Article content

U.S. President Donald Trump said he’s holding off delivering new strikes on Iran, after Tehran and other Middle Eastern powers told him they’re working on an agreement that might quickly reopen the Strait of Hormuz.

Article content

Trump said he’d agreed to cancel the attack, “subject to being able to rapidly make a DEAL,” according to a post on Truth Social. “Get to work, everybody, and get it DONE.”

Article content

Article content

Article content

The announcement marks a moment of potential respite after days of escalating tensions that saw Trump preparing to hit the Islamic Republic “very hard” in a bid to bring an end to a conflict that’s now in its sixth month.

Article content

Article content

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Sunday on Telegram that negotiations between Iran and Oman are in the final stages. The two countries that flank the strait are discussing a new route through it, but the talks don’t cover whether the strait will be closed or open, Araghchi spokesman Esmail Baghaei said in an interview on Iranian state-run TV. Baghaei blamed the U.S. for the waterway being closed to shipping traffic.

Article content

Waves of tit-for-tat Iranian attacks on American allies have targeted countries across the Middle East, while Tehran’s effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz — a global shipping chokepoint — has driven sharp swings in energy prices.

Article content

The U.S. was asked “to hold off any attack in that the perimeters of a deal has been agreed to,” Trump said in his post on Saturday. “This would include the Immediate, Complete, and Total OPENING OF THE HORMUZ STRAIT, and an end to Iran’s nuclear threat.”

Article content

Article content

Article content

Iran’s semi-official Fars news agency, which is affiliated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, said Trump’s claim of halting attacks was a “repeated retreat from threats.”

Article content

Article content

Axios reported earlier that Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman had urged Trump to refrain from new strikes. The official Saudi news agency said Sunday the kingdom’s de facto ruler had stressed to Trump the need for dialogue to de-escalate tensions.

Article content

Israel, which launched the war alongside the U.S. but wasn’t party to an initial Washington-Iran peace deal in June, is waiting out the latest diplomatic push, according to a member of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s security cabinet, Zev Elkin.

Article content

There’s “some kind of vector toward an agreement between Iran and Oman,” he told local Army Radio on Sunday. The two nations held discussions last month that sought to reopen the Hormuz strait.

Article content

Elkin expressed skepticism: “We’ll all wait to see if this vector really does become a full agreement, and whether it will be implemented and where it’s all leading.”

Article content

Trump met with Netanyahu at the White House last week, their first meeting since the Iran war began in late February. The Israeli premier said they’d discussed options for pursuing the campaign.