CAIRO (AP) — After calling off a fresh round of strikes against Iran, U.S. President Donald Trump said Monday that the two sides are resuming talks to wind down the war, even as Iranian officials claimed their diplomatic efforts were focused on neighboring nations.
Talks between the U.S. and Iran are critical to ending the monthslong conflict and reviving stalled cargo traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, a crucial waterway through which about a fifth
of all traded oil and natural gas passed before the war.
Trump, who has made a habit of threatening strikes on Iran only to dangle the prospect of a last-minute diplomatic reprieve, said the negotiations would be the “last chance ” for Iran to forge a deal to reopen the strait and address his concerns about its nuclear program.
But Iran’s foreign ministry said it's negotiating with Oman, not the U.S., prompting Trump to criticize the country’s leadership, which has grown increasingly divided over the war’s endgame.
Whether “Iran wants to admit it or not, we are, in fact, talking," Trump maintained.
Elsewhere, Israel bombed the Gaza Strip and the Syrian president met in Damascus with the Iraqi Kurdish regional leader over security concerns. In Iran, the government executed two men it claimed were Israeli spies.
Here is a look at the most important developments Monday in the Middle East.
Trump said Sunday that he decided against carrying out major strikes against Iran at the urging of Gulf allies Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
He said a plan was in place for U.S. forces to carry out “the biggest attack since World War II,” but he decided to give diplomacy more time after hearing from key Gulf leaders and fielding requests from unnamed Iranian officials. He did not provide further details or say who would be involved in the talks.
The Iranian Foreign Ministry maintained that the country was not currently holding negotiations with the United States.
Esmail Baghaei, an agency spokesperson, said Monday that ongoing talks were with Oman, the country on the other side of the strait, and were focused only on establishing a temporary route for safe navigation through the channel.
Nine vessels transited through the strait Sunday, most of them using an Iranian-controlled route, according to trade data and analytics platform Kpler.
Trump voiced frustration at Iran's public posturing, suggesting the country's leaders begged for the discussions, despite their claims of only wanting to deal with Oman.
“Iranian Leadership is unbelievably duplicitous!” the U.S. president vented on Truth Social, his social media platform.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi arrived Monday in Iraq’s holy city of Najaf to participate in the Arbaeen commemorations, an annual pilgrimage for Shiite Muslims, his office said on social media.
Araghchi’s trip comes as Iraq has been walking a tightrope between Iran and the U.S., an act that has only grown more fraught since the U.S. and Israel went to war with Iran in February.
Meanwhile Iran's Minister of Industry, Mines and Trade, Mohammad Atabak, headed Monday to Pakistan for a two-day visit expected to focus in part on ways to ease transit bottlenecks and move more Iranian containers through Pakistani ports during the U.S. naval blockade.
Syrian interim President Ahmad al-Sharaa and Iraq’s Kurdish regional president met Monday in Damascus to discuss ways of improving mutual cooperation and contributing to regional security.
The meeting between al-Sharaa and Nechirvan Barzani came amid regional tensions as Iranian-backed Iraqi militia groups carried out multiple drone strikes targeting American interests across Iraq, including the country’s Kurdish region.
Syrian state media reported last month that authorities at the country’s border with Iraq thwarted an attempt in June to smuggle weapons believed to have been headed to the Iranian-backed Hezbollah militant group in Lebanon. Hezbollah denied the charges.
Iran’s judiciary said it executed two men Monday after convicting them of spying for Israel during both last year’s 12-day war and the ongoing conflict.
The judiciary’s Mizan news agency identified the two as Omid Behzad and Pouria Safvat, who were accused of providing military coordinates, images and other intelligence used in attacks on Iranian targets. The agency did not specify where the executions took place.
Last week, Iran publicly hanged two men convicted of killing four police officers during nationwide anti-government protests in January.
A top official overseeing Gaza’s postwar transition met Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday, in part to press him to halt military attacks on the territory.
Nikolay Mladenov, the high representative for Gaza on the Board of Peace, also discussed with Netanyahu the need to decommission all weapons in the enclave, the international body established by the U.S. said in a statement.
An Israeli strike Monday evening hit a car in Gaza City, killing two men, according to Shifa Hospital, where the casualties were taken. Over the weekend, Israeli attacks left at least 17 people dead, including children, according to hospitals in Gaza.
The Israeli military said the weekend strikes targeted militants. It confirmed Monday's strike and said it would release more information later.
Days earlier, the U.S. and Hamas reached a deal to disarm the militant group, a potential step toward ending the war in Gaza.
Soaring temperatures in Gaza this summer have turned the makeshift tents sheltering hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians into suffocating ovens. Made of plastic sheets, the shelters trap heat during the day and offer little ventilation, forcing many families to spend hours outside.
The extreme weather compounds an already dire humanitarian crisis. With limited access to clean water, electricity and sanitation, residents of the overcrowded camps are at high risk of dehydration, heat-related illnesses and the spread of skin infections, diarrheal diseases and other communicable illnesses, humanitarian agencies warn.
“There is no breeze, nothing,” said Aida Abu Hadeesha, a woman displaced from the town of Rafah, near the border with Egypt. “Our kids are suffering."
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Becatoros reported from Athens, Greece and Boak from Washington. Associated Press reporters Julia Frankel in Jerusalem, Bassem Mroue in Beirut and Philip Marcelo in New York also contributed to this report.
