Here's the latest
• Threat to Oman: President Donald Trump warned of an attack on Oman if it “gets in the way” of efforts in the Strait of Hormuz. Trump previously threatened the US ally in May.
• Iran agreement expires: The 60-day deadline for the two sides to reach a deal toward ending the conflict has now passed. Trump again said he is in no rush and claimed his administration has established a direct backchannel with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, which the IRGC denies.
• Main priority: The president reiterated that the top goal in the war is preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, undercutting advisers who say keeping oil prices low is an important priority.
• Gaza ceasefire plan: Meanwhile, after Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner met Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu today for over four hours, Kushner said Hamas could disarm soon but indicated the US would support further Israeli military action in Gaza if not.
Kushner presses Israel on Trump-backed Gaza plan. Here's a catchup on news from Mideast
US special envoy Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for more than four hours Monday, pressing him to move forward with the US-backed Gaza ceasefire plan.
Kushner said Hamas could disarm soon but indicated the US would support further Israeli military action in the territory if the group does not.
Meanwhile, tensions over the Strait of Hormuz mounted after Trump threatened to attack Oman if it interfered with efforts to ease the crisis in the critical waterway, as a 60-day deadline for the US and Iran to reach a deal to end the conflict expired.
If you’re just catching up, here’s what to know:
Gaza news
- Kushner described the nearly four-hour long meeting with Netanyahu to Fox News as “very, very good,” saying they were able to address “some valid concerns” raised by the Israeli prime minister.
- Kushner said that Hamas officials “said all the right things” in their meeting on Sunday, but “it’s very, very hard to trust, you know, a terrorist organization that committed these terrible atrocities.”
- Netanyahu told Kushner that Israel would not withdraw any of its forces in Gaza or allow reconstruction to begin until the complete disarmament of Hamas, according to a senior Israeli official.
US-Iran tension
- Vessel movements through key shipping channels remains depressed. MarineTraffic data shows at least three commercial ships passed through the Strait of Hormuz over the last 24 hours: two tankers moved into the Persian Gulf, while one vessel exited into the Gulf of Oman.
- Iraq’s Kurdistan Regional Government Prime Minister Masrour Barzani accused Iran of launching drone attacks targeting his office and the residence of the head of the Kurdish intelligence agency Parastin. Tehran denied the allegation and suggested the incident may have been a “false flag” operation.
- Trump pushed back on reports of dwindling supplies and low morale on the USS Abraham Lincoln, calling recent reporting from CNN “fake news.” Since the Lincoln left its home port of San Diego, the carrier has been deployed for more than 250 days after being redirected to the Middle East to support US operations in the war with Iran.
- Trump also suggested that he and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un have recently communicated, a day after announcing that he plans to reduce military exercises with key regional ally South Korea over a lack of help in Iran.
CNN’s Mostafa Salem, Mohammed Tawfeeq and Eyad Kourdi, Jennifer Hansler, Molly English, Alayna Treene, Tal Shalev and Avery Schmitz contributed to this report.
Vessel traffic through Mideast chokepoints remains muted, data shows
Vessel movements through two significant shipping channels is still depressed, months into the US-Iran war.
Before the war, an average of about 110 ships transited the waterway daily.
Farther west, at least 37 commercial ships transited the Bab al-Mandeb strait over the same period. Nineteen vessels entered the Red Sea — 13 cargo ships and six tankers — while 18 left into the Gulf of Aden, consisting of 13 cargo ships and five tankers.
The United States, in a statement published by the Defense Department, said that “CENTCOM forces have redirected 64 commercial vessels, disabled 3, and boarded 2 to ensure compliance,” as of August 17.
GPS spoofing also remains a concern, as navigation systems interference causes ships’ broadcast positions show up in the wrong places, throwing vessels’ reported coordinates off by dozens of miles and complicating monitoring efforts.
