The U.S. and Iran are locked in a battle for control of the Strait of Hormuz after failing to meet for a fresh round of peace talks, with both sides blocking the waterway to gain leverage during an extended ceasefire.

President Donald Trump said the truce agreed April 7 would stay in place indefinitely while Washington waits for Iran to submit a new peace proposal, though Tehran says it has no plans to take part in negotiations imminently. Vice President JD Vance had been prepared to fly to Islamabad on Tuesday to resume discussions, before it became clear Iran would not send its own delegation.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters that the president “has not set a firm deadline to receive an Iranian proposal.”

The U.S. maintained a naval blockade on ships going to and from Iran’s ports to pile pressure on the Islamic Republic, in a move Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi called a violation of the ceasefire. Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said in a post that while Iran welcomes talks, the “blockade and threats are main obstacles” to diplomacy.

At the same time, Iran is maintaining a blockage of its own, keeping Hormuz closed to almost all other international traffic. The country’s gunboats fired on commercial ships in the strait on Wednesday.

Trump’s ceasefire extension represented a climb down from threats to resume the bombing of Iran in the event a deal couldn’t be reached by a Wednesday deadline, a move that would have revived a war that’s killed thousands of people and sent energy prices soaring.

In Washington, the Republican-controlled U.S. Senate for a fifth time rejected a Democratic effort to curb Trump’s military actions in Iran.

U.S. Navy Secretary John Phelan stepped down from his job “effective immediately,” the Pentagon said, without giving a reason for the decision. It’s the second high-level departure from the Pentagon since the Iran war began, after Army Chief of Staff General Randy George was asked to leave earlier this month. The removals come amid a wider senior military shakeup under Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who has sought to aggressively reshape the Pentagon’s culture and top ranks.

Oil prices rose for a third straight session with Brent crude climbing above $101 a barrel. The physical markets continue to signal a shortage of near-term supplies with Dated Brent, the world’s most important real-world crude price, rising above $107 a barrel.

U.S. gasoline pump prices, in turn, have risen to the highest level in almost four years, putting pressure on Trump to resolve the conflict.

But there’s still no sign Hormuz will be reopened to oil and liquefied natural gas shipments soon, increasing the likelihood of supply shortages and a global inflation crisis. About a fifth of the world’s oil and LNG was shipped through the waterway before the war, as well as supplies of key commodities for fertilizer and other agricultural products.

Trump blamed divisions among the Islamic Republic’s leaders for the need to extend the truce, which Fox News reported may not last for more than five days. Leavitt pushed back on suggestions that Trump has a shorter deadline.

“I know there’s been some anonymous-sourced reporting that there was maybe a three- to five-day deadline,” she said. “That is not true. The president has not set a deadline himself. Ultimately, he will dictate the timetable.”

Iran says it will not reopen the Strait of Hormuz — effectively shut since the start of the war at the end of February — or take part in peace talks until the U.S. naval blockade ends.

On Wednesday morning, Iran’s envoy to the United Nations said the country had “received some sign” the U.S. was ready to lift the blockade, without giving further details.

Aside from Hormuz, the sides remain far apart on longer-term issues such as the status of Iran’s nuclear and missile programs, and its support for militant groups across the Middle East.

Trump on Wednesday said Iran had heeded his calls not to execute eight female protesters. The president in a social media post said four of them would be released immediately and four others sentenced to one month in prison. “I very much appreciate that Iran, and its leaders, respected my request,” Trump wrote.

Hormuz was the subject of multiple reports of shipping attacks on Wednesday.

The U.K. Maritime Trade Operations, a naval liaison with the shipping industry, said on X that a cargo ship and a container ship came under Iranian fire in the waterway.

Iranian state TV reported later that the country’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps had seized two ships — identified as the MSC Francesca and Epaminondas — in Hormuz and brought them to shore for inspection. The Wall Street Journal reported that both came under attack, as well as a third, the Euphoria.

At least two fully laden Iranian tankers have sailed out of the Persian Gulf and past the U.S. blockade this week. The exit of the tankers demonstrates the limits of U.S. efforts to curb Tehran’s crude exports.

Figures from data intelligence firm Vortexa suggest at least 34 Iran-linked tankers and natural gas carriers have made their way through the strait and the U.S. blockade line.

Meanwhile, Israel and Lebanon are set to resume direct talks on Thursday in Washington. Mike Huckabee, the U.S. ambassador to Israel and a Trump ally, is expected to attend them, according to a State Department official.

Israel and Hezbollah, an Iran-backed group based in Lebanon, started a parallel war in early March. Trump announced a ceasefire last week that ends on April 26. While Hezbollah, designated a terrorist organization by Washington, isn’t formally part of it, the truce has broadly held, despite each side accusing the other of fresh attacks. Trump is keen for a wider deal to end that conflict.

The U.S. and Iran have engaged in a tense back-and-forth since the two sides announced a two-week truce on April 7.

There was confusion last week when Araghchi announced the Strait of Hormuz had been reopened for all commercial vessels. Iran soon backtracked when it became clear the U.S. blockade would remain in place.

Some members of the Iranian government and military leadership, including those at the top of the powerful IRGC, took the continuation of the U.S. blockade as a further signal that Trump can’t be trusted, according to U.S. and Iranian officials.

The IRGC’s leader, Ahmad Vahidi, is among those in that camp and is pushing for a tough negotiating stance, people familiar with the dynamics said.

The U.K. and France are holding a summit of military planners from more than 30 countries this week to discuss how Hormuz can be kept open once the Iran war ends. U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron have been leading efforts to coordinate a plan. They’ve resisted Trump’s request for allied nations to reopen the strait by force.

A previous round of talks between the U.S. and Iran in Islamabad in mid-April ended after American officials said Tehran wasn’t willing to accept limits on its nuclear program. Iran, which was led at the meeting by Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, argued the U.S. made a series of demands it could not meet.

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(With assistance from Arsalan Shahla, John Bowker, Devika Krishna Kumar and Meghashyam Mali.)

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