US President Donald Trump on Wednesday, 8 July, declared that the Memorandum of Understanding with Iran was ‘over’. said on Wednesday that the Iranian government was a “cancer” that had to be cut out early, adding that US forces hit Iranian targets “very hard” overnight.
Reversing the already fragile peace that had ensued in lieu of the ceasefire deal that Iran and the US had signed, Trump said, “These are evil, sick people. And we have to rid of that cancer… You got to cut out cancer early (sic),”
The US President made the claims at the NATO summit in Ankara alongside NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte.
Trump said Iran had fired missiles at ships instead of focusing on funeral ceremonies for its slain leader and said the US response was “20 times tougher”. The US president also said Iran could not be allowed to obtain a nuclear weapon and said Tehran had been “trouble” for 47 years.
His remarks sent , knocked 1.6% off European equity markets, and pushed government bond yields higher as investors braced for renewed inflationary pressure.
What triggered the renewed US strikes on Iran?
According to , the strikes hit “over 80 targets” in Iran in direct response to attacks on three commercial vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz: the Marshall Islands-flagged M/T Al Rekayyat, the Saudi-flagged M/T Wedyan and the Liberian-flagged M/T Cyprus Prosperity, all reportedly sailing near Oman’s coastline at the time.
Iran has instructed international shipping to use a designated “safe route” that hugs its own coastline through the strait, marking a stretch of Omani waters as a “restricted zone”. Local broadcasters said the tankers had disregarded warnings from Iranian forces to alter course.
CENTCOM said in a statement that “US forces struck Iranian air defence systems, command and control networks, coastal radar sites, anti-ship missile capabilities, and more than 60 Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps small boats in and near the strait to degrade Iran’s ability to continue attacking international commerce flowing through the international trade corridor.” The command also cautioned that further strikes could follow should Iran continue acting “outside of agreements”.
Which Iranian sites were hit in the latest strikes?
, where commercial and fishing piers were struck, and several people were injured by shrapnel, though the full extent of casualties remains unclear.
Additional strikes were reported on Qeshm Island, a strategically significant point in the Strait of Hormuz, and near Bandar Abbas, a port previously blockaded by the US Navy before the MoU took effect.
Two military installations in Iran’s southern Bushehr province were also struck, according to a provincial security official cited by the semi-official Fars news agency.
One base was hit in Dashti County and another near the town of Chogadak. Fars reported no deaths or injuries from either incident.
Has Washington taken any further economic action?
Alongside the military response, the US Treasury announced late on Tuesday that sanctions on Iranian oil exports had been reinstated, reversing a waiver Trump had granted during the earlier conflict to ease a global energy crunch triggered by the Strait of Hormuz closure.
That 60-day waiver, part of the MoU signed on 17 June, had permitted Tehran to continue selling crude and was due to run until 21 August.
The renewed sanctions apply to new oil sales from 7 July onward, though a grace period will allow previously contracted shipments to proceed, with proceeds held in a “blocked, interest-bearing account”, the Treasury said.
How has Iran retaliated?
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said it had struck 85 US military targets across Bahrain and Kuwait, with air raid sirens sounding in both countries. The IRGC said it “destroyed 85 major US military installations in Port Salman, [the US] Fifth Naval Base in Bahrain, and Kuwait’s Ali Salem Airbase, and shot down an enemy MQ9 drone that attempted to interfere in the operation.” One IRGC member was reportedly killed in the exchange.
Iran’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs condemned what it called “aggressive attacks and gross violations” of the MoU, stating that “the terrorist US military, in clear violation of Article 2, Paragraph 4 of the United Nations Charter, committed military aggression against several monitoring and surveillance centres on the southern coasts of Iran.”
The ministry added that the strikes “constitute a flagrant violation of Paragraph 1 of the Memorandum of Understanding on the Termination of War, which mandates the cessation of military operations.”
It further warned that Iran’s armed forces “will not hesitate in defending Iran’s territorial integrity, national sovereignty, and national security against US military aggression in accordance with Article 51 of the UN Charter, and will target the source and origin of the aggression.”
Parliament Speaker and lead negotiator Mohammad Ghalibaf wrote on X that the strikes, the reimposed sanctions and ongoing Israeli attacks on Lebanon together amounted to “”, declaring: “The era of bullying and extortion is over. It leads nowhere. We don’t fold.”
Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said in a Telegram statement that the US strikes had “rendered key, fundamental elements of the war-ending agreement ineffective”, adding that “the US regime, having reneged on its commitments, bears responsibility for the dangerous consequences of this escalation.”
What happens to US-Iran peace talks now?
The negotiations, which began after the 60-day MoU halted fighting across the region, including in Lebanon, now hang in the balance. The agreement had required Iran to restore commercial shipping through the Strait of Hormuz to pre-war levels in exchange for a US sanctions waiver and the unfreezing of Iranian assets, while both sides worked toward a resolution on Iran’s nuclear programme.
Trump’s comment that the deal was effectively “over”, tempered only by his acknowledgement that he “might let my wonderful negotiators keep talking”, has left diplomats and analysts uncertain about Washington’s next move.
Wednesday’s escalation marks the third occasion on which the US has launched major strikes on Iran while talks were still underway, a pattern Tehran says has steadily eroded trust between the two sides.