Iraq's Kurdistan leader accuses Iran of drone attacks; Tehran denies the allegation
Iraq’s Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) Prime Minister Masrour Barzani on Monday accused Iran of launching drone attacks targeting his office and the residence of the head of the Kurdish intelligence agency Parastin. Tehran denied the allegation and suggested the incident may have been a “false flag” operation.
No casualties were reported in the attack, the security agency said. There has been no claim of responsibility for the attack.
“Based on information and investigations conducted by the Counter-Terrorism Directorate in the Kurdistan Region, it has been confirmed that my personal office and the residence of the President of the Parastin Agency were subjected today to Iranian attacks using drones,” Barzani said in a post on X.
Barzani condemned the “reckless and unacceptable attacks,” saying they constituted “a serious escalation and a direct threat to the security and stability of the region.”
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei rejected the accusation on Monday, telling state-run IRNA that reports of an attack on Barzani’s office were a “highly suspicious development” requiring vigilance and careful scrutiny.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi echoed that position in a separate post on X, condemning the attack while questioning who was responsible.
“Nothing justifies the reckless attack on PM Barzani’s office,” Araghchi wrote. “Kurdish friends should be vigilant against false-flag ploys to sow discord between neighbors.”
The KRG, based in Erbil, is the governing authority of Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdistan Region, with its own president, parliament, cabinet and security forces known as the Peshmerga.
Kushner: US expects Hamas to start disarming soon, but is ready to support Israel if not
US special envoy Jared Kushner claimed that “progress could come quite soon” in Gaza if both sides cooperate, but indicated the US would support further Israeli military action in the territory if Hamas does not disarm.
“If Hamas actually gives over the weapons in the tunnels willingly over the next 60 to 90 days, that obviously would be the elimination of a huge security threat for Israel, almost an unthinkable achievement,” Kushner said in an interview with Fox News after meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Monday.
Kushner said that Hamas officials “said all the right things” in their meeting on Sunday, but “it’s very, very hard to trust, you know, a terrorist organization that that committed these terrible atrocities.”
“We had a very cordial meeting,” he said. “And so we’re going to give them a chance to perform, but it’s going to have to be based on actions and steps.”
Kushner described the nearly four-hour long meeting with Netanyahu on Monday as “very, very good,” saying they were able to address “some valid concerns” raised by the Israeli prime minister.
“We were able to go through some of the misunderstandings and misinformation,” such as on Israel’s right to defend itself and Gaza’s reconstruction, Kushner said.
Trump says USS Lincoln has enough food, calling reports of dwindling supplies “fake”
President Donald Trump pushed back on reports of dwindling supplies and low morale on the USS Abraham Lincoln Monday, calling recent reporting from CNN “fake news.”
Trump said to reporters in the Oval Office that there was enough food on the aircraft carrier, despite sailors and family members telling CNN the ship has experienced intermittent food shortages, low supplies of hygiene items and problems with the water system.
“The Lincoln has been out there for a period of time, good period of time,” Trump continued. “But over the years we’ve had them out there much longer.”
Since the Lincoln left its home port of San Diego last November, the aircraft carrier has been deployed for more than 250 days after being redirected to the Middle East to support US operations in the war with Iran, now entering its sixth month. The ship may break a record for the longest trip away from its home port for a US carrier since the Vietnam War.
Trump then referenced a meeting with a retired admiral over the weekend: “He said, ‘I’ve been on ships that are out there much longer than that, sir, and I know people on the Lincoln. They say it’s beautifully maintained and beautifully taken care of, and other people went out and they found that to be true.’ That was fake news reporting from CNN.”
Trump says he's communicated with Kim Jong Un amid announcement on military exercises
President Donald Trump on Monday suggested that he and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un have recently communicated, acknowledging it a day after announcing that he plans to reduce military exercises with key regional ally South Korea over a lack of help in Iran.
Trump told reporters that Kim has responded to the White House’s requests to “have a conversation,” without detailing the substance of that response.
Trump announced the reduction in military exercises on Sunday, just hours before they were due to get underway, citing his positive relationship with Kim and South Korea’s lack of assistance with Iran.
