Rubio claims “little progress” in Iran peace talks, but rejects “taxation plan” for the Strait of Hormuz.

Rubio said that “no country in the world should accept” Iran’s attempt to “create a toll system” to charge commercial ships a fee to navigate the Strait of Hormuz.

The narrow waterway – through which about a fifth of the world’s oil normally passed before the US and Israel launched their joint war with Iran – was open to all shipping until the conflict began. Tehran said it was working with Oman, another coastal nation in the strait, to “build a mechanism” to ensure “passage through the Strait of Hormuz is done in the safest way.”

Oman has not confirmed the nature of any cooperation with Iran on such a new initiative.

Rubio said Tehran is “trying to convince Oman” to join “this toll system in the international waterway.”

“That’s not acceptable. It’s not going to happen,” Rubio said of any Iranian request to impose normal demands on the passage of the ships. “If that happens in the Straits of Hormuz, it will happen in five other places around the world.”

A senior Iranian official argued in a news article published on Thursday that Iran, as a country on the coast of the waterway, is within its rights to impose new restrictions on ships using the Strait of Hormuz due to the “fundamental change” caused by the US-Israeli war launched almost three months ago.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Friday that the US is still waiting for Iran to respond to the Trump administration’s latest proposals on a possible peace deal, submitted this week by Pakistani negotiators. Tehran confirmed on Thursday that it is considering the proposal.

“We are waiting to hear about those ongoing discussions. There has been a little progress,” Rubio told reporters in Sweden, where he attended a NATO meeting. “I don’t want to exaggerate, but there has been a little movement, and that’s good.”

“The fundamentals remain the same,” he said of the latest US offer. “Iran will never have a nuclear weapon. It will never have nuclear weapons. This regime will never have nuclear weapons, and to achieve that, we will have to deal with the enrichment problem. We will have to deal with the highly enriched uranium problem. Then added to this, of course, is the issue of the strait.”

The acting secretary of the US Navy said Thursday that arms sales to Taiwan have been “suspended” to ensure the US military has enough weapons for its operations in Iran.

Asked at a congressional hearing about the blocked $14 billion arms purchase by Taiwan, Acting Secretary Hung Cao said “right now we’re pausing to make sure we have the weapons we need for Epic Fury – which we have a lot of.”

“But, we are making sure that we have everything, then the sale of foreign troops will continue when the administration deems it necessary.”

The State Department and the Pentagon did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Cao’s comments.

President Trump has not committed to pursuing the sale, raising concerns about his commitment to support Taiwan, which China claims is its territory.

CBS/AFP

Republicans struggled on Thursday to get the votes to repeal legislation that would force President Trump to withdraw from the war with Iran, delaying a vote on the issue that had been scheduled for June.

The House had scheduled a vote on a military power resolution, introduced by Democrats, that would hold up Trump’s military campaign. But as it became clear that Republicans would not have the numbers to defeat the bill, GOP leaders refused to vote for it. It was the latest sign of waning support in Congress for the war Mr. Trump more than two months ago without congressional approval.

“We had votes without asking and they knew it, and because of that they were playing a political game,” said Democrat Rep. Gregory Meeks, who sponsored the bill.

“The Republican-controlled House continues to behave like a wholly owned subsidiary of the Trump administration,” House Democratic leaders said in a joint statement. “Republicans cowardly pulled a scheduled vote on the War Powers Resolution — legislation that would have passed with bipartisan support and required the President to end the conflict in the Middle East.”

Senate Republicans are also working to ensure they have the votes to repeal another war power resolution that went to the final vote earlier this week, when four GOP senators supported the resolution and three others were absent from the vote.

What the leaders of the Congress party did showed that the Republicans are struggling to continue to support Mr. Rank-and-file Republicans are increasingly scornful of the president over the controversy.

House Republican Leader Steve Scalise told reporters that the vote was delayed to give absent lawmakers a chance to vote. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson did not answer questions from reporters as he left the House chamber.

CBS/AP

The Israeli military said it carried out an airstrike in southern Lebanon on Friday that killed two people who were armed and “moving in a suspicious manner” in an area where they were fighting Hezbollah.

Israel and the Iran-backed group have been trading regularly in the country’s south despite a ceasefire extended by Israeli and Lebanese authorities last week.

“A short time ago, IDF surveillance identified two armed individuals walking suspiciously in an area hundreds of meters from Israeli territory, in southern Lebanon,” the Israeli army wrote on Telegram.

“After being identified and being monitored by the IDF, the armed people were beaten and killed in a strike,” the post said.

Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency (NNA) reported that overnight strikes in the southern region of Tire killed four and injured two doctors at the Islamic Health Committee.

Since the start of the agreement between Israel and Lebanon on April 17, Israel has continued to launch strikes, demolish and issue evacuation orders in southern Lebanon, saying it is targeting Hezbollah, which has also continued to attack.

Iraq’s prime minister condemned the alleged attacks launched within its borders in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

The UAE said on Tuesday it launched a drone that hit a nuclear facility from Iraq, while the Saudis said they intercepted three drones entering their territory from Iraq.

Iraqi Prime Minister Ali Faleh Al-Zaidi said on Thursday that the country renewed its “rejection and renunciation” of the attack and promised a joint investigation into both strikes carried out by the UAE and Saudi Arabia.

“We express our rejection of the use of Iraqi territory or airspace as a starting point for attacks on fraternal and friendly nations, and we confirm the role of Iraq as a meeting point for common interests,” Al-Zaidi told X.

There are several Iranian-backed militias operating in Iraqi territory that are separate from the Iraqi government.