ANKARA, July 8 – U.S. President Donald Trump warned Iran that the United States will likely engage in additional strikes on Wednesday night after attacks the previous day.
“I’ll give a little warning: We’re going to hit them hard tonight,” Trump told reporters at the NATO summit in Turkey before his meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy.
In earlier comments to reporters in Ankara, Trump said a memorandum of understanding that served as an initial ceasefire deal between the United States and Iran was “over”.
But he did not explicitly say Washington would return to full-fledged war and it was not immediately clear whether the negotiations between the two sides to turn the ceasefire into a permanent deal would still continue or not.
“I don’t know if we’re going to have a deal. We may just do it without a deal,” Trump said before his meeting with Zelenskiy.
In a flare-up of hostilities that pushed oil prices up sharply, Iran said it had targeted U.S. military sites in Bahrain and Kuwait after U.S. forces struck Iranian targets in response to attacks on tankers in the Strait of Hormuz.
The renewed hostilities have also heightened safety and security concerns around the Strait of Hormuz, with shipping data showing at least four oil and gas tankers had turned back rather than try to transit the waterway, a vital supply route. REUTERS