Trump declares Iran war 'effectively over' after Gulf pushback

Donald Trump says the war in Iran is over, at least for now, and shrugs off the idea that Washington will crank up its military campaign once the midterms are behind it. Speaking at a White House press conference, he said Israel and Gulf allies are already well shielded from Iran and that escalation isn't needed. The US military, he noted, is nonetheless still cocked and ready: anyone who needs to start something, he said, will find it prepared.

The remarks came straight after Oval Office talks with Qatar's prime minister, Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, who has been lobbying Trump alongside other Gulf states to keep the fighting from restarting. Trump told reporters there was momentum toward ending the conflict and predicted it would wrap up fairly soon. He framed a fresh military push as unnecessary for the moment, but stressed that the country remains prepared to act on any justification it chooses.

It's a familiar script. Across nearly nine months of war, Trump has repeatedly claimed a final peace deal was just around the corner — dozens of times over. Troop movements into the Middle East also kept up in the run-up to the midterm elections, feeding speculation that the administration was holding back a renewed campaign until voters had finished casting ballots.

They did cast them, and Republicans were crushed, losing both chambers of Congress in a historic defeat. Vice-president JD Vance blamed the Iran war as a key factor in those losses almost immediately after the results landed.

Earlier on Monday, Trump posted on Truth Social that Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain and Kuwait would prefer the status quo — a continuation, as he put it, of the Greatest Naval Blockade in History. He repeated his position that Iran will not be allowed to develop a nuclear weapon, and said the US would resume full-scale military action if the situation shifted, though he called that quite unlikely and insisted Israel and the whole region are protected from Iranian threats.