Iran-US war latest: Trump’s pause on plan to escort ships through Strait of Hormuz follows backlash from allies, reports claim

Donald Trump has celebrated record highs for the US stock market as everyday Americans struggle with the economic cost of the Iran war.

“Stock Market hit an ALL-TIME HIGH TODAY. Jobs & 401-K’s are BOOMING!!!” he wrote on Truth Social Wednesday night, Washington time.

The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq closed at record highs Wednesday, driven in part by hopes that an end to the Iran war is in sight.

But high gas prices brought on by the war are still plaguing Americans.

President Donald Trump on Wednesday looked to one of the Ultimate Fighting Championship fighters who will compete at the White House next month for validation on his unpopular war against Iran as he hosted a group of the MMA fighters in the Oval Office.

The president was asked why he feels optimistic about the possibility of a deal to end the two-month-old conflict and what makes the current situation different from the multiple previous occasions on which he claimed a deal was close only to backtrack.

In response, he repeated a series of now-familiar boasts about the state of Tehran’s conventional military forces and claimed it would take the Islamic Republic a full two decades to rebuild what has been lost to American bombs since February 28 before turning to one of the fighters, Justin Gaethje, to ask his opinion.

“You would call that ‘we’re in good shape,’ right?”

Gaethje responded: “Fantastic shape.”

Iranian spokesperson Esmaeil Baqaei appears to have hit out at ongoing Pakistan-brokered discussions with the US as he appeared to remind them that negotiations require “good faith” and not “extortion”.

“The concept of ‘negotiations’ requires, at the very least, a genuine attempt to engage in discussions with a view to resolving the dispute (ICJ, Judgement of 1 April 2011, para. 157),” he wrote in a post on X on Wednesday.

“It needs ‘good faith’, then, meaning that ‘negotiations’ is not ‘disputation’; nor is it ‘dictation’, ‘deception’, ‘extortion’ or ‘coercion’.”

A senior Iranian parliament member said on Wednesday that a report by Axios that includes the text of a US proposal for an agreement with Iran to end the war was more of a wishlist than a reality.

The report suggested that Iran could agree to a moratorium on nuclear enrichment in exchange for a lifting of sanctions as well as both sides lifting their blockades around the Strait of Hormuz.

“The Axios text is more of an American wish list than a reality; Americans will not gain anything in a war they are losing that they have not gained in face-to-face negotiations,” Ebrahim Rezaei, spokesperson for parliament’s foreign policy and national security committee posted on X

Iran’s parliamentary speaker has mocked Donald Trump’s pause of Project Freedom in the Strait of Hormuz.

Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf took to X on Wednesday, to say: “Operation Trust Me Bro failed. Now back to routine with Operation Fauxios.”

On Tuesday, the US president announced that the operation to rescue commercial shipping “will be paused for a short period of time to see whether or not the Agreement can be finalized and signed”.

French shipping firm CMA CGM’s Saigon container ship was sailing along the Omani coast after exiting the Strait of Hormuz on Wednesday, vessel tracking data showed.

The Saigon had previously been located inside the Gulf on Tuesday, LSEG and MarineTraffic data showed.

Another CMA CGM vessel, the San Antonio, was attacked while attempting to cross the Strait of Hormuz on Tuesday, with some crew injured.

CMA CGM declined to comment.

Donald Trump said the US-Israeli war on Iran could end very soon if Tehran agrees to an outline proposal – but warned that bombing would resume “at a much higher level” if it rejects the plan.

Oil prices tumbled on Wednesday after Iran said it was reviewing the new US proposal.

Sources said Washington and Tehran were closing in on a one-page memorandum to end the chaotic conflict while leaving tricky issues such as Iran’s nuclear programme for later.

An Iranian foreign ministry spokesperson said Iran would convey its response soon via Pakistan, which hosted the war’s only peace talks and has since served as the main conduit for messages between the sides.

Alastair Jamieson reports:

The UAE said on Wednesday that its ties and its international and defense partnerships were a “purely sovereign matter”.

The remarks were made in rejection of an earlier statement by Iran saying that Abu Dhabi’s cooperation with the US threatened Iran’s security and national interests.

The UAE’s foreign ministry said the Gulf country reserves its full sovereign, legal, diplomatic and military rights to address any “threat, allegation or hostile act”.

The intensified spat between the two countries come after the UAE reported being attacked in the past days by Iran after four weeks of relative calm since the ceasefire was announced by the US Iran denied carrying out operations against the UAE in recent days, yet warned of a “crushing response” if any action was launched from the UAE against Iran.