Iran War Live Updates: Hegseth and Pentagon Officials Speak on U.S. Military Blockade 72%
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4/16/2026, 7:08:54 AM
BS Summary: This article contains 43 faulty reasoning types, including Post Hoc (False Cause), Appeal to Authority, and Ambiguity (Equivocation), with Negativity Bias as the most egregious example at 14.3% saturation with 814 hits. Analysis detected 6,828 faulty-reasoning hits from 5,675 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 64.6% and a BS Rank of 72% (4,861 of 16,813 articles). This article is worse (more manipulative) than 71.10% of the article peer group.
Iran War Live Updates: Hegseth and Pentagon Officials Speak on U.S.
Military Blockade
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth urged Iran’s leaders to “choose wisely” and said a U.S. blockade of Iranian ports would continue “as long as it takes.”
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Thursday threatened U.S. attacks on Iran’s energy infrastructure if its leaders did not agree to a peace deal, less than a week before a temporary cease-fire is set to expire.
Speaking at a news conference at the Pentagon, Mr.
Hegseth repeatedly urged Iran’s leaders to “choose wisely” and said an American naval blockade of Iranian ports would continue “as long as it takes.”
“But if Iran chooses poorly, then they will have a blockade and bombs dropping on infrastructure, power, and energy,” Mr.
Hegseth said.
Under international law, intentionally targeting Iran’s civilian infrastructure could constitute a war crime .
Gen.
Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said at the news conference that U.S.
Navy forces in the Pacific could be called upon to intercept ships moving to resupply Iran — which would broaden the naval blockade beyond the Middle East.
Iran threatened on Wednesday to halt all trade in the Persian Gulf, the Gulf of Oman and the Red Sea in response to the blockade.
It was unclear how much control Iran could exert over shipping in the region.
Its battered armed forces can still use mines and fast boats to harass ships in the Strait of Hormuz .
Its allies in Yemen, the Houthi militia, have also shown they can attack shipping in the Red Sea.
Analysts say the U.S. blockade will squeeze Iran’s economy but might not be enough to force concessions from its government or lessen the global energy crunch .
Here’s what else we’re covering:
Peace talks: Pakistan said Thursday that it expected to host a second round of peace negotiations between the United States and Iran but declined to give a date, as senior Pakistani mediators visited Tehran in an effort to shore up the U.S.-Iran cease-fire .
American and Iranian officials have said that indirect negotiations are continuing but have not confirmed they will hold another round of direct discussions.
Israel-Lebanon: As the conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, the Iran-backed Lebanese militia, threatens to upend the cease-fire, Secretary of State Marco Rubio spoke by phone with Lebanon’s president on Thursday, the Lebanese president’s office said.
President Trump said that Israeli and Lebanese leaders would speak on Thursday, though neither side confirmed it.
Lebanon’s official news agency reported new Israeli strikes in southern Lebanon on Thursday.
Iranian sailors : Sri Lanka has used the U.S.-Iran cease-fire to repatriate more than 200 Iranian sailors who came into its custody last month after a U.S. submarine torpedoed an Iranian warship near its waters, resolving a diplomatic standoff for Sri Lanka with Iran.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio spoke by phone with President Joseph Aoun of Lebanon on Thursday, and they discussed U.S. efforts to broker a cease-fire in Lebanon between Israel and Hezbollah, according to a statement from the president’s office.
Earlier in the day, President Trump posted on social media that Israeli and Lebanese leaders would speak on Thursday.
Hegseth said that President Trump has spoken to President Xi of China about a report in The New York Times that China might have shipped missiles to Iran, “and China has assured us that that indeed is not going to happen.”
Hegseth has said before that U.S. troops are fighting for military victory in Iran “in the name of Jesus Christ.”
During the news conference he again cast the war in explicitly Christian terms.
He compared the rescue of two downed F-15 crew members inside Iran to biblical miracles.
And he compared reporters in the Pentagon press corps to the Pharisees who criticized Jesus Christ.
Hegseth was asked whether any other nations would join the U.S.
Navy in maintaining the blockade.
“There should be,” he said, but has not named any countries willing to do so.
Adm.
Brad Cooper, the head of Central Commmand, joined Hegseth and Caine for his first live interview with the news media since the war started on Feb.
