Trump warns he would ‘bomb’ Oman over Iran talks as tensions around Strait of Hormuz escalate

President Donald Trump threatened on Monday to bomb Oman if the country “gets in the way” of a US deal with Iran over control of the Strait of Hormuz, according to an interview with Fox News journalist Trey Yingst published by AFP and carried by IOL.

Threats in interview

In the interview, Trump referred to ongoing talks between Oman and Iran on navigation arrangements through the strait. He said,

“If Oman gets in the way, we’ll bomb the shit out of them,”

attributing the remark to Yingst’s account of the interview.

Stakes around the Strait of Hormuz

The Strait of Hormuz has been effectively closed since the conflict began on February 28, and control of the waterway is central to the deadlock between Tehran and Washington, the AFP report stated. Before the war, the strait was an open international waterway carrying roughly a fifth of global oil supplies, the report said.

Diplomacy and regional moves

The report said Tehran and Muscat have been discussing future navigation arrangements and that Iran’s foreign ministry said the two sides were working on a joint declaration. Oman had not publicly commented on the president’s remarks, according to the AFP article.

AFP said the talks between Iran and Oman followed the collapse of a Pakistan-mediated US-Iran interim deal aimed at keeping Hormuz open to traffic, and that renewed fighting over the waterway quickly derailed that arrangement.

Further comments from Trump and allies

Trump also told Yingst that Iran should “put up the white flag of surrender,” according to the account of the interview published by AFP. The president has asserted that the strait is under US control, despite traffic remaining heavily throttled, the report noted.

The AFP coverage added that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan discussed the conflict in a phone call with Trump and “stressed the importance of ‘fully utilizing diplomacy’ to ease tensions between Iran and the United States,” citing Turkish state news agency Anadolu.

Regional impact

The report said Iran’s effective control over the strait has been used as leverage against US-led efforts to degrade Iran’s military and nuclear programme. As Iran restricts traffic in Hormuz, the AFP article also noted that its Houthi allies in Yemen have declared a parallel maritime blockade on Saudi ports in the Red Sea.

AFP reported that the closure of Hormuz has driven up fuel prices,