On June 11, a small motorboat passes ships anchored in the Strait of Hormuz near Bandar Abbas, Iran.
President Trump said Thursday that he is cancelling strikes in Iran for this evening and that a peace deal will be reached soon.
This is the latest in a series of whiplash proclamations that threaten more attacks while also promising peace.
He wrote on Truth Social, “Based on the fact that discussions with the Islamic Republic of Iran have been brought to the highest levels of Iranian leadership and approved, I, as President of the United States, have this evening cancelled the scheduled attacks and bombings against Iran.”
“The naval blockade will remain in full force and effect until this transaction is finalised – the time and place of the signing will be announced shortly,” he said.
He later said in the Oval Office: “We should be done in the next few days. We’re going to have a signing, probably in Europe, and that’s great.”
Trump was asked if he had achieved any agreement on nuclear issues and he said, “Yes, ideologically.”
The announcement comes as Trump has again been ramping up his war-related rhetoric in recent days.
Earlier Thursday morning, the president said the US would attack Iran “very forcefully tonight” and that the two sides were still in talks, according to Fox News.
Trump posted that the US would also seize critical Iranian oil infrastructure, including Kharg Island, “at some point in the not-too-distant future”.
The island, a key oil infrastructure site for Iran, has long been on the US military’s radar as a strategic target, but it carries a high potential for US casualties.
“My priority has always been to take Kharg Island,” Trump said later on Fox News. But I don’t know if America is ready for it.
And now, Trump says the deal is so close that he will announce the time and place of the signing soon.
The somewhat contradictory statements represent the box Trump is trying to box himself into by subduing Iran – and the bombings – as inflation has reached its highest level in years and his popularity remains at a low point.
It is clear that Trump wants the war to end.
Jennifer Stromer-Galley, a professor of information studies at Syracuse University, says many other things are also out of their control.
He said, “I think from a rhetorical standpoint, Trump is still trying to create the reality that he wants to be true, but it contrasts with the real situation over which he has little control at the end of the day.”
He said it was also about reassuring Americans that the war would end as promised if they had a little more time. The challenge is that gas prices are increasing. Electricity is becoming expensive. And after weeks and weeks of hearing the same thing, polls indicate that Americans are losing confidence in the message.
After more than three months of war, Iran has effectively closed the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow waterway through which about 20% of the world’s energy supplies pass.
A shaky ceasefire has been in place since April, but both sides have been increasingly attacking each other’s targets as Trump has grown frustrated over the lack of an agreement.