28.
Cooper is talking about his recent visit to troops in the region.
Previously, Cooper had provided only pre-recorded operational updates.
Caine said that the U.S. military “has not been required to board any ships” amid its blockade.
In other words, the vessels have all turned back rather than trying to run the blockade.
Caine said that U.S. military commanders elsewhere in the world, including in the Indo-Pacific region, “will actively pursue any Iranian flagged vessel or any vessel attempting to provide material support to Iran.”
That would broaden the U.S. blockade of Iranian ports beyond the Middle East.
Caine said that U.S.
Navy forces in the Pacific could be called upon to intercept ships moving to resupply Iran.
Gen.
Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, reiterated Hegseth’s claims that U.S. forces were ready to resume combat operations against Iran “at a moment’s notice.”
Hegseth seemed to be speaking to Iran’s leaders in an attempt to persuade them that their best option is to agree to a peace deal with the Trump administration.
“While you are digging out, we are only getting stronger,” he said.
“You can move things around, biut you can’t actually rebuild.”
A few seconds later: “We are locked and loaded,”Hegseth said.
And then added, “You can’t control anything.”
Hegseth acknowledged that Iran was digging out missile launchers that the U.S. military bombed but said it could not rebuild its prewar arsenal of drones, missiles and ships.
“You can dig out for now, but you can’t reconstitute,” he said of Iran’s military.
“But we can.”
If Iran does not agree to a deal, U.S. forces will attack electrical power infrastructure in Iran, Hegseth said.
Under international law, intentionally targeting the country’s energy infrastructure could constitute a war crime.
Hegseth addressed the negotiations between the U.S. and Iran, saying, “We urge the new Iranian regime to choose wisely.”
The Trump administration has been claiming that it has achieved regime change with its attacks on Iran, though analysts beleve the war may only have increased the internal sway of hard-line forces, including the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps.
Hegseth called the U.S. blockade of Iranian ports “the polite way to go.”
Hegseth said that that the U.S. military was “maximally postured to restart combat operations” if Iran did not agree to a deal.
Adm.
Brad Cooper, the leader of U.S.
Central Command, is in attendance as well and is expected to offer an update on the war with Iran.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Gen.
Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, have just walked into the Pentagon briefing room for their first press briefing since April 8.
Iran’s top negotiator and speaker of its Parliament, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, met on Thursday with a Pakistani delegation led by the head of the Army, Field Marshal Syed Asim Munir, according to Mehr, a semiofficial Iranian news agency.
Earlier, Pakistan, which is mediating between Iran and the United States, said it expected to host a second round of peace negotiations between the two countries.
In Iran and in the Arab world, Pakistani diplomacy has risen to the forefront of efforts to broker peace between the United States and Iran, as the top leaders of Pakistan tried to preserve a shaky cease-fire between the combatants and to offer their country up, again, as the venue for potential peace talks.
Pakistan’s powerful army chief, Field Marshal Asim Munir, arrived in Tehran on Wednesday, becoming the first regional player to visit Iran since the United States and Israel began attacking it on Feb.
28.
He carried with him the praise of the White House.
“Pakistanis have been incredible mediators,” Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, said after the army chief’s arrival in Iran.
“The president feels it’s important to continue to streamline this communication through the Pakistanis.”
Pakistan helped negotiate a two-week cease-fire last week , scoring a major diplomatic victory.
That cease-fire is set to expire on April 21.
Pakistan’s military said Field Marshal Munir was visiting Iran to sustain ongoing peace efforts.
On Thursday, Tahir Andrabi, a spokesman for Pakistan’s foreign ministry, said that a second round of talks between the United States and Iran was expected to take place in Islamabad, though he declined to provide a date.
Neither U.S. nor Iranian officials have confirmed that, though both sides have said that indirect negotiations were continuing.
A Pakistani official speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss ongoing negotiations said Field Marshal Munir was still in Iran as of Thursday morning local time.
Gen.
Muhammad Saeed, a former Pakistani chief of general staff and former deputy to the field marshal, said: “Pakistan is helping with an exit strategy that must be a respectable outcome for both” countries.
The diplomatic push is a pivot for Pakistan, which has spent more time as a combatant over the past year in its own conflicts than as a peace broker.
