US-Iran News LIVE: ‘Sit back and relax,’ says Trump as peace deal in limbo after fresh attacks
US-Iran News LIVE: The US said it struck Iranian military sites on the weekend, and Iran's Revolutionary Guards (IRG) said on Monday it had targeted
US-Iran News LIVE: The US said it struck Iranian military sites on the weekend, and Iran's Revolutionary Guards (IRG) said on Monday it had targeted a US base in response, the latest in a series of exchanges amid negotiations to end the three-month-old war. However, the IRGC did not identify which base they had targeted. At the same time, Kuwait — where a major US base is located — reported that its air defences were intercepting hostile missiles and drones on Monday as sirens sounded across the country, the state news agency KUNA reported.
The US and Iran have sporadically exchanged strikes since their ceasefire took effect in early April as negotiations aimed at a more durable agreement drag on. A similar exchange occurred last Thursday and was described in similar terms by both sides. US President Donald Trump has said his key aim in the war is to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon with its highly enriched uranium. Tehran has consistently denied it has plans to do that.
The two sides remain at odds on several other issues, such as Tehran's demands for the lifting of sanctions and the release of tens of billions of dollars of Iranian oil revenues frozen in foreign banks. Meanwhile, Israel's war in Lebanon with the Iranian-backed Hezbollah militia is another major impediment. On Sunday, Israeli military captured the strategic Beaufort castle, deep inside of Lebanon — further casting a shadow on the peace negotiations between Iran and the US.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio spoke with both Lebanese President Joseph Aoun and Netanyahu on the diplomatic negotiations between Israel and Lebanon and has proposed a plan to allow for "gradual de-escalation," a U.S. official said.
The BriefWire