{"id":531329,"date":"2026-07-08T14:03:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-08T14:03:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/531329\/"},"modified":"2026-07-08T14:03:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-08T14:03:08","slug":"trump-declares-mou-with-iran-over-as-hegseth-cancels-trip-to-israel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/531329\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump declares MoU with Iran ‘over’ as Hegseth cancels trip to Israel"},"content":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON\/ANKARA \u2014 US President Donald Trump on Wednesday said an interim agreement with Iran<\/a> was effectively dead, following a new exchange of US and Iranian strikes.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo me, I think it\u2019s over. I don\u2019t want to deal with them,\u201d Trump told reporters in Ankara on the sidelines of the NATO summit.<\/p>\n

The remarks came in response to a question about whether the interim agreement signed by Washington and Tehran on June 18, which opened a 60-day window for negotiations aimed at permanently ending the fighting, remained in effect.<\/p>\n

Trump added that negotiating with Tehran was \u201cjust a waste of time.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

The US president later warned that the United States would likely strike again later Wednesday. \u201cWe hit them very hard last night,\u201d Trump said. “We\u2019ll probably hit them again tonight.”<\/p>\n

Trump also suggested the US may reimpose its naval blockade<\/a> of Iran. \u201cWe may take over Kharg Island,\u201d Trump added, reiterating a previous threat to seize Iran\u2019s main oil export terminal.<\/p>\n

Background: Trump\u2019s comments came after three commercial tankers were hit by projectiles while attempting to transit the Strait of Hormuz<\/a> on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

In retaliation, US Central Command said American forces struck more than 80 Iranian military targets overnight, including air defense systems, command-and-control networks, coastal radar sites, anti-ship missile capabilities and more than 60 Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps small boats operating in or near the strait.<\/p>\n

CENTCOM described the attacks on shipping as a dangerous breach of the ceasefire and freedom of navigation.<\/p>\n

Iran resumes Gulf attacks: Iran\u2019s Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, the top military command body responsible for coordinating the country\u2019s armed forces during wartime, condemned the US strikes as a \u201cblatant act of aggression\u201d and warned that any source of support for US operations against Iranian sovereignty would be considered a legitimate target.<\/p>\n

Iran struck two Gulf countries later Wednesday, targeting Bahrain and Kuwait.<\/p>\n

Kuwait\u2019s armed forces said they intercepted two ballistic missiles and 13 drones, while Bahrain\u2019s Foreign Ministry said the kingdom\u2019s air defenses intercepted Iranian projectiles.<\/p>\n

Kuwait\u2019s Ministry of Electricity, Water and Renewable Energy said several overhead power transmission lines were damaged by shrapnel during Kuwait\u2019s response to the attacks. Reuters reported later Wednesday that Kuwait had restored power to all residential areas affected by outages linked to the transmission lines going out of service.<\/p>\n

The Gulf Cooperation Council called the strikes a \u201cblatant assault\u201d on Bahrain and Kuwait\u2019s sovereignty.<\/p>\n

UAE presidential adviser Anwar Gargash said Gulf Arab states could not remain caught between Tehran\u2019s \u201clogic of escalation\u201d and the path of stability.<\/p>\n

Iranian strikes \u201care a clear indicator that Tehran remains incapable of committing to the requirements of de-escalation and turning the page on war,\u201d Gargash wrote on X.<\/p>\n

Hegseth cancels Israel visit: Meanwhile, US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s planned visit to Israel following the NATO summit has been canceled, a well-placed source confirmed to Al-Monitor.<\/p>\n

The reason for the cancellation was not immediately clear.\u00a0<\/p>\n

During what would have been his first visit to the Jewish state as US secretary of defense, Hegseth was expected to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz, CNN reported earlier Wednesday.<\/p>\n

One of the agenda items Hegseth was expected to raise with Israeli officials was the possible sale of F-35 fighter jets to Turkey amid strong Israeli opposition to the sale, a source familiar with the planned discussions said.<\/p>\n

The sale \u201cwould destroy the power balance in the Middle East because Turkey has aggressive aspirations,\u201d Netanyahu told CNN earlier this week.<\/p>\n

During his meeting with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday on the sidelines of the summit, Trump said that his administration would remove sanctions imposed on Turkey under the Countering America\u2019s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act.<\/p>\n

The removal of the sanctions could clear the path for Turkey to acquire F-35 fighter jets. CAATSA sanctions<\/a> were imposed on Turkey in December 2020, after Ankara took delivery of the first components of the Russian-made S-400 missile defense system in July 2019. As a result, Turkey was blocked from acquiring F-35 fighter jets from the United States.<\/p>\n

This developing story has been updated since initial publication.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WASHINGTON\/ANKARA \u2014 US President Donald Trump on Wednesday said an interim agreement with Iran was effectively dead, following…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":531330,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[85,46,43],"class_list":["post-531329","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-israel","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/531329","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=531329"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/531329\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/531330"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=531329"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=531329"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=531329"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}