When the United States and Israel began their war in Iran, Pakistan was conducting a series of airstrikes against another neighbor, Afghanistan.
They have stopped for now, but only after the deaths of hundreds of civilians in Afghanistan.
And last spring, Pakistan and India were embroiled in a tense military conflict that ended after a diplomatic push by the United States.
After President Trump took credit for ending that war, Indian officials bristled, but Pakistani officials drew closer to the White House.
Field Marshal Munir personally met with Mr.
Trump twice last year, and the American president has referred to him as his “favorite field marshal.”
While Field Marshal Munir was traveling to Iran, Pakistan’s prime minister, Shehbaz Sharif, met with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia on Wednesday.
Their countries are allies and have a mutual defense agreement that was a potential source of tension between Pakistan and Iran, after Iranian forces began firing missiles at the Saudis and other Gulf countries last month.
Asif Durrani, a former Pakistani ambassador to Iran, said that unlike other countries involved in the war, Pakistan didn’t have major conflicts with Iran.
On Saturday, Mr.
Sharif greeted Iran’s Parliament speaker, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, in Islamabad with a warm embrace.
“Iran would not trust any other country,” Mr.
Durrani said about Pakistan’s role as a mediator between the United States and Iran.
“Pakistan is the only candidate.”
Iran has increased its weapons production in the months since the war waged in June by Israel with U.S. help, an official with Iran’s armed forces said.
The production rate of attack drones increased tenfold, Mahmoud Sheikh Hassani, the deputy executive officer of Iran’s armed forces, said Thursday in remarks carried by Tasnim, a semiofficial Iranian news agency.
President Trump said that Israeli and Lebanese leaders would speak again on Thursday, as he sought to build on lower-level talks this week aimed at ending Israel’s war against Iran-backed Hezbollah.
There was no confirmation from either Israel or Lebanon.
A senior official in the Lebanese presidency, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters, said that he was not aware of any planned call between Lebanese and Israeli officials.
The Israeli prime minister’s office said it would not confirm one either.
Mr.
Trump did not give further details, including any information on which officials would participate.
“Trying to get a little breathing room between Israel and Lebanon.
It has been a long time since the two leaders have spoken, like 34 years,” Mr.
Trump wrote on social media late Wednesday.
“It will happen tomorrow.
Nice!”
The conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, the Lebanese militia backed by Iran, has threatened to upend the cease-fire between the United States and Iran, which expires next week.
Iran has insisted that the cease-fire be extended to Lebanon, a proposal Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel has rejected , with backing from senior White House officials, including Vice President JD Vance .
Lebanon and Israel, who have technically been at war since 1948, do not have official diplomatic relations.
On Tuesday, Israeli and Lebanese officials held talks in Washington, their first in decades.
The State Department said afterward that steps had been taken toward further “direct negotiations” between the two countries.
Israeli and Lebanese officials have said that Israel is considering a short-term cease-fire in Lebanon.
Two Israeli officials said the cease-fire could begin as early as Thursday and last about a week.
The Israeli government has yet to formally sign off on the plan, and it remains unclear whether Hezbollah would comply even if Israel and Lebanon agreed on one.
President Joseph Aoun of Lebanon views a cease-fire with Israel as “the natural entry point for direct negotiations between the two countries,” the Lebanese presidency said in a social media post on Thursday.
Fighting between Israel and Hezbollah has continued during the two-week cease-fire between Iran and the United States.
Israel has stopped strikes on Beirut , the Lebanese capital, but has continued attacking Hezbollah in southern Lebanon.
Days before the talks in Washington, the Israeli military launched two attacks on towns in southern Lebanon on Sunday, killing at least 11 people, according to Lebanon’s official news agency.
The Israeli military said it had killed an armed combatant on the same day in a raid on what it described as a Hezbollah infrastructure site in southern Lebanon.
And on Thursday, the news agency reported clashes overnight in the southern Lebanese town of Bint Jbeil between Israeli ground forces and Hezbollah militants.
The Israeli military has been surrounding Bint Jbeil and advancing through the town for days.
In a statement, the Israeli military said that its forces had raided a Hezbollah compound in the Bint Jbeil area on Wednesday and located weapons there.
Israel launched its military campaign in Lebanon in early March, days after the United States and Israel began an air campaign against Iran.
