Iran war: Trump says US will 'watch over' Strait of Hormuz

The Israeli military has designated large portions of southern Lebanon as a "combat zone."

"We advise the residents of southern Lebanon to evacuate to the north of the Zahrani River, as all areas south of the river are considered combat zones," the Israeli military's Arabic-language spokesman Avichay Adraee said on X. 

The Zahrani River is about 40 kilometers (25 miles) north of the Israel-Lebanon border.  

Israel is currently engaged in combat with Iran-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon, which is both a paramilitary organization and Shiite political party. After the US-Israeli war began on February 28, Hezbollah joined in on March 2 with rocket fire on northern Israel.   

Hamas's armed wing, the Al Qassam Brigades, confirmed that its leader Mohammed Odeh died in an Israeli strike. 

The Al Qassam Brigades said Odeh died "in a cowardly assassination attempt that resulted in the martyrdom of him, his wife and his children." 

The killing of Odeh came a week after his predecessor, Izz al-Din al-Haddad, was killed in an Israeli attack.  

Iran's Revolutionary Guards official Mohammad Akbarzadeh warned Iranian troops were prepared for defense, but sought to downplay the possibility of the full-scale conflict with the US restarting.

"The possibility of war is low because of the enemy's weakness, the armed forces are lying in wait with full magazines," Akbarzadeh,  the deputy political chief of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy, said in comments carred by Iran's semi-official Tasnim News Agency. 

"Do not doubt that we will turn the area from Chabahar to Mahshahr into a graveyard for aggressors," Akbarzadeh said, referring to cities on the southern and northern parts of the Iranian coast.   

During a meeting with his cabinet at the White House, US President Donald Trump spoke on the efforts to end the conflict with Iran. 

"Iran is very much intent, they want very much to make a deal. So far they haven't gotten there... we're not satisfied with it, but we will be. We will be either that or we'll have to just finish the job," Trump said. 

In regards to the Strait of Hormuz, Trump said the passageway would be open and that it would not be controlled by anybody. Trump was asked whether he would accept a deal where both Iran and Oman share the strait. 

"The Strait is going to be open to everybody. It's international waters. We'll watch over it, but nobody's going to control it," Trump said. "Oman will behave like everybody else or we'll have to blow them up. They understand that."

Trump also said the November midterms would not influence his Iran strategy. The Democrats could make big gains in the November election, posing a challenge for his operations with Iran.

"They thought they were gonna outwait me. You know, 'We'll outwait him. He's got the midterms," Trump said, in an apparent reference to the Iranians. "I don't care about the midterms."

The US government appears to be disputing Iranian state media accounts of a tentative provisional agreement in talks between the two sides. 

The Iranian report claimed that a draft outline of a memorandum of understanding (MOU) had been reached and included a US commitment to lift the naval blockade on Iran and withdraw its forces from the Gulf region. 

Using its secondary account on X called Rapid Response 47, the White House insisted "FACTS MATTER" as it rejected the reports. 

"This report from Iranian controlled media is not true and the MOU they 'released' is a complete fabrication," the account claimed. "Nobody should believe what Iranian state media is putting out." 

The White House was yet to comment on its primary account or its website but both sides have frequently issued or leaked information about the state of the faltering talks, only for the other to dispute some or all of the details afterwards. 

The US military will need at least three years to bring its stockpiles of key weapons systems back to the pre-Iran war levels, according to a new report by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a Washington-based think tank.

US-made Tomahawk cruise missiles, Patriot defense systems and THAAD drones and missile interceptors have become massively depleted due to strikes in Iran, the report found.

"The United States has enough munitions for any plausible scenario in the Iran war, but the depleted inventories have created a window of vulnerability for a potential Western Pacific conflict," CSIS was quoted by the AP news agency as saying, referencing a possible conflict with China.

The US is in a geopolitical contest with China, with Washington's more powerful military giving it leverage as Beijing seeks to project power globally.

Beijing has said it wants its military capable of retaking Taiwan by force if necessary no later than 2027. The island, which broke away from the mainland in the aftermath of the Chinese revolution, claims independence and is tacitly supported by several Western countries, including the US.

However, analysts have said that the 2027 deadline is meant to be more of an aspiration for Beijing than a concrete threat to invade the island by that time.

According to Iranian state television, the memorandum of understanding that Washington hopes Tehran will agree to includes reopening the Strait of Hormuz to commercial shipping. In exchange, the US will withdraw its troops from the vicinity and lift its naval blockade.

The deal would have Iran manage the key waterway jointly with Oman.

Before the war, the strait was a key waterway for international shipping, particularly for oil and other energy exports. The monthslong disruption has already had significant negative impacts on the global economy.

Iranian officials stressed that the details were not yet finalized, and that any deal would have to go before the UN Security Council before it can become a binding resolution.

South Korean Vice Foreign Minister Park Yoon-joo said on Wednesday that the government had summoned the Iranian ambassador after an investigation into an explosion aboard a Korean shipping vessel earlier this month.

The HMM Namu had been navigating the flashpoint Strait of Hormuz on May 4 when it was struck by a projectile, injuring a crew member.

"Various pieces of evidence point toward Iran," Park was quoted by the Korea Herald as saying, but he stopped short of saying whether he thought it had been a deliberate attack. 

He added that an inquiry had shown that the projectile was an Iranian-developed anti-ship missile.

Park said that Seoul would press Tehran for "responsible measures, including steps to prevent a recurrence."

US President Donald Trump is set to meet with his cabinet on Wednesday, a day after Secretary of State Marco Rubio implied that a ceasefire deal was in sight. Trump has said that an agreement was "largely negotiated" but that the final details remained in flux.

From the Iranian side, the Revolutionary Guard (IRGC) told Iranian media that the probability of renewed hostilities was "low."

"The possibility of war is low because of the enemy's weakness, the armed forces are lying in wait with full magazines," said Mohammad Akbarzadeh, deputy political chief of the IRGC Navy.

It remains to be seen if the Trump administration will actually gain anything significant from the deal, as little has moved politically in Tehran and a key part of the deal is reopening the Strait of Hormuz, which would be returning to the status quo from the before the war. 

The Israeli military said on Wednesday that the newly appointed chief of Hamas's armed wing had been killed in strikes on Gaza the day before.

Hamas has not confirmed that Mohammad Odeh, whose predecessor had also been killed in Gaza days prior, was deceased. However, a relative told Reuters news agency that he had in fact died.

In a statement on X, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said: "We committed ourselves to eliminating everyone who led the October 7 massacre, and that is what we will do: they are all marked for death, wherever they may be."

Gaza health officials said that at least seven people had been killed and several more were wounded in Israeli strikes on Gaza on Tuesday.

Despite a January 2025 ceasefire deal, Israel has carried out sporadic strikes in Gaza over the past year, also accusing Hamas of failing to carry out its promise to fully disarm. Meanwhile, Israel has expanded its campaign against what it says are Hezbollah targets in Lebanon.

Israeli officials have said that a top Hamas leader was killed in fresh strikes on Gaza, although the militant group has yet to confirm the news.

At the same time, signals from both Iran and the United States indicated that their two-month conflict may be inching towards a peace deal.

Check back here for updates from across the wider Middle East.