Iran has pushed back against Donald Trump, putting its new peace deal on the table and warning the US President that the room for American decision-making had narrowed, as ITV News’ Ellie Pitt reports.
\nIran says the US has responded to its latest peace proposal, and Tehran is currently reviewing the reply.
\nProposal includes 30-day resolution aimed at ending war, Iranian state-linked media reports.
\nDonald Trump says a project will start on Monday to help stranded ships leave the Strait of Hormuz.
\nTrump warned there could be fresh strikes on Iran if regime “misbehaves”.
\nUK military’s Maritime Trade Operations centre says a ship near the Strait of Hormuz reports being attacked.
\nEleven villages and towns in Lebanon ordered to evacuate by Israel on Sunday despite ceasefire.
\nUS sends $8 billion in weapons to Israel, Qatar, UAE and Kuwait.
\nMore than 5,000 US troops will leave Germany, Trump says.
\nThe United States has responded to Iran’s latest peace proposal, and Tehran is reviewing Washington’s reply, the country’s foreign ministry spokesperson has said.
\nSpeaking on state television on Sunday, Esmaeil Baghaei said the proposal does not include “nuclear negotiations” and “exclusively focuses on ending the war”.
\nIn a post on Truth Social on Sunday, Trump said his representatives are having discussions with Iran that could lead to something “very positive for all.”
\nIt comes as Trump said the US will start helping stranded ships leave the Strait of Hormuz on Monday.
\nIran’s peace proposal includes a 30-day resolution to end the war and requests the US cease its blockade on Iranian ports and remove troops from the region, state-linked media has reported.
\nIt calls for the US to lift sanctions on Iran, end the ongoing naval blockade, withdraw forces from the region, and cease all hostilities, including Israel\u2019s operations in Lebanon, according to the semi-official Nour News agency.
\nWhen Trump confirmed he was “reviewing” the proposals on Saturday, he did not appear optimistic about it, saying Iran had “not yet paid a big enough price for what they have done to Humanity, and the World, over the last 47 years.”
\nThe US and Iran struck a ceasefire agreement on April 7 and have not traded fire since then, but American forces have been blocking Iranian ports along the Strait of Hormuz since April 13.
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\nThis is in response to Iran almost entirely closing the waterway to the rest of the world since the war began, which has seen oil prices soar.
\nOn Sunday, Trump announced “Project Freedom” would begin on Monday morning.
\nIn a post on Truth Social, he said Sunday that “neutral and innocent” countries have been affected by the Iran war, and “we have told these Countries that we will guide their Ships safely out of these restricted Waterways, so that they can freely and ably get on with their business.”
\nHowever, earlier on Sunday, Iran\u2019s deputy parliament speaker said the nation would “not back down” from its position on the Strait of Hormuz.
\nIt comes as a cargo ship near the Strait of Hormuz said it was attacked by multiple small craft, according to the British military\u2019s United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations centre on Sunday.
\nAll crew on the unidentified northbound carrier were safe after the attack off Sirik, Iran, east of the strait, the monitor said.
\nIran stands firm on Strait of Hormuz
\nIran\u2019s deputy parliament speaker said on Sunday that Iran \u201cwill not back down” from its position on the Strait of Hormuz, adding that the waterway “will not return to its prewar conditions”.
\nAli Nikzad, who has no decision-making power in parliament, made the comments while on a visit to port facilities on Iran\u2019s strategic Larak Island, located close to the narrowest part of the strait.
\n\u201cThe Strait of Hormuz belongs to the Islamic Republic of Iran,\u201d he said, adding that the country was working to compensate businesses and property damaged during the war, and that Trump’s blockade plan was certain to fail.
\nNikzad reiterated Iran\u2019s position that any ships not associated with the US or Israel will be able to pass after paying a toll.
\nThe US has warned shipping companies they could face sanctions for paying Iran in any form, including digital assets, to pass safely.
