President Donald Trump said he plans to waive oil-related sanctions, have the US Navy escort tankers through the Strait of Hormuz and predicted the war with Iran would resolve “very soon” as he confronted mounting economic and political pressures after days of dramatic fluctuations in oil markets.
The president said that he did not believe the conflict would be over this week, but insisted the operation was ahead of schedule and looked to shore up investors increasingly concerned about energy prices. He vowed bombing “at a much, much harder level” if Iran disrupted oil supplies alongside his sanctions pledge.
“We’re looking to keep the oil prices down,” Trump said at a news conference at his resort in Doral, Florida. “They went artificially up because of this excursion.”
The president did not offer additional specifics, beyond acknowledging he had discussed the topic with Russian President Vladimir Putin in a phone call earlier Monday. Russia has faced sanctions on its oil revenue in an international bid to deprive the country of revenue over its war in Ukraine.
But as a whole, Trump’s remarks underscored a new willingness by the White House to publicly indicate that it could be moving soon to attempt to wrap up the conflict.
“Together with our Israeli partners, we’re crushing the enemy in an overwhelming display of technical skill and military force,” Trump told Republican lawmakers earlier Monday. At the press conference, the president claimed the US had hit 5,000 targets in the country, said Iran’s missile capability was down to 10%, and that drone launches from the country had decreased 83%. The US military objectives could be described as “pretty well complete,” Trump said.
At the same time, Trump acknowledged unanswered questions that remained about the leadership in Tehran and vowed he would “not relent until the enemy is totally and decisively defeated.” The president said that while the US had sunk more than 50 Iranian ships, a prolonged conflict could see the US bomb additional “important targets” including electricity production facilities.
“We’ve already won in many ways, but we haven’t won enough,” he said. “We go forward more determined than ever to achieve ultimate victory that will end this long-running danger once and for all.”
The comments underscored the challenges ahead for Trump, who will need to reconcile his promises of total victory with the economic and political consequences of continuing the war.
US stocks recovered from losses earlier Monday, after the president made intial comments signaling an openness to ending the conflict to CBS News. Those comments sent the S&P 500 up as much as 1%, after a CBS reporter posted the comments on X. Oil and US Treasury yields fell.
US oil futures fell below $90 a barrel post settlement after surging above $119 early in the session in a volatile trading day. Markets eased as the world’s largest economies considered a coordinated effort on emergency energy supplies and Trump’s comments signaled he could seek a conclusion to the conflict.
Still, the Strait of Hormuz remained all but closed, with no finalized plans on how nations will safeguard ships passing through the key waterway.
Trump told CBS the Strait of Hormuz was seeing more ship traffic and that he is “thinking about taking it over.” It was not immediately clear what specific actions the president was contemplating.
Trump also spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin about Iran and the war in Ukraine, Tass reported Monday, citing Yuri Ushakov, an aide to the Russian leader.
The US president, already facing domestic concerns over persistent inflation ahead of November midterm elections, must now grapple with rising gasoline pump prices as the war shows no letup. On Sunday, he called $100 oil a “small price to pay” and said the cost “will drop rapidly when the destruction of the Iran nuclear threat is over.”
The effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz has forced Saudi Arabia, the world’s biggest oil exporter, to reduce production, according to a person familiar with the matter. That follows similar moves by the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Iraq.
Futures pulled back after Group of Seven finance ministers said they were ready to take any steps needed to support global energy supply, including releasing strategic oil reserves.
Still, the G-7 is “not there yet” in terms of agreeing to tap emergency energy supplies, according to France, which holds the current presidency. But the group said in a statement that it would “continue to closely monitor the situation and developments in the energy markets” and “stand ready to take necessary measures, including to support global supply of energy such as stockpile release.”
The US reported its seventh casualty on Sunday. Two Israeli soldiers and about a dozen Israeli civilians also have lost their lives. Data from the UAE suggests Iran’s barrage of missiles and drones is easing, even as Tehran is still attacking Israel and Arab Gulf states regularly with drones and missiles.
