Mother Jones
Trump Threatens War Crimes in Iran Again
In a Truth Social tirade on Sunday morning, President Donald Trump claimed that Iran violated their ceasefire agreement with the US by firing shots at ships in the Strait of Hormuz and again threatened to commit war crimes by taking out the country’s energy infrastructure.
“Many of [the bullets] were aimed at a French Ship, and a Freighter from the United Kingdom,” Trump contended about Iran’s targeting of the ships, without evidence. “That wasn’t nice, was it?”
The US and Iran agreed to a two-week ceasefire in early April. The agreement is set to expire later this week, and the US continues to negotiate next steps around access to the Strait—the world’s most important oil transit corridor. “We’re offering a very fair and reasonable DEAL, and I hope they take it,” Trump wrote in the same social media post. “If they don’t, the United States is going to knock out every single Power Plant, and every single Bridge, in Iran. NO MORE MR. NICE GUY!”
International law experts consider strikes on infrastructure—even if they qualify as military targets—to be war crimes because they cause disproportionate harm to civilians.
Here we go again
On Saturday, the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations organization, developed by Britain’s Royal Navy, reported two incidents of ships being hit in the Strait of Hormuz. Those ships, along with several others, turned back. The two vessels appear to both belong to India, according to India’s ministry of external affairs.
This reported attack took place the day after Iran re-established an effective closure of the strait on Saturday, overturning its announcement less than 24 hours before to “completely open” the shipping waterway during the Israel-Lebanon ceasefire.
According to Al Jazeera, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy explained on Saturday that the nation decided to close the strait until the US withdraws its blockade on all ships entering and leaving Iranian ports. Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, Iran’s parliamentary speaker, said in a television interview that the blockade, which began last week, was “a clumsy and ignorant decision” and violated the ceasefire agreement.
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps threatened that ships attempting to cross the strait during Iran’s closure would be considered in “cooperation with the enemy” and “any violating vessels would be targeted.” That same day, reports began to come out of the two ships hit in the strait.
Trump announced in the same Truth Social message that US officials will arrive in Pakistan on Monday to resume negotiations with Iran. According to the Associated Press, Iran did not immediately confirm whether they would send representatives to meet the US delegation. If JD Vance’s failed negotiations with Iran last week are anything to go by, it doesn’t seem like an agreement will happen anytime soon.
More than 3,000 people have been killed in Iran as of April 9 since US and Israeli strikes began at the end of February, according to Iran’s forensic chief. The US military has confirmed 13 combat-related deaths in the region.