The president also dismissed criticism that he is prioritizing the interests of adversaries like North Korea over long-term allies, arguing his approach to Kim is making the world safer.
“I’m making it much safer. I’m actually making it much safer. Kim Jong Un has always treated me with great respect. And we met on numerous occasions, actually two primary occasions. Spoken and spent time,” Trump said, referencing meetings with Kim during his first administration.
“I understand him. He understands me. … I get along with him very well. What I’m doing is making things safer,” he added.
Last year, Trump administration officials privately discussed setting up a meeting between Trump and Kim around the president’s October trip to Asia. CNN previously reported that Trump’s initial outreach to the North Korean leader earlier in 2025 never received a reply because the North Koreans would not accept the letter.
Board of Peace again demands Hamas disarmament before Israeli withdrawal from Gaza
After a lengthy meeting in Jerusalem with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, President Donald Trump’s Board of Peace once again demanded the complete disarmament of Hamas before any withdrawal of Israeli forces within Gaza, according to an official with the US-backed organization.
“It was agreed that there will be no IDF redeployment from Gaza until Hamas is fully disarmed and all of Gaza is demilitarized - every weapon, light and heavy, and every tunnel,” said the official after the meeting that lasted more than four hours. Board of Peace director Nickolay Mladenov took part in the meeting with Netanyahu, as did US envoy Jared Kushner and former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair.
The official made no mention of Netanyahu’s recent rejection of the latest 15-point ceasefire plan, which had been hailed by Trump as a major breakthrough. Instead, the official said that the Board of Peace and Netanyahu have agreed “on a path forward.”
“The Israelis are going to give this a chance,” the official said. “Now it’s up to Hamas to show if it truly intends to comply.” Hamas has refused to unilaterally disarm without the end to Israel’s near-daily attacks in Gaza and the concurrent withdrawal of Israeli forces.
The Board of Peace informed Netanyahu that Hamas has agreed to disarmament and to halt its military activity in Gaza. In exchange, Netanyahu affirmed that Israel would “honor its outstanding commitments,” according to the official. It’s unclear what - if any - changes Netanyahu agreed to make, since a senior Israeli official said Israel would not stop its targeted killings of Hamas commanders.
The focus on Hamas contrasts with a joint statement Sunday from a number of Arab and Muslim countries - including mediators Qatar and Egypt - that blamed Israel for the stalled ceasefire plan. Pointing to Netanyahu’s rejection of the latest plan, the countries said: “Israel now bears responsibility for obstructing the efforts to bring peace in Gaza.”
Netanyahu tells Kushner no withdrawal until full Hamas disarmament, Israeli official says
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told US envoy Jared Kushner that Israel would not withdraw any of its forces in Gaza or allow reconstruction to begin until the complete disarmament of Hamas, according to a senior Israeli official.
The two also agreed that an American general would oversee the decommissioning of Hamas weaponry, the official said, which would be the first step in the demilitarization of the shattered enclave.
Hamas has refused to disarm unless it is sequenced with an end to near-daily Israeli attacks on Gaza and the beginning of a withdrawal of Israeli forces currently occupying more than half of the territory.
Board of Peace director Nickolay Mladenov and former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair also took part in the meeting. According to an official readout from Netanyahu’s office, the group agreed to establish working groups on disarmament and on sanitation, clean water, and public health issues.
According to a separate Israeli source, Netanyahu said that making progress on the Trump administration’s latest 15-point ceasefire plan for Gaza — which Israel rejected — would be “problematic” because of the upcoming Israeli elections.
The source also told CNN that Netanyahu insisted Israel would not change its policies on the ongoing targeted killings of Hamas commanders.
What experts say about Trump's stated plan to make the Strait of Hormuz a "US territory"
On Friday, President Donald Trump said he plans to declare the Strait of Hormuz a US territory after “we finish defeating Iran,” which he said would happen “pretty soon.”
Days before, the president claimed the US had “total control” over the waterway. “We own it, and at some point, maybe they’ll do something, and then they get blown away,” Trump told reporters.
