Iran warns of military ship ban in Hormuz under potential deal with Oman, and other Middle East news
Iran won't allow military vessels to transit through the Strait of Hormuz under an agreement that the Islamic Republic is negotiating with Oman, Iran's deputy foreign minister said.
The top diplomats of the two countries met to discuss managing commercial shipping traffic in the vital waterway, which remains largely shut down nearly six months after the Iran war began.
Meanwhile, Israeli strikes in Gaza continued, testing the already fragile ceasefire with Hamas.
Here’s a look at the latest developments in the Iran war and the wider Middle East. Full coverage can be found here.
Iran and Oman have reached an understanding on a new framework for managing ship traffic in the Strait of Hormuz that would exclude military vessels from traversing the vital waterway.
Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi told state television late Tuesday that commercial shipping traffic into the Persian Gulf from the Gulf of Oman would pass entirely through Iranian waters, while the outbound route would pass partly through Iranian waters and partly through Oman’s territorial waters.
He said the route would be temporary, and that Iran and Oman must discuss a permanent maritime traffic plan within 30 to 60 days. U.S. President Donald Trump has threatened to bomb Oman if it “gets in the way" as his administration opposes parts of the evolving deal.
The U.S. president said during an interview on Wednesday that he thinks Ayatollah Motjaba Khamenei is “very seriously wounded,” but not dead.
“If he is, they’re putting on a pretty good show,” Trump told conservative American host Glenn Beck, noting that Iranian officials reference “going back to talk to him all the time ... to get a final blessing on things.”
Motjaba Khamenei became supreme leader after his father, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was killed at the start of the war when the U.S. and Israel bombed Iran on Feb. 28. The younger Khamenei was badly wounded in the attacks and has remained out of public view.
Some parents said children in Gaza are dismantling their kites after Israel threatened to ramp up strikes as the toys keep flying into southern Israel. In the past, kites and balloons have been set aflame and launched across the Gaza border, igniting fields and property in Israeli communities.
The Palestinian militant group Hamas has downplayed the danger the kites pose.
In tents near the Mediterranean Sea in southern Gaza, kids dismantled the plastic, cloth and wood contraptions as adults looked on. For Atiya Abu Samhan, the kite ban represented another indignity for Palestinian children.
“They’ve lost their simple dreams, their education, their childhood, the simple things they used to enjoy,” he said.
An Israeli strike on a tent for displaced people Wednesday in southern Gaza killed one person and wounded at least four, the territory’s Health Ministry official. The Israeli military said that it struck a “military operative,” without elaborating.
Palestinians in the Gaza Strip have reported a surge in deadly Israeli strikes, despite a fragile ceasefire in the nearly three-year Israel-Hamas war. Israel has said that it targets Hamas and other militants who pose a threat, as well as those who participated in the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, which triggered the war.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says his government has legalized more than 104 settlements and established 160 farming outposts in the West Bank since he took office again in 2022.
“I know that we are not only ensuring our existence in the present, we are ensuring the existence of the people of Israel in the future,” he said at an event in Jerusalem on Tuesday night.
Israeli settlements in the West Bank are largely considered illegal, but Netanyahu has made their expansion a priority in the lead-up to Israel’s upcoming election.
About 3 million Palestinians live alongside more than 500,000 Israeli settlers in the occupied territory, which has seen a recent spike in violence as the Israeli presence expands.
Dubai International Airport, one of the world's busiest travel hubs, said Wednesday that it saw a sharp drop in passengers as the Iran war disrupted air travel and prompted many travelers to choose routes that avoided the Middle East.
The airport recorded 13 million passengers in the second quarter of 2026, bringing the total to about 31.5 million passengers for first half of the year. That's down 31.3% compared to last year at the halfway mark.
The U.S. aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln will make a stop in Thailand after its grueling deployment in the Middle East, Thai officials said Tuesday, without specifying a date or port for security reasons.
The Lincoln’s lengthy deployment during the Iran war has included a record-setting uninterrupted time at sea of more than 250 days, raising concerns about deteriorating mental health among the crew.
Germany has ended the military mission of its advisers in Iraq’s semiautonomous northern Kurdish region after years of supporting the U.S.-led coalition’s efforts against Islamic State group militants.
The Kurdish region’s Ministry of Peshmerga Affairs said Wednesday that it held an official ceremony to mark the German mission's end at Camp Stephan at Irbil International Airport, where the country maintained a small contingent as it reduced its military footprint. U.S. forces have also begun withdrawing from northern Iraq before a Sept. 30 deadline.
Human Rights Watch condemned a decision by Yemen’s Iranian-backed Houthi rebels to refer at least six people to a criminal court known for putting defendants to death on terror and espionage charges.
The New York-based advocacy group said at least five of those facing charges in the notorious Specialized Criminal Court are either U.N. employees or civil society workers. HRW also said one of the defendants, Ali Mudhwahi, a national public health expert with UNICEF, was tortured and forced to confess that vaccines were spying tools.
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