President Trump stated that a recent maritime memorandum of understanding with Iran was a deliberate test of Tehran’s reliability rather than a final agreement, accusing the Iranian government of failing to honor its commitments.
The remarks come amid an escalation in regional conflict, where U.S. airstrikes, Iranian retaliatory attacks on commercial shipping, and a new 20% U.S. transit fee have pushed international Brent crude oil prices past $86 a barrel.
During a radio interview with host Hugh Hewitt, Trump dismissed the weight of the initial agreement, explaining that the framework was intended to gauge Iran’s willingness to cooperate before finalizing a broader deal.
“It was built to test,” Trump said in the interview. “It was a test. We didn’t know. It didn’t, look, memorandum of understanding, when you’re dealing with sleazebags, it [doesn’t] mean much. And they don’t mean much when you’re dealing with honorable people, too, because it’s a memorandum of understanding. It doesn’t mean much.”
Trump defended the approach as a standard U.S. negotiating tactic but noted he had initially favored bypassing the preliminary step. “I said why are we even, you know, it’s a standard tactic in the U.S. that you go to a memorandum of understanding, and then you go to the deal. I said just go to the deal first. But you know why? It was sort of a test. And they weren’t there. They didn’t honor the test. We had it. We had this deal settled numerous times, and I said watch. I guarantee, watch, and they never, they never followed it.”
Prior to the breakdown, Iran’s Persian Gulf Strait Authority claimed that more than 200 foreign commercial vessels had coordinated their transit through the northern route of the Strait of Hormuz under the three-week framework. However, Iran declared the waterway closed over the weekend following what it called U.S. provocations.
The U.S. has rejected the closure, asserting that the strait remains open via a southern route near Oman. In a separate interview on Newsmax, Trump insisted the U.S. maintains operational control over the strategic waterway, which handles roughly 20% of global oil shipments.
“They can make trouble, they can do things that are not nice, but we control it,” Trump said, adding that the U.S. would act as a “guardian angel” for the shipping lane. He announced a 20% security fee on all commercial cargo passing through the strait to reimburse U.S. military costs and stated that a naval blockade of Iranian ports would be reinstated. “We’re going to let everyone get through, except if you’re doing business with Iran,” he said.
The proposed transit fees drew swift criticism from the commercial shipping sector. German logistics company Hapag-Lloyd rejected the policy, noting that the Strait of Hormuz consists of international waters rather than man-made infrastructure.
“It would be fundamentally wrong to charge tolls for passage through international waters,” a spokesperson for Hapag-Lloyd said. “Tolls for infrastructure such as the Suez Canal or Panama Canal are different, because they reflect major infrastructure investments. That is not the case in the Strait of Hormuz.”
Oman’s Foreign Ministry announced it is actively cooperating with all involved parties to restore unhindered transit through the waterway in accordance with the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea.
The diplomatic collapse coincides with intense military action. The U.S. military conducted a third consecutive night of airstrikes against Iranian targets on Monday. According to U.S. Central Command, the five-hour operation utilized combat sea drones for the first time to hit a naval base, alongside strikes on drone and missile sites in the port cities of Bandar Abbas and Bushehr. Local officials in Bushehr, home to Iran’s civilian nuclear power plant, reported that four projectiles struck the city.
Iran responded by launching cruise missiles at two oil tankers, the MT Al Bahiyah and MT Mombasa, near the coast of Oman. The Ministry of External Affairs in India confirmed that one Indian national was killed and 10 others were injured in the tanker attacks, leading New Delhi to summon an Iranian diplomat to lodge a formal protest.
Air defense sirens also sounded for a third time in Bahrain, which hosts the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet, as authorities warned residents to take shelter amid Iranian missile fire. Regional strikes also targeted locations in Jordan.
Simultaneously, diplomatic discussions continue in Rome regarding the conflict in Lebanon. Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar announced that Israel is prepared to move forward with a late-June agreement to withdraw troops from two designated “pilot zones” in southern Lebanon, allowing Lebanese government forces to assume control.
“We are ready to move forward implementing these two pilot zones,” Saar told reporters in Jerusalem. “I hope and tend to believe that this round of discussions in Rome will promote it.”
The withdrawal of Israeli forces from southern Lebanon remains a primary demand from Iran in broader regional negotiations. However, Israel maintains it will not fully withdraw its forces from the border region until Hezbollah disarms, a condition the militant group has rejected.
READ: FOX Nation Partners With Conor McGregor And BKFC For New Combat Sports Tournament Series
Please make a small donation to the Tampa Free Press to help sustain independent journalism. Your contribution enables us to continue delivering high-quality, local, and national news coverage.
Sign up: Subscribe to our free newsletter for a curated selection of top stories delivered straight to your inbox.
