On Donald Trump's 48-hour deadline threat, Iran says Strait of Hormuz 'open to all except...'

Iran and the United States escalated a war of words over the strategic Strait of Hormuz, with Tehran warning it would shut the vital waterway if Washington carries out threats to strike Iranian power plants, and the US president demanding the passage remain fully open.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said in a post on X that threats against Iran would only strengthen national unity, adding that the strait would remain open “to all except those who violate our soil.”

“The illusion of erasing Iran from the map shows desperation against the will of a history-making nation,” he wrote, adding that Iran would “firmly confront delirious threats on the battlefield.”

Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi asserted that the Strait of Hormuz was not formally closed but that “ships hesitate because insurers fear the war of choice you initiated—not Iran.”

“Freedom of Navigation cannot exist without Freedom of Trade. Respect both—or expect neither,” Araghchi wrote on X.

The remarks came after US President Donald Trump said on his Truth Social platform that the United States would strike Iran’s power plants if Tehran did not ensure the waterway was “fully open, without threat” within 48 hours.

“If Iran doesn’t FULLY OPEN… the United States of America will hit and obliterate their various POWER PLANTS,” Trump wrote.

Iran Parliamentary Speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf said that any US attack on Iranian infrastructure would make critical facilities across the region, including energy and desalination plants, “legitimate targets” that could be “irreversibly destroyed.”

He later added that “entities that finance the US military budget are legitimate targets.”

Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations, in a letter to the Security Council cited by state-run IRNA, said attacks on power plants would be “inherently indiscriminate and clearly disproportionate.”

Tehran has said it would “completely” close the Strait of Hormuz if the United States follows through on its threats. About one-fifth of the world’s oil supply passes through the strait.

While Iran has indicated that vessels from countries it does not consider hostile could still pass, attacks on ships and heightened risks have effectively halted most tanker traffic.