As recently as Sunday, Trump’s defense secretary was still signaling that the US would be escalating its attacks on Iran.
“We have just now begun to fight, just now begun to surge,” Pete Hegseth told CBS’s 60 Minutes in an interview.
Israeli forces maintained attacks on southern Lebanon, aiming to degrade Iran-aligned Hezbollah. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization intercepted a ballistic missile fired from Iran toward Turkey on Monday, the second such incident, raising the risk the military alliance could be drawn more directly into the conflict.
More than 1,300 Iranians have died in the war so far, according to an official toll that’s not been updated for several days. Some 486 people have died in Lebanon, according to the nation’s health ministry. Four civilians died in the UAE, while two members of its armed forces were killed when a malfunctioning helicopter crashed. There also have been several deaths in other Gulf countries.
Trump said in a pair of social media posts on Monday that he had spoken to Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to help ensure safety of the Iranian women’s soccer team, whose players finished their competition in the Asian Cup on the Gold Coast. Trump said the players would “most likely be killed” if they returned to Iran.
On Sunday, Iran’s media announced that Mojtaba Khamenei — whose father Ayatollah Ali Khamenei ruled the country for almost 37 years and was killed when US-Israeli strikes began on Feb. 28 — won a “decisive vote” in Iran’s Assembly of Experts to become supreme leader.
The 56-year-old has deep ties to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, about the most powerful military and economic organization in Iran. The group pledged full obedience to the new leader.
On Monday, Trump indicated his displeasure, saying Iran should put in a leader “that’s going to be able to do something peacefully, for a change.”
The new leader “shares many of the same ideological leanings as his father and will aim to maintain continuity — including in the war,” said Dina Esfandiary, a Bloomberg Geoeconomics analyst. His election “suggests Iran won’t be shifting tack in the Middle East war,” she said.
“It’s unclear whether he will display flashes of pragmatism like his father did when he pursued and accepted the 2015 nuclear deal,” Esfandiary added. “For now, that seems unlikely.”
On Saturday, Iran President Masoud Pezeshkian vowed not to back down, saying “the idea that we would surrender unconditionally — they must take such a dream to the grave.”
Saudi Arabia hardened its tone against Iran as it dealt with incoming projectiles again on Monday, including ones heading toward oil giant Aramco’s Shaybah field and areas in and around Riyadh.
The Saudi foreign ministry warned that Tehran’s actions risk further escalation, in which Iran “will be its biggest loser.” The strikes and comments suggest the kingdom hasn’t been successful in its efforts to intensify diplomatic outreach to Iran.
On Monday, the US ordered American non-essential diplomats in Saudi Arabia to leave the country, citing safety risks. The move marks Washington’s first “ordered departure” since the war began. It follows a US servicemember’s death after being wounded in an attack on US troops in Saudi Arabia on March 1.
Israel struck many fuel depots in Tehran on Saturday, sparking a warning from the Red Crescent about toxic acid rain in the city of 9.5 million people.
Read More: Tehran Engulfed in Fire, Smoke and Acid Rain Following Strikes
US Senator Lindsey Graham, a firm supporter of the war, asked Israel to “please be cautious about what targets you select.” Oil infrastructure, he said, will be essential to Iran’s recovery “when this regime collapses.”
Israel said the fuel storage sites were legitimate military targets because they help Iran’s war effort, and added it might target power stations next.
Trump is weighing the option of deploying special forces on the ground to seize Iran’s near-bomb-grade uranium, as officials grow increasingly concerned the stockpile may have been moved, according to three diplomatic officials briefed on the matter.
But the US is still “nowhere near” ordering troops into Iran to safeguard nuclear material, Trump told the New York Post on Monday.
A desalination plant in Bahrain was damaged following an Iranian drone attack, the government there said, adding that there was no impact on water supplies.
The Iranian strike on Bahrain came after Tehran accused the US of hitting one of its desalination plants. Persian Gulf countries rely on the facilities for most of their fresh drinking water and sustained attacks could compound the impact of a war.