Trump has repeatedly claimed the US “owns” the Strait of Hormuz, parts of which form the territorial seas of Iran and Oman. However, maritime law experts point out claiming a territory is not this simple.
“Under US law, claiming territory by a Presidential declaration (or) decree is not enough. There are important constitutional requirements that must be cleared first,” Jason Chuah, Professor of Maritime Law at City, University of London and Distinguished Fellow, Maritime Institute of Malaysia, told CNN.
While the occupation of a territory might give the occupying state control over the area, he said, “on its own, it does not convey legal title.”
Simon Baughen, Professor of Shipping Law at Swansea University, said the path toward claiming Hormuz as a US territory was unlikely to come to fruition.
A more likely outcome, Baughen suggested, could be that the US, Iran and Oman agree to open the Strait of Hormuz and charge tolls to vessels passing through the waterway.
But, he said: “That is also illegal under customary international law and also the provisions of the 1982 UNCLOS (United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea) Treaty.”
Neither Iran nor Oman has absolute rights over the Strait of Hormuz, Chuah pointed out. “Freedom of navigation prevails. That is the law,” he said.
“A navy can control a waterway. It cannot, merely by controlling it, rewrite the law of title,” Chuah added.
Trump threatens to attack Oman as Kushner meets with Netanyahu. Catch up here
US President Donald Trump has threatened to attack Oman if it interferes with his country’s efforts in the Strait of Hormuz, as the conflict with Iran continues and a two-month window for peace talks expires without a clear path to end the war.
“If Oman gets in the way, we’ll bomb the shit out of them,” Trump said in an interview with Fox News’ Trey Yingst that was published today.
Here’s what else is going on in the Middle East:
- Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for more than four hours today, pressing him to move forward with the Trump-backed Gaza ceasefire plan and “not create obstacles,” an Israeli source familiar with the discussions said.
- Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthis have said they attacked what they described as a Saudi military ship and four escort vessels in the Red Sea with ballistic missiles, following a weekend of escalation in the region.
- Oil prices are rising modestly today, after the 60-day window for US-Iran peace talks closed without any lasting deal to end the war. Brent crude, the global oil benchmark, climbed 0.38% to $88.85 a barrel.
- Talks between Iran and Oman regarding the Strait of Hormuz are complex but continuing “in all seriousness,” Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei said. He pointed to several “actors trying to exert influence on this process” as a reason for the delay in a deal.
- Iran’s army is offering a 5 billion tomans ($30,000) cash bounty for anyone who kills or captures a US soldier and hands them over to authorities, according to the country’s semi-official Mehr news agency.
- Inflation rates in Iran have reached “alarming levels,” with many working-class families in the country unable to afford basic food items, according to state-affiliated Iranian media.
CNN’s Alejandra Jaramillo, Tal Shalev, Billy Stockwell, Mostafa Salem, Hanna Ziady, Aida Karimi and Laura Sharman contributed to this reporting.
Kushner pressed Netanyahu in 4-hour meeting to “not create obstacles” to stalled Gaza plan
In a meeting that lasted more than four hours, US envoy Jared Kushner pressed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to move forward with the Trump-backed Gaza ceasefire plan and “not create obstacles,” according to an Israeli source familiar with the discussions.
Netanyahu, who rejected the 15-point plan earlier this month, said that making progress on the plan was “problematic” because of the upcoming Israeli elections at the end of October, the source told CNN. Courting a right-wing voter base and trailing in repeated polls, Netanyahu has been unwilling to make concessions on Gaza ahead of the elections.
Instead, Netanyahu told Kushner and Board of Peace director Nickolay Mladenov that Hamas needed to take steps first, the source said. The two met with Hamas in Egypt on Sunday.
Netanyahu has demanded that Hamas completely disarm before Israel begins to withdraw its forces from Gaza. But Hamas has said it’s only willing to disarm if that occurs alongside a sequenced withdrawal of Israeli forces from the enclave.