Hezbollah had fired rockets at northern Israel in solidarity with Iran, its patron.
Since then, the group has launched more than 6,500 rockets, missiles and drones toward Israeli territory and at its forces in Lebanon, according to the Israeli military.
Much of the incoming fire has been intercepted.
Late last month, Israel’s defense minister, Israel Katz, said that Israel would demolish Lebanese towns near the border and set up a security zone, which would displace hundreds of thousands of Lebanese residents.
Tahir Andrabi, a spokesman for Pakistan’s foreign ministry, said on Thursday that a second round of talks between the United States and Iran was expected to take place in Islamabad, but declined to provide a date.
Neither U.S. nor Iranian officials have confirmed that a second round of talks will occur, though both sides have said that indirect negotiations are continuing.
Speaking to reporters at a weekly news briefing, Andrabi said that Pakistan was maintaining “open channels of communication with the concerned parties.”
Hours after President Trump said on social media that Israeli and Lebanese leaders would speak on Thursday, there is still no confirmation from either country.
Three Lebanese officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters, said they were not aware of any such meeting.
The Israeli prime minister’s office would not confirm one either.
President Trump said on social media that Israeli and Lebanese leaders would speak to each other on Thursday.
He did not elaborate and it was not clear if he was referring to the countries’ heads of state or other senior officials.
The conflict between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon has threatened to upend the fragile cease-fire between the United States and Iran.
On Tuesday, after a rare meeting in Washington between the Israeli and Lebanese ambassadors, the U.S. announced that the two sides had agreed to “launch direct negotiations” to end the fighting.
FIFA President Gianni Infantino said on Wednesday that the “Iranian team is coming, for sure,” to play in the World Cup in the United States this summer.
Speaking at CNBC’s Invest in America Forum in Washington, he said, “We hope that by then, of course, the situation will be a peaceful situation.
As I said, that would definitely help.
But Iran has to come.”
The comments come as peace talks between Iran and the United States have not yet resumed, and a cease-fire is set to expire next week.
President Trump has said that it would not be “appropriate” for Iran to participate in the tournament this summer and that it may be a risk for the players’ “own life and safety.”
It remains unclear whether Iran will pull out of the tournament.
Iran’s sports minister, Ahmad Donyamali, told state TV in February the team “certainly” would not participate after strikes by the United States and Israel killed Iran’s supreme leader.
In March, Iran said it was negotiating with FIFA to move its matches from the United States to Mexico, which is co-hosting the tournament along with Canada.
But FIFA made it clear that it had no plans to do so.
“Sports should be outside of politics,” Mr.
Infantino said at the CNBC event.
Iran was drawn to play two group-stage games in Los Angeles, home to one of the world’s largest Iranian diasporas, and one in Seattle.
The United States is in a different group and could play Iran only if both teams advance in the tournament.
In 1998, Iran earned its first World Cup victory by knocking out the United States in a memorable 2-1 win that drew thousands of celebrants into the streets of Tehran.
In 2022, the United States squeaked by Iran 1-0 in a dramatic match to advance to the round of 16.
The Senate on Wednesday blocked a Democratic bid to cancel arms sales to Israel, but the party’s concerns over the war against Iran widened its rift over arming the longtime U.S. ally.
Progressive senators led by Senator Bernie Sanders, independent of Vermont, have long been critical of robust American aid for Israel’s military.
But several Democrats who in the past had opposed efforts by Mr.
Sanders and others to block U.S. arms transfers changed course and registered their disapproval of the sale of armored bulldozers and 12,000 bombs.
On Wednesday, 36 Democrats voted to take up a measure that would block the sale of the 1,000-pound bombs, while 40 Democrats voted in favor of a measure to bar the sale of the bulldozers that Israel has used to level entire neighborhoods in Gaza and Lebanon .
Roughly a dozen more Democrats voted for those measures than have voted for similar ones in the past.
Republicans voted en masse against taking up the measures.
Congress has the power to cancel weapons transfers proposed by the administration, but only if both chambers pass disapproval resolutions and the president signs them, or supermajorities override his veto.
Democratic leaders of the effort argued that the Senate must stop the transfer of new weapons to Israel that would support a war that President Trump launched against Tehran, in coordination with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, without congressional authorization and which a majority of Americans oppose .
