WASHINGTON/ TEHRAN: Iran’s Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf said on Monday his country’s military stood ready to “teach a lesson” to any aggressor, after US President Donald Trump warned the Middle East ceasefire was on “massive life support”.
“Our armed forces are ready to respond and to teach a lesson for any aggression,” Ghalibaf said on X. “A bad strategy and bad decisions always lead to bad results -- the world already understands this.”
President Trump earlier in the day said the ceasefire in the Middle East war was on “massive life support” after rejecting Iran’s latest counteroffer, which it said had included demands for the release of frozen assets and the end of a US blockade.
The president’s angry reaction to Iran’s position -- itself a response to a US proposal -- sent oil prices soaring and dashed hopes that a deal could be quickly negotiated to reopen the Strait of Hormuz to commercial shipping.
After slamming the response as “TOTALLY UNACCEPTABLE”, Trump insisted the US would see a “complete victory” over Iran, adding that the truce which has largely halted fighting in the Gulf for over a month was on its last legs. He called Iran’s response to US peace proposal a “stupid proposal”.
“The ceasefire is on massive life support, where the doctor walks in and says, ‘Sir, your loved one has approximately a one percent chance of living,’” he told reporters on Monday.
The developments unnerved global energy markets already thrown into chaos by the war and the overlapping blockades imposed by Iran and the US in the Strait of Hormuz -- a vital conduit for oil and gas shipments.
Trump did not say what had offended him in Iran’s response, but Tehran’s foreign ministry said it had called for an end to the US naval blockade of its ports and to the war “across the region” -- implying a halt to Israel’s strikes targeting Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Crucially, ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei told reporters, Iran demanded the “release of assets belonging to the Iranian people, which have for years been unjustly trapped in foreign banks”.
This would be not just a return to the status quo before the United States and Israel launched the war on February 28, but a victory in the Islamic republic’s long-standing campaign against its economic isolation. “We did not demand any concessions. The only thing we demanded was Iran’s legitimate rights,” Baqaei said.
An end to international sanctions would diminish Washington’s leverage over Tehran as it tries to secure a lasting end to Iran’s nuclear enrichment. The US, Israel and their allies have long accused Iran of seeking atomic weapons, an accusation Tehran has repeatedly denied.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insisted the conflict would not end until Iran’s nuclear facilities were destroyed. “It’s not over, because there’s still nuclear material -- enriched uranium -- that has to be taken out of Iran,” he told US broadcaster CBS’s 60 Minutes. “There’s still enrichment sites that have to be dismantled.”
The Wall Street Journal, citing people familiar with the matter, said Iran’s counter-proposal had included the possibility of diluting some of its highly enriched uranium, with the rest transferred to a third country.
Iran had sought guarantees that the transferred uranium would be returned if negotiations failed or Washington abandoned the agreement, sources told the Journal.
The lack of a path to a resolution has focused concern on the Strait of Hormuz, where Iran is restricting maritime traffic and setting up a payment mechanism to charge tolls for crossing ships.
US officials have stressed it would be “unacceptable” for Tehran to control the international waterway. Trump told Fox News that he was considering reviving a short-lived US operation to escort oil and other commercial shipping through the Hormuz, but that he had not yet taken a final decision.
Saudi sources previously told AFP that Saudi Arabia had prohibited the US from using its airspace and bases for the operation the first time around over fears “it would just escalate the situation and would not work”.
The US Navy is also blockading Iran’s ports, at times firing on ships to disable them or boarding and diverting them.
In a social media post on Sunday, the spokesman for the Iranian parliament’s national security commission warned Washington: “Our restraint is over as of today.” “Any attack on our vessels will trigger a strong and decisive Iranian response against American ships and bases,” Ebrahim Rezaei said.
Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei said on Monday Iran’s proposal to end war with the US and reopen the Strait of Hormuz was legitimate and generous, adding that the US continues to uphold unreasonable and one-sided demands.
“Our demand is legitimate: demanding an end to the war, lifting the (US) blockade and piracy, and releasing Iranian assets that have been unjustly frozen in banks due to US pressure,” Baghaei said. “Safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz and establishing security in the region and Lebanon were other demands of Iran, which are considered a generous and responsible offer for regional security.”
China voiced strong opposition on Monday to US sanctions for three China-based companies that Washington claimed enabled Iran’s military operations, calling the curbs illegal and unilateral. “We have always required Chinese enterprises to conduct business in accordance with laws and regulations, and will firmly safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of Chinese enterprises,” spokesperson Guo Jiakun told a regular press briefing. “The pressing priority is to prevent by all means a relapse in fighting, rather than using the war to maliciously associate and smear other countries.”