Trump’s threat to Oman isn’t unusual. He does this a lot these days.
This is not the first time President Donald Trump has threatened Oman; he also did so back in May. But it’s also just not that rare for Trump to threaten other countries, period.
Back in May, CNN calculated that Trump had either attacked or threatened one out of every 13 counties in the world. Oman was at least the 15th, out of nearly 200 countries.
Trump has launched strikes in seven countries in his second term alone: Iran, Iraq, Nigeria, Somalia, Syria, Venezuela and Yemen. He’s also threatened or left open the possibility of strikes against seven others: Canada, Colombia, Cuba, Greenland (which is part of Denmark), Mexico, Panama and now Oman.
Of course, a dynamic we’ve also seen a lot during the Iran war is that often Trump’s threats don’t necessarily mean a whole lot. Repeatedly, he has made very specific threats and then, even when Iran didn’t comply with his demands, he declined to make good on those threats.
Trump will often cite some type of indication of progress when backing off the threat, but that progress has regularly failed to materialize.
Iran's IRGC denies Trump’s claim of backchannel talks
There are currently no backchannel talks between the United States and Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), contrary to US President Donald Trump’s earlier claim, an IRGC spokesperson said Monday.
Earlier today, Trump told Fox News that his administration had established a direct backchannel with the IRGC. He added that he was “not in a hurry” to reach a deal, even as the 60-day window for peace talks closed on Monday without any concrete plans announced to end the war.
In response, a Revolutionary Guards spokesperson told Iran’s semi-official Tasnim news agency that Trump’s claim is a “lie” and “nothing more than fantasies stemming from the delusions and nightmares brought on by defeat and desperation in the war.”
The spokesperson also said diplomacy is not within the remit of the IRGC, according to Tasnim.
A look at previous US presidents' dealings with Iran
US President Donald Trump reiterated today “the number one Goal is, and always will be, that Iran cannot have, in any way, shape, or form, a Nuclear Weapon,” as we’ve reported.
He is the latest American president to come up against a hardline Iranian regime, with the war now in its sixth month.
Here’s a look at how some of Trump’s predecessors interacted with Tehran:
President Jimmy Carter
Almost two years after becoming president, Carter faced the Iran hostage crisis after 90 people, including 66 Americans, were taken hostage when the US embassy in Tehran was seized following the Iranian Revolution.
At the beginning of the crisis, Carter sent US officials to Iran to negotiate the release of the hostages, though Iran’s then-Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini refused to meet with them.
Carter’s foreign policy team “often seemed weak and vacillating” during the crisis, according to the US Office of the Historian.
A week later, Carter ordered Iranian assets in US banks to be frozen. In April 1980, when only some of the hostages had been released, Carter cut diplomatic ties with Iran, announcing further sanctions and ordering all Iranian diplomats to leave the US.
The crisis was eventually resolved after US officials, via Algeria, were able to negotiate the release of the hostages.
On January 19, 1981, the US and Iran signed an agreement to release them, and to unfreeze Iranian assets. After more than a year in captivity and minutes after Carter left the presidency, the hostages were released.
President Ronald Reagan
Carter’s successor Ronald Reagan declared Iran a “state sponsor of terrorism” in 1984. But in 1986, his administration began covertly looking into ways to improve its relationship with Tehran, despite backing Iraq in the Iran-Iraq war.
Reagan approved a high-profit sale of weapons to Iran despite an embargo, in the hopes that it would yield the return of Americans held hostage in Lebanon by Hezbollah, a militia with close ties to Iran. Funds from some of the arms sales were diverted to the Contras, a minority Nicaraguan political group that was fighting the leftist Sandinista government.
The scandal was called the Iran-Contra affair, and it broke just before the 1986 midterm elections, posing an enormous threat to Reagan and his party.
According to PBS, when the scandal emerged, Reagan publicly denied that any operation had taken place. He then retracted his statement a week later, saying that it had not been an arms-for-hostages deal.
