US President Donald Trump said he expected a deal with Iran to be completed within the coming week to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, after Israel and Hezbollah agreed to stop attacking each other in Lebanon.
Iranian leaders earlier announced a suspension of negotiations with Washington, saying that a ceasefire in Lebanon must be secured before any broader agreement with the US can proceed.
Mr Trump said talks with Iran were continuing “at a rapid pace”. Later, he told ABC News that while there had been “a little glitch today”, he had “turned that one around very quickly". An agreement to reopen the strait would be reached “over the next week”, he added.
There had been fears Israel was set to launch a major offensive in Beirut’s southern suburbs, a Hezbollah stronghold. Iran responded by threatening to abandon talks with the US and enter Hezbollah’s fight against Israel in Lebanon.
Mr Trump said he secured a pledge from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that his country's forces would refrain from pushing deeper into Lebanon. Hezbollah said it would halt attacks on Israel and its troops, the US President added.
“I had a conversation with Bibi [Benjamin] Netanyahu today, asking him not to go into a major raid of Beirut, Lebanon. He turned his troops around. Thank you Bibi,” Mr Trump said in a post on Truth Social late on Monday.
He added that he “had a conversation” with representatives of Hezbollah's leadership, which the US has designated as a terrorist group. “They agreed to stop shooting at Israel and its soldiers. Likewise, Israel agreed to stop shooting at them. Let’s see how long that lasts – hopefully it will be for eternity,” he wrote.
Axios reported that Mr Trump had angrily confronted Mr Netanyahu in an "expletive-laden" phone call. It quoted US officials and another source briefed on the call.
It followed a day in which Iran attacked Kuwait and issued a warning over developments in Lebanon. Senior officials in Tehran framed Israel’s escalation in the country as a red line that would affect the wider diplomatic track with Washington and explicitly linked the Lebanese front to talks over the strait.
Iran’s Parliamentary Speaker and chief negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, said on X that he told Lebanon's Parliamentary Speaker Nabih Berri that if “the crimes of the Zionist regime in Lebanon continue, we will not only halt the dialogue process, but also stand firmly against them”.
Kuwait came under attack on Monday as the US and Iran traded strikes, emphasising the fragility of efforts to extend a ceasefire and negotiate an end to the war. Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said it struck a US base after the American military said it hit two command-and-control sites in the strait.
Tehran's moves on Monday raised the stakes for Washington and affected its ability to back Israel without jeopardising a broader deal with Iran.
Mr Netanyahu said on X that he told Mr Trump strikes on Beirut would go ahead if Hezbollah continued to attack "our cities and citizens". The Israeli leader said his country's military operations in southern Lebanon would continue regardless.
The regional war began on February 28 with Israeli and US strikes on Iran. Tehran responded by firing thousands of missiles and drones at its Gulf Arab neighbours, while Hezbollah entered the fray shortly afterwards with attacks on Israel. A fragile ceasefire between the US and Iran has been in place since April 8.
