U.S. President Donald Trump said his patience with Iran was running out after he discussed the costly and unpopular war with Chinese President Xi Jinping on Thursday and a ship was reported seized by Iranian personnel off the United ​Arab Emirates.

The White House said Trump and Xi had agreed during talks in Beijing on the need to keep the Strait of Hormuz shipping lane open. Iran effectively shut the waterway in response to U.S.-Israeli attacks which ‌began on February 28, causing an unprecedented disruption to global energy supplies. China is close to Iran and the main buyer of its oil, Reuters reported.

The U.S. paused its attacks on Iran last month but began a blockade of the country’s ports. Talks aimed at ending the conflict have stalled with Iran refusing to end its nuclear program or relinquish its stockpile of enriched uranium.

“I am not going to be much more patient,” Trump said in an interview aired on Thursday night on Fox News’ “Hannity” program. “They should make a deal.”

On the key issue of Iran’s hidden stockpile of enriched uranium, Trump suggested it only ​needed to be secured by the U.S. for public relations purposes.

“I don’t think it’s necessary except from a public relations standpoint,” Trump said in the interview.

“I just feel better if I got it, actually. But it’s, I think, it’s ​more for public relations than it is for anything else.”

In the latest incidents on the trade route, an Indian cargo vessel carrying livestock from Africa to the UAE was sunk on Wednesday ⁠in waters off the coast of Oman.

India condemned the attack and said all 14 crew members had been rescued by the Omani coast guard. Vanguard, a British maritime security advisory firm, said the vessel was believed to have been hit by a missile or ​drone which caused an explosion.

Separately, British maritime security agency UKMTO reported on Thursday that “unauthorised personnel” had boarded a ship anchored off the coast of the UAE port of Fujairah, and were steering it towards Iran.

Vanguard said a company security officer had reported that “the vessel was taken ​by Iranian personnel while at anchor.”

After talks between Trump and Xi on Thursday, the White House said the leaders had agreed that the strait should be open and that Xi made clear China’s opposition to the militarisation of the strait and any effort to charge a toll for its use.

Trump said Xi also promised not to send Iran military equipment. “He said he’s not going to give military equipment, that’s a big statement,” Trump said on “Hannity”.

Xi also expressed interest in purchasing more American oil to reduce China’s future dependence on the strait and the leaders agreed that Iran should never obtain nuclear weapons, ​the White House readout said. Tehran has denied seeking such weapons.

DIPLOMACY ON HOLD

Trump is keen to elicit Chinese support to end a war that has become an electoral liability as it drags on towards key U.S. midterm elections in November. But analysts doubt Xi will ​be willing to push Iran hard or end support for its military, given its value as a strategic counterweight to the U.S.

In an interview with CNBC from Beijing, U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said he believed China would “do what they can” to help open the strait, something “very much ‌in their interest.” ⁠Before the war, about a fifth of global oil and liquefied natural gas supplies passed through the waterway.

But diplomacy has been on hold since last week when Iran and the U.S. each rejected the other’s most recent proposals.

Fujairah is the UAE’s sole oil port, on the Gulf of Oman just outside the Strait of Hormuz, and enables some shipments to reach markets without passing through the chokepoint.

Iran appears to be making more deals with countries to allow some ships to pass through the strait – if they accept Tehran’s terms.

A Japanese tanker crossed on Wednesday after Japan’s prime minister announced that she had requested help from the Iranian president. A huge Chinese tanker also crossed on Wednesday, and Iran’s Fars news agency reported on Thursday that an agreement had been reached to let some Chinese ships pass.

Iran’s Revolutionary ​Guards said 30 vessels had passed through the strait since Wednesday ​evening, still far short of the 140 on a ⁠typical day before the war, but a substantial increase if confirmed.

According to shipping analytics firm Kpler, some 10 ships had sailed through the strait in the past 24 hours, against five to seven that have crossed daily in recent weeks.

IRAN’S THREAT ‘SIGNIFICANTLY DEGRADED’

Thousands of Iranians were killed in the U.S. and Israeli airstrikes in the first weeks of the war, and thousands more have been killed in Lebanon ​since the war reignited fighting between Israel and the Iran-backed group Hezbollah.

Talks between Lebanese and Israeli officials on Thursday in Washington were productive and positive, according to a senior State Department ​official, who said they were set ⁠to continue on Friday.

Trump said his aims in starting the war were to destroy Iran’s nuclear program, end its ability to attack neighbours and make it easier for Iranians to overthrow their government.

A senior U.S. admiral told a U.S. Senate committee on Thursday Iran’s ability to threaten its neighbours and U.S. regional interests had been “significantly degraded”.

“They no longer threaten regional partners, or the United States, in ways that they were able to do before, across every domain,” Admiral Brad Cooper said.

But Cooper declined to directly address reports by Reuters and other news organisations that Iran ⁠had retained significant missile ​and drone capabilities.

Iran’s rulers, who used force to put down anti-government protests at the start of the year, have faced no organised opposition since the war ​began. And their closure of the strait has given them additional leverage in negotiations.

Washington wants Tehran to hand over the uranium and forgo further enrichment. Iran is seeking the lifting of sanctions, reparations for war damage and acknowledgment of its control over the strait.

