Trump won’t attack Iran for now; Israel warns of ‘chemical weapons’

[Financial News] In an interview the day after the strike on the Strait of Hormuz, U.S. President Donald Trump said he would not escalate the conflict with Iran after the midterm elections. Israel, meanwhile, warned the United States that it should take Iran’s chemical weapons seriously.
In an interview with the Financial Times (FT) on the 3rd (local time), Trump said he would not escalate hostilities with Iran after that day’s midterm elections. Responding to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s call for an attack on Iran, he said, “We are fully prepared to attack at any time if necessary, but there may be no reason to do so.”
In a report on the 1st, U.S. political news outlet Axios said Netanyahu and Trump discussed resuming attacks on Iran during a phone call on the 31st of last month. According to officials, Netanyahu urged an attack on Iran immediately after the midterm elections on the 3rd, but Trump said they should first wait and see how negotiations progressed.
On the 3rd, Trump said the United States and Iran were not actually fighting, claiming, “We attacked Iran with B-2 bombers in June last year and neutralized its ability to develop nuclear weapons, so we are effectively not at war.” He added, “We attacked again afterward, in February, in Operation Epic Fury. But if you think about it, it’s been quite a while since we were actually at war with Iran. Six months, maybe even longer,” he emphasized.
U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM), which has been attacking Iran since February, has refrained from airstrikes on mainland Iran since bombing Iranian military facilities around the Strait of Hormuz on September 1. Trump said on social media on the 8th of last month, “We will not attack Iran before the U.S. midterm elections on November 3.” However, the United States bombed an Iranian strategic site on Qeshm Island near the Strait of Hormuz on the eve of the midterm elections. In an interview with Fox News on the 3rd, Trump said, “We struck as soon as Iran’s air defense facilities were completed,” adding, “It was just a small strike, not a war.”
In an interview with the FT on the 3rd, Trump said, “I don’t think we are in a state of war like the one in Ukraine, or like World War I or World War II.” He said the volume of crude oil passing through the Strait of Hormuz had increased compared with before the war, and that the U.S. blockade of Iranian ports was successfully suppressing Iran’s economy, describing the situation as “really excellent.” He added, “It seems we’re getting everything we want.”
Trump also said the United States was currently holding indirect negotiations with Iran over what to do with 450 kg of nuclear-weapons material (enriched uranium), adding, “Even if it’s under hundreds of tons of rock, I don’t like that it’s there.”
For Netanyahu, who lost his parliamentary majority in the election on the 27th of last month, resuming hostilities with Iran could help him steer the political situation in his favor. The New York Times (NYT), citing officials on the 3rd, reported that Israeli intelligence agencies had recently warned the United States and oil-producing countries along the Persian Gulf about the possibility of Iran using chemical weapons. Iran has claimed that it developed chemical weapons during its war with Iraq in the 1980s but later destroyed them all. Israeli officials have stressed over the past two weeks that Iran’s chemical weapons pose a more serious threat than its nuclear weapons. Some officials suspected that Netanyahu was trying to persuade Trump to resume a large-scale military attack targeting Iran.

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