“Despite the fact that Reagan defended the actions by virtue of their good intentions, his honesty was doubted,” PBS explains. “Polls showed that only 14 percent of Americans believed the president when he said he had not traded arms for hostages.”
President Barack Obama
Obama managed to negotiate a tentative rapprochement with Tehran during his tenure, having vowed to unfreeze US-Iran relations in his 2008 presidential campaign.
Obama spoke by telephone with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani in 2013, the first direct conversation between leaders in Washington and Tehran since 1979, when Carter talked by telephone with Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi before Pahlavi was overthrown.
Also in 2013, after years of negotiations, a landmark agreement was reached that slowed Iran’s nuclear development program in exchange for the lifting of some sanctions that caused the country’s economy to stagnate.
The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), finalized two years later in 2015, capped Iran’s uranium enrichment for 15 years and facilitated UN-led inspections to ensure Tehran’s adherence to the deal, in exchange for partially dissolving sanctions on Iranian oil wealth and unfreezing billions of dollars in assets.
Trump withdrew from the deal in his first term.
Yemen’s Houthis claim attack on Saudi military vessels in Red Sea
Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthis said Monday they had attacked what they described as a Saudi military ship and four escort vessels in the Red Sea with ballistic missiles, following a weekend of escalation in the region.
According to the group’s spokesperson Yahya Saree, the vessels were targeted off the coast of Yemen’s port city of Mokha – the site of repeated Houthi attacks in recent days. CNN cannot independently verify the militant group’s latest claim, and there has been no immediate comment from Saudi authorities.
Clashes have intensified near the Bab al-Mandeb Strait, a key maritime chokepoint, after the Houthi group declared a blockade of Saudi shipping in the Red Sea. Saudi Arabia is the main backer of Yemeni government forces.
Monday’s claimed attack comes after the Houthis launched several ballistic missiles at Mokha on Friday, according to Yemen’s internationally recognized government. The port later suspended operations, Reuters reported.
The Yemeni government’s armed forces said Sunday they had carried out nearly 200 attacks on the Houthi movement in the previous 24 hours.
On Monday, the Houthi group said it would continue monitoring all “Saudi enemy movements” in the area and vowed to “target these movements and mobilization, whether on land or at sea.”
CNN’s Mitchell McCluskey contributed reporting.
Trump threatens Oman as US-Iran agreement expires
US President Donald Trump threatened today to attack Oman if it interferes with US efforts in the Strait of Hormuz, as the conflict with Iran continues and a two-month window for peace talks expires without a clear path to end the war.
“If Oman gets in the way, we’ll bomb the shit out of them,” Trump said in an interview with Fox News’ Trey Yingst.
Trump’s comments come as the 60-day window for peace talks between the US and Iran, agreed to in June, closed Monday without any concrete plans announced for the war to end. Meanwhile, Iran said Monday that its talks with Oman regarding the Strait of Hormuz are complex but continuing.
This isn’t the first time Trump has threatened Oman, which is a US ally. At a Cabinet meeting in May, the president said: “Oman will behave just like everybody else, or we’ll have to blow ‘em up.”
Trump also confirmed to Fox News that his administration has established a direct backchannel with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, but said he is in no rush to reach a deal.
CNN has reached out to the White House for comment on Trump’s threats against Oman.
Oil prices tick up as hopes of a US-Iran deal fade
Oil prices are rising modestly after a 60-day window for US-Iran peace talks closed Monday without any lasting deal to end the war.
Brent crude, the global oil benchmark, climbed 0.38% to $88.85 a barrel. West Texas Intermediate, the US benchmark, was broadly flat at $82.42 a barrel. Brent has climbed by about $10 a barrel from the lows seen in early August as diplomatic efforts to end the conflict stalled.
“We do not see an easy way out of the current situation,” Mohit Kumar, chief European economist at investment bank Jefferies wrote in a note. “Iran will not give up control over the Strait (of Hormuz) and the US would not accept a solution where Iran can charge tolls and control the passage of ships through the strait,” he added.