Saudi fighter jets bombed targets linked to powerful Tehran-backed Shi’ite militias in Iraq during the Iran war, while retaliatory strikes were also launched from Kuwait into ​Iraq, Reuters reported citing multiple sources familiar with the matter.

The strikes are part of a broader pattern of military responses around the Gulf that remained largely hidden during a conflict ‌that began with U.S.-Israeli attacks on Iran and has spread to the wider Middle East.

For this report, Reuters spoke to three Iraqi security and military officials, a Western official, and two people briefed on the matter, one of them in the U.S.

The Saudi strikes were carried out by Saudi air force fighter jets on Iran-linked militia targets near the kingdom’s northern border with Iraq, one Western official and the person briefed on the matter said. The Western ​official said some strikes took place around the time of the April 7 U.S.-Iran ceasefire.

They targeted sites from which drone and missile attacks were launched at Saudi Arabia and other ​Gulf states, the sources said.

Citing military assessments, the Iraqi sources said rocket attacks were launched on at least two occasions from Kuwaiti territory on ⁠Iraq. One set of strikes hit militia positions in southern Iraq in April, killing several fighters and destroying a facility used by Iran-backed militia Kataib Hezbollah for communications and drone operations, they said.

Reuters ​could not determine whether the rockets from Kuwait were fired by the Kuwaiti armed forces or the U.S. military, which has a large presence there. The U.S. military declined to comment. The Kuwaiti ​information ministry and the Iraqi government did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

SAUDI ARABIA ALSO HIT IRAN

A Saudi foreign ministry official said Saudi Arabia sought de-escalation, self-restraint and the “reduction of tensions in pursuit of the stability, security and prosperity of the region,” but did not address the issue of strikes on Iraq. A spokesperson for Iraq’s Kataib Hezbollah also did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

On Tuesday, Reuters reported that Saudi Arabia launched strikes ​directly on Iran during the war in retaliation for attacks on the kingdom, the first time Riyadh is known to have hit Iranian soil. The UAE also carried out similar strikes on ​Iran, three people familiar with the matter said.

But hundreds of the drones that targeted the Gulf emanated from Iraq, all the sources said.

Militia-linked Telegram channels repeatedly posted statements during the war claiming attacks on targets in Gulf ‌states, including ⁠Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. Reuters could not independently confirm their authenticity.

Sustained attacks from a second front in Iraq prompted Saudi Arabia and Kuwait to lose patience with the militias, which collectively command tens of thousands of fighters and arsenals including missiles and drones.

Kuwait summoned Iraq’s representative in the country three times during the war to protest cross-border attacks, as well as the storming of the Kuwaiti consulate in the city of Basra on April 7. Saudi Arabia also summoned Iraq’s ambassador on April 12 to protest attacks.

IRAQ-GULF TIES DEFINED BY SUSPICION

Gulf Arab relations with Iraq have long been defined by suspicion. Ties were ​severely damaged in 1990 when Iraqi President Saddam ​Hussein’s forces invaded Kuwait and fired Scud ⁠missiles at Saudi Arabia, and they remained strained for decades.

The 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq deepened Gulf concerns by empowering Shi’ite political factions and armed groups closely tied to Tehran, turning Iraq into a key node in Iran’s regional network of proxies.

Gulf states have repeatedly accused Baghdad of failing to ​rein in those groups, which operate with significant autonomy and have launched attacks across borders.

A China-brokered détente between Iran and Saudi Arabia in ​2023 had offered hope for ⁠broader regional stabilisation. But the outbreak of war has severely tested those gains, drawing Gulf states into a conflict they had sought to avoid and exposing the limits of diplomatic progress made in recent years.

In March, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait had warned Baghdad via diplomatic channels to curb rocket and drone attacks by pro-Iranian groups against Gulf states, according to two Iraqi security officials and a government security adviser.

Iraqi forces say ⁠they intercepted some ​attempted attacks, including the seizure of a rocket launcher west of Basra intended to strike Saudi energy facilities.

But Iran-backed ​militias continue to fly surveillance drones along Iraq’s borders with Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, conducting reconnaissance and feeding intelligence to Iran, according to four Iraqi security sources and a person briefed on the matter.

“They are gathering information on what has been ​damaged, what is still working. They are preparing for the next strike,” the person briefed on the matter said.

The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) says 70 children have been killed in the occupied Palestinian territories excluding Gaza since the beginning of 2025, averaging about one child per week.

UNICEF also reported that more than 800 children have been injured in the West Bank and East Jerusalem during the same period. According to the agency, most of those killed or injured were struck by live ammunition, while others were stabbed, beaten, or exposed to pepper spray.

UNICEF spokesperson James Elder said the cases reflect “a sustained pattern of the worst kind of violations against children” during a briefing in Geneva following a visit to the West Bank.

The agency stated that 93% of the children killed since January 2025 were reportedly killed by Israeli forces, while others were killed in settler attacks, by unexploded ordnance, or in incidents involving Palestinian forces.

The Israeli military has not yet commented on the report.

Human rights organizations have previously reported an increase in violence against Palestinians by Israeli settlers and security forces since 2023.