\nLebanese villages and towns told to evacuate
\nCivilians living in Al-Duwayr, Arab Salim, Al-Sharqiya (Nabatieh), Jibshit, Braashit, Sarafand, Dounin, Briqa, Qaaqaiya Al-Jisr, Al-Qasiba (Nabatieh) and Kafra Sir were urged to leave their homes by the IDF during the early hours of Sunday morning.
\n“In light of the terrorist Hezbollah party’s violation of the ceasefire agreement, the Defense Army is compelled to act against it forcefully. The Israeli Defense Forces do not intend to harm you,” Adraee wrote on X. “Out of concern for your safety. You must evacuate your homes immediately and stay away from the villages and towns for a distance of at least 1,000 metres to open areas.
\n“Anyone present near Hezbollah elements, their facilities, and their combat means exposes their life to danger!”
\nThe IDF also claimed it had targeted and killed two members of Hezbollah in a drone strike.
\nOn Saturday, nine villages and towns in southern Lebanon were urged to evacuate under a similar order from Adraee.
\nIsraeli airstrikes killed at least seven people in southern Lebanon and wounded several others, while parts of a Catholic convent in a border village were also destroyed, AP reported.
\nThe IDF’s Arabic-language spokesperson, Lt. Col. Ella Waweya, said the Israeli air force carried out about 50 airstrikes over the past 24 hours targeting Hezbollah infrastructure and members.
\nHezbollah said that it had launched a drone attack against Israeli troops gathered on Saturday inside a house in the coastal village of Bayed.
\nLebanon’s Health Ministry has said 2,659 people have been killed and 8,183 wounded since the war began.
\nMore US troops to leave Germany, says Trump
\nTrump has said the US will reduce its troop presence in Germany even further than the 5,000 the Pentagon announced would be withdrawing on Friday.
\n\u201cWe\u2019re going to cut way down. And we\u2019re cutting a lot further than 5,000,” Trump told reporters in Florida on Saturday.
\nBoris Pistorius, Germany’s defense minister, appeared to have taken the initial news about troops withdrawing in his stride, stating that the drawback was expected.
\n\u201cThe presence of American soldiers in Europe, and especially in Germany, is in our interest and in the interest of the US,\u201d Pistorius told the German news agency dpa on Saturday.
\n“If we are to remain transatlantic, we must strengthen the European pillar within Nato,” he said.
\nThe US has a significant military presence in Germany, with more than 36,000 active duty troops assigned to bases across the country as of last December.
\nDepending on operations, exercises and troop rotations, around 80,000-100,000 US personnel are usually stationed in Europe.
\nUS sends arms to Israel, Qatar, UAE and Kuwait
\nThe Trump administration has fast-tracked billions of dollars in arms sales to its Middle East allies, the US State Department has said in a series of statements.
\nThe total cost of the weapons comes to more than $8 billion, with Secretary of State Marco Rubio invoking emergency powers to approve the sales.
\nAmong the items are Advanced Precision Kill Weapon Systems (APKWS) – made up of rocket launchers with laser-precision and high explosive war heads – given to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) for an estimated $147.6 million (about \u00a3108 million), to Israel for $992.4 million (\u00a3729.5 million) and to Qatar for $992.4 million.
\nQatar will also receive Patriot missiles $4.01 billion (\u00a32.95 billion) and Kuwait will receive an Integrated Battle Command System – which can detect, track, and intercept air and missile threats -for $2.5 billion (\u00a31.84 billion).
\nThe US will also supply non-major defense equipment items such as technical data, spare and repair parts, personnel training, logistics support and transportation, the state department said.
\nFrom Westminster to Washington DC – our political experts are across all the latest key talking points. Listen to the latest episode below…
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\n#InternationalDiplomacy<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Iran has pushed back against Donald Trump, putting its new peace deal on the table and warning the US President that the room for American decision-making had narrowed, as ITV News’ Ellie Pitt reports. Iran says the US has responded to its latest peace proposal, and Tehran is currently reviewing the reply. Proposal includes 30-day […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":17470,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17469","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-iran-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fajr.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17469","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fajr.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fajr.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fajr.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fajr.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17469"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/fajr.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17469\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fajr.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/17470"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fajr.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17469"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fajr.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17469"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fajr.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17469"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}