President Trump said Saturday he had cancelled a planned U.S. bombing campaign on Iran, hours after Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman telephoned him to warn against dragging the Persian Gulf into a 'wider conflict' and after a tanker was struck in the Strait of Hormuz.
The reversal, announced on Truth Social, breaks a week in which the war's tempo had accelerated: a joint U.S.-Israeli strike package aimed at Iranian energy infrastructure was ready to launch as soon as this weekend, U.S. embassies in 10 Middle Eastern capitals told Americans to be ready to leave, and Kuwait's air defenses shot down Iranian drones before dawn Saturday. Trump said the pause was 'subject to being able to rapidly make a DEAL' that would include reopening the Strait of Hormuz and ending Iran's nuclear threat. Tehran denied asking for the halt.
The Riyadh call
Bin Salman placed the call to Trump on Saturday, according to Saudi Arabia's official press agency and CBS News reporting. The Saudi foreign ministry said the crown prince 'stressed the need to prioritize dialogue to reduce escalation and the importance of making every possible effort to achieve calm that paves the way for diplomatic solutions.' A source told CBS News the outreach was 'all about concern over the targets,' a reference to the Iranian energy sites the United States and Israel had been preparing to hit as soon as this weekend.
The Hormuz incidents
The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations agency said a tanker sailing 12.5 miles off Lima, Oman, was 'struck by an unknown projectile which has caused damage to the engine room.' A separate explosion was reported Saturday close to another vessel 21 nautical miles northwest of Khasab. No casualties were reported. Iran's Persian Gulf Strait Authority declared Friday that transit through the waterway was 'not possible.' Kuwait's army said its air defenses had intercepted drones it attributed to 'sinful Iranian aggression'; Iranian state media said the strikes had targeted Ahmad al-Jaber Air Base in retaliation for U.S. attacks earlier in the week on Qeshm Island.
What Trump said
Trump's post said the United States remained 'locked and loaded and ready to go' against Tehran and that 'The Country of Israel joins me' in the commitment. At his Cabinet meeting Friday, before the Saudi call, the president told reporters the U.S. would be 'hitting them very hard' until Iran cracked and said he was 'losing faith' in Iranian negotiators. The pause is the second such reversal in a little over a week; the earlier Omani-mediated halt collapsed on July 28, when Iran fired ballistic missiles at U.S. installations in Jordan.
The counterpoint
Iran rejected Trump's account within hours. The semi-official Mehr news agency called his claim that Tehran had requested the halt 'nothing but a new lie.' Iran's acting Defence Minister, Majid Ibn al-Reza, said the country viewed every threat from adversaries as 'real and credible' even when framed as psychological warfare and added, 'We will neither be caught off guard nor remain passive.' Ross Harrison of the Middle East Institute told Al Jazeera that without a written agreement on the strait, 'this isn’t going to hold' and the announcement was 'only going to be another pause.'
Pakistani and Qatari mediators told Turkey's Anadolu news agency they expect 'positive developments' on the resumption of U.S.-Iran talks by the end of the week. Financial markets reopen Monday.