Truth Social post<\/a> that he\u2019s instructed his leadership to \u201cto be prepared to go forward with a full, large scale assault of Iran, on a moment\u2019s notice\u201d if a deal isn\u2019t reached.\n <\/p>\n\n He pointed to what he said was regional leaders\u2019 optimism about the prospects of a deal that would be acceptable to the US and allies in the Middle East.\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cThis Deal will include, importantly, NO NUCLEAR WEAPONS FOR IRAN,\u201d Trump said.\n <\/p>\n
\n Later in the day, Trump told reporters at the White House that this time was \u201ca little bit different\u201d from previous instances when he thought Iran was close to an agreement.\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cIt\u2019s a very positive development, but we\u2019ll see whether or not it amounts to anything,\u201d he said, adding that there have been \u201cperiods of time\u201d in which US officials thought a deal was close, \u201cbut this is a little bit different.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
\n After growing frustrated with the state of negotiations, Trump had made plans to strike targets in Iran on Tuesday after being given a list of options from senior military advisers, according to a person familiar with the plan. But the president did not disclose which targets or how extensively the operation under consideration was.\n <\/p>\n
\n Trump told reporters Monday that the Gulf states asked him to put off the attacks for a few days, but that the pause could last longer.\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cWe were getting ready to do a very major attack tomorrow. I put it off for a little while \u2014 hopefully, maybe, forever \u2014 but possibly for a little while, because we\u2019ve had very big discussions with Iran, and we\u2019ll see what they amount to,\u201d Trump said. \u201cI was asked by Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE, and some others if we could put it off for two or three days, a short period of time, because they think that they are getting very close to making a deal.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
\n While reiterating his red line that Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon, Trump also suggested that if the Gulf states were satisfied with a peace proposal, the US would be, too. He said other countries he hadn\u2019t named had also requested that he hold off on more attacks.\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cI was called by these three countries, plus others, and they\u2019re dealing directly with our people, and right now Iran, and there seems to be a very good chance that they can work something out. If we can do that without bombing the hell out of them, I\u2019d be very happy,\u201d Trump told CNN\u2019s Kristen Holmes.\n <\/p>\n
\n Trump warned Iran on Sunday that the \u201cclock is ticking\u201d to make a deal, otherwise it will face a resumption of the military campaign that has been on hold since last month.\n <\/p>\n
\n But Iran\u2019s latest proposal to end the war did not offer significant concessions on some critical sticking points, a person familiar with the matter said Monday. Long-standing disagreements over nuclear enrichment remain central to the impasse, the person added.\n <\/p>\n
\n Earlier Monday, Iran said it had responded to some US concerns about its negotiating position via Pakistani mediators, but American officials did not view the latest offer as making large enough compromises to shift Trump\u2019s thinking.\n <\/p>\n
\n It wasn\u2019t immediately clear what changes Iran made to the document in the latest back-and-forth, but Trump has repeatedly asserted certain red lines \u2014 including on halting enrichment of nuclear material and Iran handing over its stockpile of near-weapons-grade uranium.\n <\/p>\n
\n When Trump announced<\/a> an extension to the ceasefire on April 21, it was Pakistan, he said, who asked him to \u201chold our attack on the country of Iran.\u201d At the time, he also cited divisions within Tehran\u2019s government and said he wanted to wait for a \u201cunified proposal.\u201d\n <\/p>\n\n But the president has only grown more frustrated at the halting pace of negotiations. And at home, the war \u2014 now in its third month \u2014 has spiked gas prices and sunk his approval ratings on the economy.\n <\/p>\n
\n After meeting with top members of his national security team over the weekend, Trump is expected to convene the team again early this week to discuss a path forward. As he made clear in his Monday Truth Social post, he\u2019s leaving his options open.\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cI have instructed Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth, The Chairman of The Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Daniel Caine, and The United States Military, that we will NOT be doing the scheduled attack of Iran tomorrow, but have further instructed them to be prepared to go forward with a full, large scale assault of Iran, on a moment\u2019s notice, in the event that an acceptable Deal is not reached,\u201d he wrote.\n <\/p>\n
\n This story has been updated with additional developments.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"President Donald Trump said Monday that he will \u201chold off\u201d on a Tuesday plan to attack Iran, citing…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":679431,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,41,39,42,40],"class_list":["post-679430","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/679430","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=679430"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/679430\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/679431"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=679430"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=679430"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=679430"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}