President Donald Trump has rebuffed Tehran’s offer of a week-long truce meant to pave the way for reopening the Strait of Hormuz, the Wall Street Journal reported Friday, citing people familiar with the matter. According to the newspaper, Trump is weighing a return to military action against Iran once the November midterm elections are behind him.
The same sources told the Journal that the president currently has little appetite for a fresh round of large-scale strikes, partly out of concern for preserving American munitions stockpiles that might be needed for other contingencies elsewhere. Still, resuming the bombing campaign after the midterms is described as very much an option Trump is keeping open.
Iran’s proposal was unveiled earlier the same day by Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, who said Tehran had passed along, through Qatari mediators, what he called a definitive seven-day roadmap. Under its terms, all hostilities would pause for a week, roughly twelve billion dollars in frozen Iranian assets would be released, oil sanctions would be lifted, and the naval blockade around the country would end. On the seventh day, the strait would reopen to shipping and nuclear talks would resume.
The war between Iran and the US-Israeli coalition has now dragged on for more than seven months, since a February offensive that killed thousands on the Iranian side. Tehran answered with strikes on American and Israeli positions in the region, prompting further US retaliation. A mid-June arrangement briefly halted the fighting before it unraveled within weeks.
At the heart of the standoff sits the fate of Hormuz itself, the narrow waterway through which a substantial share of the world’s oil and gas shipments must pass. By turning down Iran’s latest overture, Washington leaves shippers, insurers and energy traders facing yet more weeks of uncertainty in the Gulf, just as the American political calendar heads toward a midterm vote that could reshape the administration’s approach to the region altogether.
