U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday dismissed Iran’s demand for reparations for devastation caused by U.S. and Israeli bombardment over the past five months, then turned around and demanded “compensation from Iran” for people he said were killed and wounded by Iranian roadside bombs and other conflicts. The exchange lays bare a familiar arrangement: leaders on both sides hurl claims of damage while ordinary people absorb the wreckage, the sanctions, the blockades and the dead.
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei said Iran will not reopen the Strait of Hormuz until the U.S. meets its conditions. Tehran wants the U.S. to end its blockade of Iranian ports, lift economic sanctions and release Iran’s frozen assets. It also says the U.S. must pay compensation for war damage. Baghaei said, “It is up to the U.S. side to stop and make amends for its illegal and destructive actions.”
Who Pays for the Power Games
Trump said he wants Tehran to compensate the families of Iranian protesters who were killed, and added, “I have instructed my representatives to put this firmly into any, and all, future negotiations.” The demand comes wrapped in the language of bargaining, but the facts on the ground are simpler: ports are blocked, assets are frozen, and people are left to live under the pressure of decisions made far above them.
The U.S. government has blamed Iran-backed militants for the deaths and injuries of hundreds of Americans over several decades. Those include a 1983 bombing that killed 241 U.S. military personnel at a Marine compound in Beirut and the deaths of at least 603 U.S. troops in Iraq between 2003 and 2011. The closure of the Strait of Hormuz, through which roughly one-fifth of the world’s traded oil supplies passed before the war, has kept energy prices a major focus of U.S. politics ahead of November’s midterm elections. The people who pay at the pump don’t get a seat at the table. They just get the bill.
Unity, Sanctions and the State’s Internal Strain
Iran’s president said Monday the country’s supreme leader is calling for “unity and cohesion” as the Islamic Republic faces economic hardships and sanctions stemming from its war with the United States. President Masoud Pezeshkian described a nearly seven-hour meeting with Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei in an interview with Iranian state television that aired amid apparent tensions among the Islamic Republic’s leaders. Pezeshkian told the state-run IRIB that he and Khamenei discussed “people’s livelihoods, the state of the market, employment, people’s housing,” as well as “problems that are now being created as a result of the (U.S.) sanctions.” He didn’t say when or where they met.
He said Khamenei emphasized unity. “All of the enemy’s plans are aimed at creating division,” Pezeshkian said. “What we have to do is prevent divisions from emerging.” The language is neat. The hardship is not. Markets, housing and employment sit under the weight of sanctions and war, while the leadership talks cohesion from above.
It is only the second time the Iranian president has said he has met with the new supreme leader since Khamenei was appointed in March following a U.S.-Israeli strike that killed his father. Khamenei, believed to have been wounded in the same attack, has not appeared in public since then.
Military Zones, Settlers and the People Caught Below
Israel’s military said Monday it had declared a Christian-majority town in the occupied West Bank a closed military zone to keep out Israeli settlers and other non-residents. The new tactic is designed to keep Israelis out of Taybeh, which has been subject to arson, vandalism and settlers coming onto private and village property. The army said Palestinian residents and journalists would be allowed unless soldiers determine their presence poses a threat. The army said its troops would detain suspects and disperse gatherings to keep the peace.
The designation comes after months of the army and police struggling to maintain order throughout the territory, where at least 87 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli settlers or soldiers in 2026, according to the Ramallah-based Palestinian Health Ministry. That’s the apparatus speaking in the language of order while people keep dying under it.
Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels attacked a Red Sea port town controlled by government forces on Sunday, killing seven and injuring 30 people. Yemen’s Defense Ministry, which operates under its internationally recognized government, said four military personnel and three civilians were killed. Clashes continued Monday near the village of Taiz. The Houthi group said a 13-year-old child was killed by artillery shelling and another child was injured. The attack on Mokha is the latest in one of the largest waves of Houthi strikes on Yemeni military positions and areas held by the Saudi-backed government since a 2022 truce. It comes as threats to shipping through the Strait of Hormuz have renewed focus on the Red Sea and Bab el-Mandeb Strait at its southern tip.