ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - US President Donald Trump said on Monday that he was in no hurry to reach a deal with Iran and insisted that his approach was not being driven by November’s midterm elections, as Washington continues to tighten economic and military pressure on Tehran.
“I have no time schedule,” Trump told Fox News. “I’m not in a hurry … the midterms have nothing to do with my thinking.”
Trump said Iran should “put up the white flag of surrender,” while portraying Tehran as increasingly weakened by months of war and economic pressure.
“They’re good poker players, but they’re dying,” he said.
The US president also confirmed that Washington has a direct backchannel with officials from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
His comments came a day after Axios reported that the Trump administration had previously turned to Kurdistan Region President Nechirvan Barzani to establish contact with senior IRGC officials amid doubts in Washington over whether Iran’s diplomatic team had the authority to deliver an agreement.
According to the report, Barzani helped establish contact with Ahmad Vahidi, then the IRGC’s deputy commander and now its commander. Vahidi reportedly told Barzani that the IRGC “fully” supported Iran’s negotiating team and preferred to resolve the confrontation through negotiations.
Iran’s foreign ministry on Monday did not rule out that such a backchannel existed.
Spokesperson Esmail Baghaei instead rejected the suggestion that the report demonstrated divisions within Iran’s leadership, describing such claims as part of a “psychological operation” aimed at creating rifts among the country’s decision-makers. He separately denied that a proposed secret US-Iran meeting actually took place in Erbil, calling that claim “completely fabricated.”
Trump also addressed negotiations between Tehran and Oman over navigation through the Strait of Hormuz, issuing a stark warning to Muscat.
“If Oman gets in the way, we’ll bomb the shit out of them,” he told Fox News.
Oman has been playing a central role in efforts to ease tensions over Hormuz, where months of conflict have disrupted commercial shipping and turned control of one of the world’s most important maritime chokepoints into a central issue in negotiations.
Washington, meanwhile, continues to use the naval blockade to squeeze Iran economically.
US Central Command (CENTCOM) says US forces are continuing to enforce restrictions on vessels attempting to reach Iranian ports. The command has previously said that 91 commercial ships had been redirected as part of blockade enforcement, including vessels boarded and ordered to change course.
The pressure comes on top of years of sanctions, war damage, high inflation and worsening living standards inside Iran, increasing the strain on a government already struggling to finance imports and sustain economic activity.
Yet Tehran has continued to raise tensions across the region.
On Monday, Kurdish authorities said two drones launched from Iran targeted the private office of Kurdistan Region Prime Minister Masrour Barzani and the residence of the head of the Kurdistan Region’s security agency in Pirmam, northeast of Erbil. No casualties were reported.
The strikes came after months of Iranian and Iran-linked attacks on the Kurdistan Region. Rudaw has recorded around 1,000 attacks by Tehran and affiliated Iraqi militias during the conflict, killing 32 people and wounding 154.