“If we want to rein in a Trump administration that launched an illegal war against Iran, we should also rein in the Netanyahu administration that’s doing exactly the same thing with American taxpayer dollars,” Senator Chris Van Hollen, Democrat of Maryland, said ahead of the vote.
Mr.
Sanders offered similar resolutions last summer, which Republicans also blocked, and in 2024, with the same outcome .
In those cases, about half of Senate Democrats backed his effort.
On Wednesday, roughly three-quarters of them did.
Among the converts were Senators Maria Cantwell of Washington; Ruben Gallego and Mark Kelly of Arizona; Alex Padilla and Adam Schiff of California; Elissa Slotkin of Michigan; and Ron Wyden of Oregon.
“We oppose actions that further deepen the United States in an unauthorized conflict in Iran — one with no clear strategy, no legal authority, and no defined end,” Mr.
Padilla and Mr.
Schiff said in a joint statement.
Four Democrats, including Senator Jack Reed of Rhode Island, the ranking Democrat on the Armed Services Committee, voted to take up the measure blocking the bulldozers, but not the one to block the bombs.
The Trump administration had declared an emergency, citing the war in Iran , to bypass Congress and more swiftly transfer the powerful bombs to Israel.
The votes came as Israel continued its sweeping military campaign against Lebanon that has killed more than 2,100 people, including civilians and Hezbollah fighters, according to the Lebanese authorities.
Mr.
Sanders criticized Israel for its widespread attacks on civilian centers in Gaza that killed tens of thousands of Palestinians, as well as its blockade of the border that has prevented critical food and medical supplies from reaching residents in the war-torn territory.
He also warned that continued unchecked U.S. military support for Israel would lead to more deadly attacks.
“For Netanyahu, Gaza was not enough,” Mr.
Sanders said on the floor.
“Attacking Iran was not enough.
Netanyahu is now waging a full-blown war of expansion against Lebanon.”
Mr.
Kelly said the joint U.S.-Israeli operation that had widened into a regional war, and led to severe economic fallout, was “not business as usual.”
“And it is not making us safer,” he added.
“The United States and Israel are fighting a war against Iran without a clear strategy or goal.”
Senator Jim Risch of Idaho, the Republican chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, said the measures would “embolden” Iran and “call into question American reliability” in the Middle East.
“It would send the message that the United States is prepared to leave our ally Israel vulnerable to further Iranian attacks and put the tens of thousands of Americans living there at risk,” he said.
President Trump is trying to cast his Iran war as all but over, a done-and-dusted success.
But after years of trying to impose his own reality on the world, he has now run into a crisis that is not bending to his narrative.
“It’s a new regime,” Mr.
Trump said in a Fox Business interview that aired on Wednesday, referring to Iran’s new leaders.
“We find them pretty reasonable to be honest with you, by comparison pretty reasonable.”
It was the latest instance of Mr.
Trump’s trying to spin a “regime change” accomplishment in Iran, even though analysts believe the war may have only increased the internal sway of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps , the hard-line military force that has long been a major player in Iran’s politics and economy.
The new supreme leader, Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, has not been seen in public since he replaced his father, who was killed at the start of the war, but his elevation as head of state has been another symbol of continuity.
“Most generously you could say there is a leadership change,” said Behnam Ben Taleblu, the senior director of the Iran program at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a Washington think tank with a hawkish stance on Iran.
“It is incorrect for the proponents of the conflict to frame this as a change for the better.”
Indeed, trade through the Strait of Hormuz remains far from normal and Iran’s government is not bending to Mr.
Trump’s demands on its nuclear program.
But in Mr.
Trump’s telling, U.S. victory in Iran is already clear.
In the Fox Business interview, reprising his frequent comments of the last two weeks, Mr.
Trump asserted that Iran’s navy, air force and antiaircraft equipment had all been wiped out, along with many top officials.
If Iran did not rule out nuclear weapons, Mr.
Trump said, “we will be living with them for a little while, but I don’t know how much longer they can survive.”
In fact, analysts say, the 40 days of U.S.-Israeli bombardment that ended with last week’s cease-fire appear to have increased the power of the military and hard-liners in the Iranian system.
