Trump plays down prospect of strikes on Iran after Republican midterm rout

[DUBAI] US President Donald Trump said he had no immediate plans to launch strikes on Iran following midterm elections in which the Democrats took control of Congress in a landslide win over his Republican party.

“We seem to be getting everything we want,” Trump said in an interview with the Financial Times about the state of the war, though he added the US is still prepared for an escalation with the Islamic Republic if necessary.

“I’m ready, we’re ready. We’re locked and loaded if we need to go, but there may be no reason for it.”

Later, Trump said the Iran war – now into its ninth month – was not a primary reason for the Republicans being routed, even though polls consistently showed Americans are against the conflict and have balked at the related surge in petrol prices.

“People understood the importance of what I’ve done with Iran,” Trump said in an interview with Fox News. “You can’t let the number one state sponsor of terror have a nuclear weapon.”

“You know, it’s the most dangerous country in the world, and we wiped them out practically. Haven’t finished a job, and maybe I will, and maybe I won’t.”

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Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, Iran’s parliament speaker and a senior negotiator with the US, said the midterms showed Americans have voted “NO TO WAR”.

Ghalibaf, commenting on X, warned the US of a “nightmare” if it does opt to restart mass attacks on Iran.

While Trump and his officials such as Vice-President JD Vance have sounded slightly more dovish about Iran this week, sending oil prices down, tensions between the warring sides are still high.

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Teheran has said it is prepared for strikes to commence at any moment and that it will retaliate fiercely.

According to a Tasnim news agency report, Iran has said it could expand its response if Gulf states host US attacks.

An adviser to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps commander-in-chief said on Wednesday (Nov 4) that the country will broaden its response beyond US military bases if Gulf states allow Washington to launch attacks against it from their territory.

Hamidreza Moghadamfar said at a rally in Bandar Abbas that Iran would use a “new doctrine and new technology” in responding to any US or Israeli action, warning that countries including the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain would face a wider response if they hosted attacks on Iran.

Gulf Arab states are nervous and appealing to Trump to give diplomacy more time. American allies such as the UAE, Qatar and Saudi Arabia were attacked thousands of times by Iranian drones and missiles during the most intense phase of the war between late February and a truce in early April.

US-Iran talks

Talks between Iran and the US, mediated by Qatar and Pakistan, have made little progress in recent weeks. Still, Qatari officials expect feedback from both sides to news proposals over the next day or so, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday.

The two countries are divided on a number of issues, with Iran wanting the US to lift a naval blockade on its ports and Washington seeking concessions on Teheran’s nuclear activities.

Oil prices were little changed on Wednesday, with Brent trading at US$104 a barrel.

That is far below last week’s close of around US$118, but it’s still up 70 per cent in 2026 so far, mostly because of the war and impact on shipping in the Strait of Hormuz, through which around one fifth of the world’s supplies of oil and liquefied natural gas normally flow.

This week, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said his government has been granted more authority by Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei to pursue peace talks. That could include issues previously considered “non-negotiable” by Teheran, Pezeshkian said.

The war began in late February when the US and Israel attacked Iranian targets and killed senior officials, including former Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.

US officials initially talked of a war lasting no more than four to six weeks and Trump has grown frustrated with Iran’s resilience. Teheran has caused chaos across the Persian Gulf region and wider Middle East with its counterstrikes.

The rise in fuel costs, with diesel hitting a record in the US and petrol surpassing US$4 a gallon on average, contributed significantly to Americans turning against the conflict. BLOOMBERG