Trump told Fox News on Monday that he would bomb U.S. ally Oman if it interfered with peace talks between the United States and Iran. The comment came as a 60-day Memorandum of Understanding between Washington and Tehran expired, with little prospect of renewal and no direct talks underway.
According to a report by Al Jazeera, Trump said during the Fox News interview that Iran should surrender and claimed his administration had opened a backchannel for talks with Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. When asked about Oman's role in brokering a deal, Trump was direct. "If Oman gets in the way, we'll bomb the s*** out of them," he said.
Oman is a U.S. ally that has never entered into direct conflict with the United States. It has positioned itself as a neutral party in the U.S.-Iran war and has been negotiating with Iran over the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz. Despite that neutrality, Oman has suffered strikes from Iran, which has targeted U.S. military assets and infrastructure in the region. Now it faces threats from Washington as well.
This was not the first time Trump made such a threat. At a cabinet meeting on May 27, a reporter asked Trump whether he would accept a deal allowing Iran and Oman to jointly oversee shipping through the strait. "Nobody is going to control it. It's international waters, and Oman will behave just like everybody else, or we will have to blow them up," Trump replied. The U.S. State Department later shared the comment on social media with a transcript that confirmed the reference was to Oman.
An IRGC spokesman denied Trump's claim that direct talks were taking place between IRGC officials and Americans. Telling Iran's semi-official Tasnim News agency, the spokesman said: "There are no talks taking place between IRGC officials and the Americans, and this lie by Trump is merely fantasies caused by the delusions and nightmares he has suffered as a result of defeat and desperation in the war."
The U.S.-Iran conflict has now lasted nearly six months and has taken a significant toll on American military resources. NPR reported that U.S. interceptor missile stockpiles have decreased by approximately two-thirds during the war, according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies. The USS Washington, previously stationed in the Pacific, has been sent to relieve the USS Lincoln in the Middle East. Naval experts told NPR it could be weeks, if not months, before a replacement carrier formation arrives in the Pacific.
The strain has also affected U.S. relationships in Asia. President Trump ordered the Pentagon this week to reduce joint military exercises with South Korea, citing its lack of support in the war against Iran. Those annual drills date back to at least 1976 and are designed largely to counter North Korea's nuclear program.
On the Gaza front, Trump's son-in-law and envoy Jared Kushner met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for nearly four hours to discuss a new U.S.-backed roadmap for the region. Before arriving in Israel, Kushner held talks with Hamas leaders in Egypt. Netanyahu initially rejected the roadmap, which called for Israeli withdrawal alongside Hamas disarmament, but Kushner said he talked him through misunderstandings about the plan. Under the new terms, Hamas would be required to surrender its weapons to a U.S. general for destruction rather than to a Palestinian committee. NPR's Daniel Estrin said real progress is unlikely in the next 10 weeks leading up to Israeli elections, as both sides are expected to stall.