The US government announced sanctions against three people and nine companies, including four based in Hong Kong and four in the United Arab Emirates, for aiding Iran’s shipment of oil to China. The ninth company is based in Oman. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the Trump administration would continue to ratchet up pressure on Tehran to deprive the Iranian government and military of funding for weapons, its nuclear program or support for proxies in the region.
President Trump said on Monday that he plans to suspend a federal gasoline tax as consumers deal with surging energy prices in the wake of the Iran war.
Responding to a reporter’s question at the White House, Trump said he would be taking the step, with the suspension to remain in place “till it’s appropriate.”“It’s a small percentage, but you know it’s still money,” he said.
US federal taxes on gasoline amount to 18.4 cents per gallon on gasoline and 24.4 cents per gallon for diesel, according to the US Energy Information Administration (EIA).
Britain on Monday slapped sanctions on a dozen Iran-linked individuals and entities accused of involvement in “hostile activities” by Tehran targeting the UK or other countries.Updating its official sanctions list, the Foreign Office in London imposed the UK travel bans and asset freezes on nine people, two shadow banking exchange houses and the allegedly criminal Zindashti network.
Global stock markets mostly rose while oil prices climbed on Monday after President Trump rejected Iran’s terms for ending the war in the Middle East.
Following a soft start Wall Street’s three main indices pushed higher during the morning session as equity traders continued to shrug off the war.
In Europe, London and Frankfurt rose while Paris fell, pulled down by luxury shares following an analyst report that warned of weak growth opportunities for the sector. Oil prices spiked more than four percent following the exchange, before easing.
Iran’s oil sector has faced some issues since the start of a US maritime blockade on Iranian ports, but the oil ministry has taken countermeasures, Iran’s Oil Minister Mohsen Paknejad said on Monday to state TV, without specifying the measures.
“During the 40 days of war, our production didn’t decrease and the export process was favourable,” Paknejad said. “Naturally, in the days following the (US) blockade, we have faced challenges but measures were taken and this process continues” adding “the enemy is full of delusions.”
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan was to visit Qatar on Tuesday for talks on the Iran war, its impact on the Gulf and efforts to ensure navigational safety in the Strait of Hormuz, a Turkish diplomatic source said on Monday.
Fidan, who last visited Doha in March and held two separate calls with Iran’s foreign minister at the weekend, will repeat Turkiye’s support for its ally Qatar against attacks from Iran, the source said.
Iranian authorities on Monday announced the seizure of six properties allegedly linked to the former captain of the national football team, Ali Karimi, who now lives in exile and is vehemently critical of the Islamic republic.
Lebanese leaders urged the US ambassador to Beirut to pressure Israel to halt its attacks as it pounded the country from the air on Monday despite a truce in the Israel-Hezbollah war. Lebanese authorities on Monday also raised the overall death toll from Israeli strikes since March 2 to 2,869 people.
Israel’s military said Monday that one of its soldiers had died in fighting near the border with Lebanon, bringing its losses to 18 personnel since the war with Hezbollah began in early March.
London’s Heathrow Airport announced Monday that passenger numbers dropped in April as the Middle East war disrupted global air travel. The airport handled 6.7 million passengers last month, down 5.3 percent from one year earlier, Heathrow said in a statement.
Iranian authorities on Monday hanged a post-graduate student from an elite Tehran university on charges of espionage. Erfan Shakourzadeh, 29, was hanged after being convicted for collaborating with the CIA and Mossad, the Iranian judiciary’s Mizan Online website said.
China’s consumer prices ticked up in April as the cost of crude oil rose globally due to the Iran war, official data showed on Monday. China’s consumer price index (CPI) last month rose 1.2 percent year-on-year, data from the National Bureau of Statistics showed.
Israel’s Iron Dome has been nearly 99 per cent effective against missiles from Hamas and Hezbollah militants and has knocked out most missiles from Iran, the chairman of state-owned Iron Dome maker Rafael Advanced Defense Systems Ltd said on Monday.
Rafael’s Yuval Steinitz told a conference of the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs that since the October 2023 Hamas raid on Israel, Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon have between them fired some 40,000 rockets at Israel.
“Iron Dome intercepted most of them with success rates that (are) not 100% but close to 100%. It’s around 98%, even 99%, so it’s not perfect, but almost,” Steinitz said.
Iran, he said, has fired about 1,500 ballistic missiles at Israel in two rounds of fighting since 2024 and “only several dozens” were not intercepted. He noted that there was no shortage of missile interceptors.
Pakistan remains the official mediator between Iran and the United States, Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei said on Monday.
Speaking to the media, Baghaei said that other countries, including Qatar, which maintains good ties with both Iran and the US, present their ideas to the Iranian foreign minister whenever they deem it necessary.He added that Tehran appreciates all these countries for their efforts aimed at de-escalation, Iran’s Irna news agency reported.
