing comments from judiciary chief Gholamhossein Mohseni-Ejei earlier in the session.

Pezeshkian also credited cooperation between the government, parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf and the judiciary for helping the country manage the crisis, and said former presidential rivals Ghalibaf and Alireza Zakani were now assisting his administration.

Mohseni-Ejei, addressing the same session, urged vigilance against what he called infiltrators and "hypocrites" (a term Iranian officials commonly use for the exiled opposition group Mojahedin-e Khalq), and said protecting national unity was as important as continuing to confront Iran's adversaries.

He said Iranians demanding accountability over rising prices were making a legitimate demand alongside continued resistance to Washington.

Pezeshkian said inequalities in access to electricity, water, gas and public appointments remained a government priority to address, alongside the external pressure Iran continues to face from the United States and Israel.

Iran fought a nearly five-month war with the United States and Israel that began in February, when President Donald Trump announced "major combat operations" against Tehran alongside Israeli strikes on military, government and infrastructure sites. Iran's supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, was killed during the conflict and succeeded by his son, Mojtaba Khamenei, who has kept a low public profile since taking on the role.

A ceasefire held for roughly a month before collapsing in mid-July over a dispute tied to the Strait of Hormuz, and both sides have since exchanged strikes for nine consecutive nights, with Iran targeting US bases in Jordan, Kuwait and Bahrain and the US striking Iranian military, coastal and infrastructure sites.

The renewed fighting has killed at least 17 US service members since February, according to the State Department, and caused extensive damage to Iranian cities and infrastructure, including bridges in Hormozgan province. Iran's rial has come under sustained pressure through the conflict, and rising prices for basic goods have added to public frustration, a dynamic Pezeshkian referenced directly when he described the economy as the country's main battleground alongside the military confrontation.