U.S. President Donald Trump said on Friday that his administration would resume negotiations with Iran after the United States carried out another round of military strikes against the Islamic Republic earlier in the week.
“The Islamic Republic of Iran has asked us to continue ‘talks,’” Trump wrote. “We have agreed to do so, but the United States has stated to them, in no uncertain terms, that the ceasefire is over.”
The United States attacked some 90 military targets in Iran on Wednesday in response to Iranian strikes on commercial shipping in the Strait of Hormuz. The prior day, the U.S. military struck more than 80 targets in the Islamic Republic.
Speaking at a NATO summit in Ankara that day, Trump called Iranian leaders “scum” and said that negotiating with them was “a waste of time.”
Iran responded on Thursday with missile and drone attacks directed at U.S. forces in Bahrain, Jordan, Kuwait and Qatar. All of the attacks appear to have been intercepted.
Iranian leaders have said that they are willing to continue tit-for-tat strikes and attacks on shipping in the Strait of Hormuz until the United States accedes to its demands on control of the vital energy corridor.
“Let me put it plainly. If you strike, you’ll get hit,” Iranian Parliament speaker Mohammad Ghalibaf wrote. “The Strait of Hormuz will only open with ‘Iranian arrangements,’ not American threats.”
