Trump Declares End to Iran Ceasefire, Oil Prices Surge Amid Military Strikes
Donald Trump has declared that the ceasefire with Iran is over. The President of the United States said he did not want to waste time dealing with Iran.
Trump made the remarks after Washington launched strikes against the Islamic Republic. Iran retaliated by targeting American military bases in Gulf states.
“As far as I’m concerned, it’s over,” Trump said at the NATO summit in Ankara, Turkey, when asked if the ceasefire with Iran had now ended. “It’s just a waste of time dealing with them,” he stated.
Following Trump’s statement, world crude oil prices immediately surged by more than five percent. The international benchmark, Brent North Sea crude, jumped 5.3 percent to USD 78.09 per barrel, while West Texas Intermediate crude rose 5.4 percent to USD 74.23 per barrel.
Trump said he would speak with US negotiator Steve Witkoff and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, who have dealt with Iran. However, he stressed that it was up to Tehran to return to the negotiating table.
“As far as I’m concerned, dealing with them is just a waste of time. They are liars,” Trump said. He accused Iran of repeatedly distorting what had been agreed in the ceasefire signed by Washington and Tehran on 17 June. “Everyone agreed, no nuclear weapons. We made a deal. They went out, joked to the press, they said we never even talked about it,” Trump stated.
Earlier, the US military announced that its forces had completed the latest operation targeting Iran’s air defences, missile launch sites, command networks, and military vessels in retaliation for Tehran’s recent attacks on commercial ships in the Strait of Hormuz.
The US military said its forces struck more than 80 targets linked to Iran in an operation it described as a “devastating strike against Iran to deliver a heavy blow.”
US Central Command (CENTCOM), which oversees American military operations in the Middle East, announced that its forces launched offensive strikes targeting Iranian air defence systems, command and control networks, coastal radar sites, anti-ship missile capabilities, and more than 60 small craft belonging to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) in and around the Strait of Hormuz.
In a statement via social media platform X, CENTCOM said the US strikes were launched as a “direct response to Iran’s latest attacks on commercial vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz.” CENTCOM further described its strikes as a “devastating strike against Iran to deliver a heavy blow for its actions targeting and attacking commercial ships initiated by innocent civilians in international shipping lanes.”
Responding to the US attacks, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) launched retaliatory strikes on dozens of US military facilities in Bahrain and Kuwait.
“As an initial response to this aggression, the IRGC Navy and Air Force conducted a combined missile and drone operation, striking 85 major US military facilities in both countries, while also shooting down an MQ-9 drone,” the IRGC said in a statement broadcast by Iranian state television, IRIB.
The IRGC said Iran’s strikes also hit the US Fifth Fleet base in Bahrain and the Ali Al-Salem Air Base in Kuwait. It stated that the operation was an “initial response” to what it called a violation of the ceasefire and agreement by the US.