TV News LIES

US President Donald Trump said “things seem to be going very well with Iran” after receiving what he described as “pretty good news twenty minutes ago,” adding he “maybe won’t extend the ceasefire if no deal by Wednesday, but will keep the US blockade of Iranian ports.”

Trump also said Chinese President Xi Jinping is “very happy that the Strait of Hormuz is open and/or rapidly opening,” and said his upcoming meeting with Xi would be “a special one and, potentially, Historic”.

While Trump has claimed that Iran has agreed to hand over its enriched uranium, Ebrahim Rezaei said Tehran will not accept enriched uranium being transferred out of Iran and denied that any commitments to do so had been made, rejecting US claims to the contrary.

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Iran will shut the strait of Hormuz if the US blockade continues, Iran’s parliamentary speaker has warned.

Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf also said passage through the waterway would depend on authorisation from Iran, while swiping at Donald Trump in the series of posts on X.

Ghalibaf said (in a translation):

1 - "The President of the United States made seven claims in one hour, all seven of which were false.

2 – They did not win the war with these lies, and they will certainly not get anywhere in negotiations either.”

Ghalibaf, who last weekend co-led the Iranian side in negotiations with the US in Islamabad that failed to reach an agreement, continued in his posts:

3 –" With the continuation of the blockade, the Strait of Hormuz will not remain open.

4  – Passage through the Strait of Hormuz will be conducted based on the “designated route” and with “Iranian authorization”.

Whether the strait was open or closed and the regulations governing it “will be determined by the field, not by social media”, Ghalibaf added.

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After the U.S. military launched operations to demine the Strait of Hormuz, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) navy reportedly warned an American destroyer in the passageway.

“This is the last warning. This is the last warning,” the Iranian forces radioed to one of the two U.S. destroyers in the strait, according to The Wall Street Journal.

“Passage in accordance with international law. No challenge is intended to you, and I intend to abide by rules of our government’s cease-fire,” the U.S. ship responded, referring to the temporary pause in hostilities between the two sides.

The Hill has reached out to U.S. Central Command (Centcom) for comment on the reported radio message. The IRGC navy, meanwhile, denied Saturday that U.S. ships passed through the strait.

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In his strongest words yet, Pope Leo XIV on Saturday denounced the "delusion of omnipotence" that is fueling the U.S.-Israel war in Iran and demanded political leaders stop and negotiate peace.

Leo presided over an evening prayer service in St. Peter's Basilica on the same day the United States and Iran began face-to-face negotiations in Pakistan and as a fragile ceasefire held.

History's first U.S.-born pope didn't mention the United States or President Donald Trump in his prayer, which was planned before the talks were announced. But Leo's tone and message appeared directed at Trump and U.S. officials, who have boasted of U.S. military superiority and justified war in religious terms.

"Enough of the idolatry of self and money!" Leo said. "Enough of the display of power! Enough of war!"

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US vice-president JD Vance left Islamabad on Sunday after failing to reach a deal with Iran after a marathon 21 hours of negotiations.

Vance cited shortcomings in the talks, saying that Iran had chosen not to accept American terms, including to not build nuclear weapons.

“The bad news is that we have not reached an agreement, and I think that’s bad news for Iran much more than it’s bad news for the United States of America,” Vance said.

“So we go back to the United States having not come to an agreement. We’ve made very clear what our red lines are.”

Vance said he spoke with US president Donald Trump at least half a dozen times during the talks, and one of the most significant points of difference between the two sides had been around the development of nuclear weapons.

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When Pakistan’s prime minister, Shehbaz Sharif, announced that the US and Iran, along with their allies, had agreed to an immediate ceasefire on Tuesday night, he made clear that the truce applied “everywhere including Lebanon”. But hours later, the Israeli government insisted that the deal did not include halting its attacks on Lebanon, which had become one of the deadliest fronts of the regional war instigated by the joint US-Israeli attack on Iran.

By Wednesday afternoon, Israel had launched its largest and most destructive attack on Lebanon in years, killing at least 300 people and wounding more than 1,100. Dozens of Israeli warplanes dropped bombs on 100 targets across Lebanon within 10 minutes, with the Israeli military claiming it was targeting Hezbollah “command centers” in an operation it called “Eternal Darkness”. But Israeli warplanes leveled several buildings in crowded residential neighborhoods of Beirut, spreading panic in the Lebanese capital and overwhelming hospitals with hundreds of casualties. Israel also continued bombing Lebanon’s infrastructure, destroying the last remaining bridge that linked southern Lebanon to the rest of the country.

Israel’s escalating attacks on Lebanon could unravel the two-week ceasefire even before negotiations between the US and Iran, which are expected to start on Saturday in Islamabad. Iranian leaders are accusing the US of failing to uphold the truce and threatening to back out of it unless Washington restrains its ally. “The U.S. must choose – ceasefire or continued war via Israel. It cannot have both,” Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, wrote on Twitter/X on Wednesday. “The world sees the massacres in Lebanon. The ball is in the U.S. court, and the world is watching whether it will act on its commitments.”

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