Despite the widespread destruction and the killings of officials by the U.S. and Israeli militaries, the Iranian regime is acting emboldened, having demonstrated that it can wreak havoc in global trade and send U.S. gas prices soaring.
The result is that a president who has long relied on threats and bluster as essential foreign-policy tools seems to be groping for the leverage to bring Iran’s regime to heel.
Analysts say that the success of the administration’s latest effort, its blockade of Iranian ports, depends on the ability of the United States and its allies to withstand the additional pressure that Iran could impose on Persian Gulf trade in response.
Mona Yacoubian, a former State Department official and Middle East expert, drew a contrast in Mr.
Trump’s struggle with Iran to his success in exacting concessions from U.S. allies by threatening them with tariffs.
“This is not something he has control over with the stroke of a pen,” said Ms.
Yacoubian, who directs the Middle East program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank.
“This is where the president’s approach of his own charismatic and powerful personality, in my view, is not a match for the complexity, the opacity, that is the case with Iran.”
The administration has been eager to portray a groundbreaking deal with Iran as being possible.
Vice President JD Vance said Tuesday that Mr.
Trump sought a “grand bargain” in which the United States would treat Iran “economically like a normal country” if it acted “like a normal country.”
“He doesn’t want a small deal,” Mr.
Vance said.
Mr.
Vance ended an extensive session of talks with Iranian officials in Pakistan last week without an agreement.
He said Tuesday that the United States would keep negotiating, and that “the people we were sitting across from wanted to make a deal.”
But Iran appears to have taken note of the leverage it has against Mr.
Trump, given the pain of rising gas prices and Republican worries that the unpopularity of the Iran war could hurt the party in the midterm elections in November.
That means that even though Iran appears ready to negotiate, its leaders could make demands of their own on matters like the future governance of the Strait of Hormuz, while still driving a hard bargain on nuclear policy, the issue that matters most to Mr.
Trump.
Nate Swanson, a former U.S. official who was on the Trump negotiating team with Iran until July, said the regime in Tehran was not going to capitulate to Mr.
Trump’s demands in negotiations, “just as they did not on the battlefield.”
Mr.
Trump was unlikely to succeed, he said, in “trying to force transformational change on a system that feels like it just won a war.”
“Iran will only make a deal they see as being in their interest,” Mr.
Swanson, now at the Atlantic Council, said.
“That will most likely be small and transactional.”
Mr.
Swanson also cautioned against reading too much into the perceived pragmatism of individual Iranian negotiators like Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, the parliament speaker whom Mr.
Trump has cast as part of a more moderate, new crop of Iranian leaders.
Without a consolidated power base, all Iranian officials will need to emphasize their hard-line bona fides, he said.
“It’s not in Ghalibaf’s or anyone else’s interest to stray from the party line right now,” Mr.
Swanson said.
Iran said on Wednesday that it would widen its efforts to stop all exports and imports in the Persian Gulf, the Sea of Oman and the Red Sea in response to the American naval blockade of its ports.
While such action by Iran could be economically damaging, it is unlikely that Iran has the capabilities to enforce all of those threats, experts say.
“Iran has limited capability to execute its threats in the Persian Gulf, and really limited capability in the Red Sea,” said Eugene Gholz, a professor at the University of Notre Dame who focuses on military threats in the Strait of Hormuz.
He said the threat meant “some, but not much.”
It is also not clear that portions of what Iran is now threatening go significantly beyond the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, which it has largely maintained since the war’s start.
Maj.
Gen.
Ali Abdollahi, the commander overseeing Iran’s army, said in a statement on Wednesday that if the U.S. blockade “creates insecurity” for Iran’s commercial and oil vessels, Iran would see it as a “prelude to violating the cease-fire.”
In response, the commander said, Tehran would seek to impose authority in critical shipping routes beyond the Strait of Hormuz, including the Persian Gulf, the Sea of Oman and the Red Sea.
While battered, Iran’s armed forces do still have the ability, with mines and fast boats, to harass ships in the Strait of Hormuz, through which about a fifth of the world’s oil normally passes .
The strait is the crucial bridge linking the Persian Gulf and the Sea of Oman.
Therefore, the blockade Iran already has in place affects most of the shipping that would transit through the Persian Gulf and the Sea of Oman, Mr.