Despite the impasse, oil prices have remained below $100 a barrel for several months. That’s in part because shipping traffic through Hormuz is likely higher than official numbers suggest, according to Kumar.
The historic supply shock has also been softened by other factors, including alternative export routes out of the Gulf, China reducing its oil imports, the United States increasing production and drawdowns from global oil stockpiles.
“The global supply-demand situation is not that bad and the markets can withstand a few weeks of Strait closure,” Kumar said.
An agreement between the US and Iran has expired — what now?
The deadline to end the war between Iran and the United States expired today, leaving both countries deadlocked over management of the Strait of Hormuz and the future of frozen Iranian funds. So, what happens now?
Tehran and Washington committed in a memorandum of understanding signed in June to achieve a “final deal in maximum 60 days” through negotiations, but also accounted for failure to do so by agreeing to extend that deadline with mutual consent.
What was set to be negotiated over two months was the future of Iran’s nuclear program and sanctions relief for Iran.
However, the 60-day ceasefire was mired with infringements. Iran rejected how ships were choosing to transit through the Strait of Hormuz and began targeting vessels, and the US responded by launching intensive strikes against Iranian targets. The Islamic Republic proceeded to fire missiles and drones on neighboring countries hosting US bases.
All eyes now turn towards negotiations between Iran and Oman expected to resolve how ships cross Hormuz. If the issue of movement in the maritime chokepoint is resolved, with agreement from Washington and its allies across the region, it may remove a major hurdle towards unlocking further negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program and sanctions.
For now, Iranian officials have said that a “transit route map” has been agreed upon with Oman, but a final agreement including a joint statement has not been finalized.
Referring to one of the reasons for the delay, Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei said some “malevolent parties” want the region to “always be in a state of conflict and chaos.”
Trump says stopping Iran nuclear weapon is top goal, undercutting advisers on oil prices
President Donald Trump reiterated Monday that the US’ top goal in the Iran war is preventing the country from obtaining a nuclear weapon — undercutting some of his advisers who have emphasized keeping global oil and gas prices low as an equally important priority.
The president’s statement comes after Vice President JD Vance said last week that the administration has two goals in the war, including maintaining the flow of oil and gas from Gulf countries.
Appearing on Fox News on Thursday, Vance was asked how the conflict could ultimately end.
“It’s ensuring that the Gulf countries continue to send oil and gas to the world economy so that we have energy price stability,” Vance said, adding: “That’s goal number one: Keep oil and gas cheap for Americans all over our country. And then, obviously, goal number two is ensure that Iran never gets a nuclear weapon.”
When asked Friday about Vance’s comments, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said that “both goals are equally as important to the president.”
Israeli strikes on Lebanon highlight cracks in US-Iran Memorandum of Understanding
Saturday marked one of the deadliest days in Lebanon since the US-Iran Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed in June, an agreement intended to pave the way for negotiations toward a permanent end to the war.
The MoU’s opening paragraph called for an “immediate and permanent termination of military operations on all fronts, including in Lebanon,” but fighting between Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah has continued in southern Lebanon throughout the 60-day deadline to end the war under the agreement.
Israeli strikes killed 11 people and wounded 19 others in Lebanon on Saturday, according to the country’s health ministry, making it the deadliest day since the truce. The Israel Defense Force said the strikes were targeting Hezbollah infrastructure after the militant group carried out what it described as “an action” against Israeli soldiers in southern Lebanon. It did not provide any details about the Hezbollah action.
Israel also agreed to withdraw its troops from two areas in southern Lebanon in another set of talks brokered by the US in June after the MoU was signed. The agreement stipulated that Hezbollah must disarm, but the group rejected that condition until Israel fully withdraws.
Israeli strikes in Lebanon have killed at least 4,346 people since March 2, according to the Lebanese Ministry of Public Health. The latest escalation comes as the 60-day period has expired without a final agreement, with negotiations stalled and both sides accusing each other of violating the terms of the MoU.
