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Pause, talks, and readiness
President Donald Trump is giving U.S.-Iran diplomacy “some space,” United Nations Ambassador Mike Waltz said Sunday as the U.S. paused strikes for a second straight day.
“Washington - In a striking shift in the trajectory of the confrontation between the United States and Iran, it appears that U”
CBS News reported that more than 400 U.S. service members have been flown out of the Middle East for various types of treatment since Operation Epic Fury began, with a U.S. official saying most cases were not combat-related.
CBS News also said the Iranian military halted retaliatory attacks against U.S. allies in the Middle East after Washington paused its strikes on Iran for the last two nights.
In the Strait of Hormuz, CBS News reported that Iran’s Revolutionary Guard turned back six ships after warning shots, with a state television correspondent saying, "Last night, six vessels that attempted to transit through a route other than the designated one were stopped by the IRGC Navy with warning shots and turned back."
The BBC meanwhile framed the pause as a window for negotiations, saying the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations said Trump paused attacks to give diplomacy a chance.
Waltz’s line vs Trump’s images
Waltz told NBC’s “Meet the Press” that the U.S. military “has everything that it needs to conduct this campaign as effectively as it needs to be,” while also warning that those leaking information about depleted munitions “deserve to be in jail.”
MS NOW reported that hours after Waltz’s remarks, Trump posted images to social media depicting the U.S. attacking Iran, including AI-generated images on Truth Social showing strikes on Kharg Island.
The Washington Post said Waltz’s comments came as the U.S. military paused its bombing raids on Iran over the weekend after 13 consecutive days of heavy strikes.
The Guardian reported that when asked on NBC’s Meet the Press whether Trump was ruling out additional strikes in Iran, Waltz said: “I wouldn’t go that far at all. The president is keeping all options on the table.”
In parallel, the Guardian said Tehran would pause what it called “retaliatory” attacks against U.S. allies, with army spokesperson Mohammad Akraminia saying, "Our strategy has essentially been retaliatory, we have also halted our retaliatory operations."
Oil, casualties, and the off-ramp
As the pause continued, CNN said the Pentagon quietly changed its accounting for Iran war casualties, updating its database to add more than 140 wounded U.S. service members and restoring the record of four soldiers killed last weekend.
“Live coverage update: as we enter Monday dawn in London time, our live coverage also moves to the new page for July 27 / 5 Amordad”
CNN also tied the conflict’s stakes to energy prices, saying oil fell over 5% on Sunday while gas prices ticked higher as the conflict impacts maritime traffic in the region.
The AP reported that the U.S. military has paused its airstrikes on Iran after nearly two weeks of intensifying bombing, while diplomatic efforts pushed forward to avert a return to all-out war.
The AP quoted Michael Singh of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy saying, “If it turns into a multiday pause, that’ll be something significant,” and also said it was hard to know whether the pause was “an operational pause” or “a pause to allow for some kind of behind-the-scenes diplomacy?”
In the Strait of Hormuz, the AP said Iran and Oman held several rounds of technical talks, and Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei confirmed that the Omani delegation left Tehran on Saturday afternoon while talks made progress and were continuing.