Gholz said.
In effective terms, Mr.
Gholz said, Iran’s new threat would largely stop ships already waiting in both waterways.
The newest part of Iran’s threat concerns the Red Sea, where, notably, Saudi Arabia has substantially increased its oil exports as a workaround to the blockade in the Strait of Hormuz.
But Iran does not have a military presence in the Red Sea, meaning it would most likely have to rely on proxy groups, notably the Houthi militia in Yemen, to enforce any blockade.
The Houthis have proved capable of attacking shipping in the Red Sea, shutting down that route during the war in Gaza.
The Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based research group, found in an April report that even a limited Gulf or Red Sea attack campaign could strain the global economy .
The Red Sea accounts for 9 to 12 percent of global trade and 25 to 30 percent of global container trade, according to the report.
But the Houthis’ capabilities have been significantly degraded in the past two years, Mr.
Gholz said.
He added that it was unclear if the Houthis would be willing to engage in a costly and dangerous operation to enforce a total blockade of the Red Sea.
A wider campaign, the Institute for the Study of War found, would jeopardize the Houthis’ position with Saudi Arabia, with whom they have a fragile cease-fire, and would risk a U.S. retaliation.
“They can harass some ships,” Mr.
Gholz said, “but they probably can’t enforce a blockade.”
Israel is considering a short-term cease-fire in Lebanon that could pause the war against Iran-backed Hezbollah, Israeli and Lebanese officials said on Wednesday.
The Israeli government has yet to formally sign off on the truce, and the discussions around it remained fluid.
It could be discussed by Israel’s high-level security cabinet when it meets on Wednesday night, one of the Israeli officials said.
Israel and Lebanon held rare talks on Tuesday, hailed by the United States as a “historic milestone” that Washington hoped would bring lasting peace.
It is unclear whether Hezbollah would go along with a cease-fire, however, even if Israel and the Lebanese government agreed on one.
Iran has insisted that its current two-week truce with the United States should extend to Lebanon, and the Trump administration has appeared eager to secure a détente between Israel and Hezbollah.
A cease-fire in Lebanon would remove one obstacle in talks to convert the U.S.-Iran truce into a durable peace.
President Trump said last week that he had asked Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel to scale back attacks in Lebanon.
Israel did stop strikes on the Lebanese capital, Beirut, but kept up attacks on Hezbollah in southern Lebanon.
A senior Lebanese official said the Lebanese government has been notified by the United States that Israel was considering a short-term truce after the Israel-Lebanon talks in Washington on Tuesday.
Hezbollah had yet to respond to the idea, the Lebanese official added.
The Lebanese government does not speak for Hezbollah.
Two of the Israeli officials said the cease-fire could begin as early as Thursday and last about a week.
A senior U.S. administration official said the truce under consideration was not something Washington had asked for, nor was it part of the U.S.-Iran negotiations.
The official said President Trump nonetheless would welcome the end of hostilities in Lebanon as part of an Israeli-Lebanese peace agreement.
All of the officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the sensitive diplomacy publicly.
A spokesman for the Israeli prime minister could not immediately be reached for comment.
Israel launched its sweeping military campaign in Lebanon in early March, just days after the U.S.-Israeli air war with Iran started.
It began after Hezbollah fired a volley of rockets at northern Israel in solidarity with its patron, Iran.
An Israeli ground invasion in southern Lebanon has forced more than one million people to flee their homes.
More than 2,000 people have been killed, according to the Lebanese authorities, including both civilians and Hezbollah fighters.
Israel has signaled recently that it was planning to occupy large parts of southern Lebanon even after the current conflict with Hezbollah.
Israel Katz, the Israeli defense minister, said this month that Israel was planning to set up a deep security zone inside Lebanese territory.
To create the zone, he said, Israel would demolish buildings in Lebanese towns near the border and prevent hundreds of thousands of displaced Lebanese from returning to their homes.
On Wednesday, Lt.
Gen.
Eyal Zamir, the Israeli military chief of staff, said that Israel was keeping up attacks on Hezbollah.
Much of southern Lebanon — all the way to the Litani River, long seen as a key demarcation line — would become “a destruction zone for Hezbollah terrorists,” General Zamir said in a statement.
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