By Lara Seligman, Robbie Gramer and Michael R. Gordon
President Trump says he has an agreement with Iran to end the war, but that the final details still need to be completed in the coming days.
"We just made a great settlement of the war with Iran, and we're going to be subject to finalization of documents, which should get done over the next few days," Trump said at the White House on Thursday.
He said Vice President JD Vance could be in Europe for a singing ceremony that would possibly take place in Europe over the weekend. Trump said he wouldn't attend a ceremony to sign an agreement.
"The documents are in pretty final shape," he said, adding that the Strait of Hormuz "will officially open as soon as we sign, which could be soon, very soon.."
Trump earlier said he had canceled planned strikes on Iran. The continuing discussions "have been brought to the highest level of Iranian leadership and approved," Trump wrote in a Thursday afternoon post on Truth Social, hours after threatening to strike Iran "VERY HARD."
"Discussions and final points have been, in both concept and great detail, approved by all parties involved," Trump said.
The U.S. naval blockade of Iranian ports will remain in effect until the "transaction" is completed, Trump said, noting that "time and place of the signing" would soon be announced.
Trump's announcement is the latest back and forth in a tumultuous three months of conflict, which began Feb. 28 when the U.S. and Israel launched strikes against Iran. The two sides announced a fragile ceasefire in early April, but have traded fire on multiple occasions since the truce began.
Negotiations have so far hit an impasse as Tehran refuses to accede to Trump's demands to lift its blockade of trade through the Strait of Hormuz or dismantle its nuclear program. The U.S. for its part has repeatedly refused Iranian requests for up front U.S. sanctions relief as a precondition for opening the strait.
Republican hawks in Congress are publicly pressuring Trump not to accept a deal that would be seen as too soft on Iran or a repeat of the JCPOA -- the Obama-era nuclear deal that Trump withdrew the U.S. from in his first administration.
"I hope we have in fact reached a diplomatic solution to end the Iranian conflict that will meet President Trump's red lines and be fundamentally different from the JCPOA," Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), a vocal Trump ally, said on Thursday in a social-media post. "As in the past, any agreement reached with Iran related to their nuclear program will be presented to Congress for review and approval."
U.S. military forces have carried out multiple waves of airstrikes in the past few days after an Iranian drone downed a U.S. Apache helicopter near the Strait of Hormuz on Monday. They targeted air defenses, ground-control stations and radar sites near the strategic waterway. But the U.S. has avoided hitting Iran's infrastructure in recent days, U.S. officials said.
Trump had earlier threatened to strike Iran "VERY HARD" Thursday night and take "total control" of the country's oil-and-gas industry, suggesting that he was abandoning the diplomatic route and was aiming to force Tehran into a nuclear deal it has resisted for months. Trump said in a Truth Social post that the U.S. would, "in the not too distant future," seize Kharg Island, Iran's main oil export hub off the country's southern coast. The U.S. would then "assume total control" of Iran's oil and gas markets, he said, comparing the move to U.S. involvement in Venezuela, which he said "is working out brilliantly for both Venezuela and the United States of America."
Trump had also told Fox News in an interview Thursday morning that the U.S. could make a fortune by taking Kharg Island and controlling Iranian oil sales as it has with Venezuela's, but that Americans probably don't have the appetite for such a military operation and would rather see U.S. soldiers brought home.
Trump's earlier threat came after a fresh wave of U.S. strikes against Iran on targets near the Strait of Hormuz, following weeks of impasse in negotiations to end the war. Iran said it struck back by targeting U.S. military facilities in Bahrain, Kuwait and Jordan, raising the risk that the tenuous ceasefire would spiral into a full-fledged military conflict again.
Seizing Kharg Island, which handles roughly 90% of Iran's oil exports, would have been a complex and dangerous operation, and would likely have required ground troops in a significant escalation of the conflict. Thousands of Marines in the U.S. Central Command are now aboard four Marine warships from the 31st and the 11th Marine Expeditionary Units, according to U.S. officials.
Trump has relied almost exclusively on airstrikes during the Iran war, except for putting troops inside Iran to rescue a downed pilot. A Kharg operation would likely have been the riskiest of the war, which has now lasted more than three months.
The U.S. first bombed Kharg Island in March, hitting military targets surrounding the island's oil infrastructure. Trump at the time said he chose not to "wipe out" the island's energy terminals but said he would reconsider that threat if Iran kept the Strait of Hormuz closed. In the ensuing months, Iran has maintained a sweeping blockade of most energy shipments out of the strait, roiling global energy markets and ratcheting up pressure on Trump.
The U.S. countered with a naval blockade on Iranian oil shipments to choke off the Iranian government's main source of revenue. At the same time, it has quietly continued guiding some commercial vessels through the Strait of Hormuz, using jet fighters and helicopters to defend ships against Iranian missiles and drones, U.S. officials said this week.
Write to Lara Seligman at lara.seligman@wsj.com, Robbie Gramer at robbie.gramer@wsj.com and Michael R. Gordon at michael.gordon@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
June 11, 2026 15:49 ET (19:49 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2026 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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