U.S. President Donald J. Trump announced in a post this morning on TruthSocial that he will allow the Strait of Hormuz to remain open, with no further naval blockade, but that the ships will remain in place “should it be necessary to reinstitute the Blockade, which seems, at this point, highly unlikely.” The President adds that money and sanctions on Iran being released by the U.S. Treasury, estimated to initially be around $12 billion, will be “used for the purchase of food and medical supplies, exclusively from the United States, including Corn, Wheat, and Soybeans from our great American Farmers.”
Iran has imposed a daily limit on the number of vessels allowed to transit the Strait of Hormuz, according to a military source cited by Fars News Agency. The cap will fluctuate based on conditions.
Vote now, vote often. #IRANWAR#POLL#OOTT
BREAKING: Iran's chief negotiator Ghalibaf has finalized the immediate release of $12 billion in frozen Iranian assets during the Switzerland talks, with Deputy FM Gharibabadi saying implementation is now urgently underway, per Tasnim. This directly contradicts VP Vance's new claim that "no money is being released to Iran."
Iran also refused to use the unfrozen funds to buy US agricultural products, saying Iran has "no obligation to buy agricultural products from the United States" under the existing agreement, rejecting Vance and Jared Kushner's framework requiring Iran to do so.
@AmandaMAtwell Ireland, Austria, Portugal, and Hungary could all fit inside Texas. Their countries are smaller than our states so we only need a driver's license
The World Cup has landed in Houston.
A 15,000-person Dutch march, fire trucks keeping fans cool, and seas of orange, Houston has become the Americana alternative to New York and Los Angeles for European fans.
Trump on April 1: We're now totally independent of the Middle East. We don't need their oil.
Trump on June 17: If I didn't agree to the MOU, we would run out of reserves in about 4 weeks.
Trump on April 1: We're now totally independent of the Middle East. We don't need their oil.
Trump on June 17: If I didn't agree to the MOU, we would run out of reserves in about 4 weeks.
Marco Rubio, Senate floor, September 2015
“I do want to be recorded for history’s purposes, for I know what is going to happen with regards to this, if it goes through. Iran will immediately use the money it is receiving in sanctions relief to begin to build up its conventional capabilities. It will establish the most dominant military power in the region outside of the United States and it will raise the price of us operating in the region. They’re going to build anti-access capabilities, rockets capable of destroying our aircraft carriers and ships, continue to build these swift boats that are able to come on us, these fast boats that are able to swarm our naval assets, and they’ll make it harder and harder for U.S. troops to be in the region.
“They’ll also work with other terrorist groups in the region to target American service men and women, and they may or may not deny that they’re involved but they will target us and raise the price of our presence in the Middle East until they hope to completely pull us out of that region.
“They’ll also continue to build long-range missiles, missiles capable of reaching the United States. Those are not affected by this deal, and they’ll continue to build them as they have been doing.
“And then, at some point in the near future, when the time is right, they will build a nuclear weapon, and they will do so because at that point they will know that they have become immune, that we will no longer be able to strike their nuclear program because the price of doing so will be too high.
“This is not just a work of imagination. It exists in the world today. It’s called North Korea, where a lunatic possesses dozens of nuclear weapons and a long-range rocket that can already reach the United States. And we cannot do anything about it. An attack on North Korea today would result in an attack on Tokyo or Seoul or Guam or Hawaii or California. And so the world must now live with a lunatic in possession of nuclear weapons.
“And this is the goal Iran has as well, to reach a point where they become immune to any sort of credible military threat because the price of a military strike would be too high. And then they become an established nuclear weapons power. And never in the history of the world has such a regime ever possessed weapons so capable of destruction. Iran is led by a Supreme Leader who is a radical Shia cleric with an apocalyptic vision of the future. He is not a traditional geopolitical actor who makes decisions on the basis of borders or simply history or because of ambitions. He has a religious apocalyptic vision of the future, one that calls for triggering a conflict between the non-Muslim world and the Muslim world, one that he feels especially obligated to trigger. And he’s going to possess nuclear weapons?
“This is the world that we are on the verge of leaving our children to inherit, and perhaps we ourselves will have to share in.
“So I want to be recorded for history’s purposes, if nothing else, to say that those of us who oppose this deal understood where it would lead, and we are making a terrible mistake. And I fear that passage of this deal will make it even harder for us to prevent it.
“And I hope there’s still time for us to change our minds, but here’s the good news: Iran may have a Supreme Leader, but America does not. In this nation we have a republic, and soon we will have new leaders, perhaps in this chamber, but also in the executive branch. And I pray that on their first day in office they will reverse this deal and reimpose the sanctions and back them up with a credible threat of military force, or history will condemn us for not doing what needed to be done at this critical moment in the world’s history.”
BREAKING: Iran's IRGC has launched multiple drones at commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz every night since the US-Iran deal was electronically signed Sunday, including yesterday, to enforce Iranian control over Hormuz shipping, per NBC News citing a US official.
Meanwhile multiple loaded Iranian oil tankers have left the port of Chabahar and crossed the US blockade line today, without being stopped, per MarineTraffic.
Iran is operationally exercising its full sovereign authority over the Strait of Hormuz while simultaneously receiving $400 billion in total deal funds across frozen assets and reconstruction funds, fulfilling IRGC Commander Vahidi's framework of "we take the money" while retaining the missile program, proxy network, rebuild capacity and control over Hormuz.
BREAKING: US officials have now confirmed in a briefing that Iran will get full access to a total of $100 billion in frozen funds and the $300 billion reconstruction fund, both included in the deal with implementation now underway, per WSJ.
More than $150 billion of the fund has already been committed, directly contradicting Trump's claims that the US would not contribute to the $300 billion fund, per Reuters.
This administration’s attempts to bring gasoline prices down for the average American are asinine. The average American spends about $200 per month on gas. Even if that doubles, it’s a mouse fart in a hurricane compared to how much auto, home, and health insurance bills have skyrocketed since before COVID.
Those costs are absolutely breaking the country, yet politicians refuse to discuss it. Now we’re about to send billions to a dangerous regime that openly says they want us dead—just to lower oil and gas prices. None of this makes sense.
At least 39 times in the last 65 days, the President of the United States has declared the United States and Iran were close to a deal only to have the Iranians openly mock him and deny it.
Yesterday, the President went on Fox & Friends in the morning to declare bombings would resume and be even more ferocious. By the afternoon, he declared bombings would cease because a deal was close. He claimed buy-in from the Egyptians, the Emirates, the Saudis, the Kuwaitis, the Israelis, the Iranians, and more.
Egypt said it had no knowledge of any deal. Israel said it had no knowledge of a deal. Then FARS, the semi-official Iranian news agency that represents the voice of the Revolutionary Guard in Iran said there was no deal. Overnight, word came the Ayatollah refused a deal. Then the Iranians started firing drones at commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz.
The President, the other days, said Iran was playing us. The only one being played is President Trump. A state of war exists between Iran and its neighbors. The ceasefire is a farce. The President has turned into a clown.
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