Live updates: U.S. shoots down Iranian drones; Tehran says no final decision as Trump touts imminent deal

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has emphasized that he and President Trump are "in complete agreement" that Iran cannot have nuclear weapons as peace negotiations between Washington and Tehran continue.

"As long as I am the Prime Minister of Israel, Iran will not have nuclear weapons," Netanyahu said in a statement today. "President Trump and I are in complete agreement on this issue," he added.

Netanyahu, who faces an election later this year, noted that under his leadership Israel has long fought to ensure Iran cannot develop a nuclear weapon. He said that "if it weren’t for this struggle, Iran would have had atomic bombs to destroy Israel long ago."

Iran has maintained that it does not seek to develop a nuclear weapon, while Trump administration officials have said averting the risk of Iranian nuclear weapons would be central to any deal to end the war.

Iran has made no commitments regarding its nuclear program or control of the Strait of Hormuz in the current draft of the memorandum of understanding with the U.S., Iran's official state news agency IRNA says.

According to IRNA, the "current draft agreement" states that "Iran undertakes no new commitments" on nuclear weapons, with further negotiations on the issue set to take place in a 60-day period following the signing of the agreement.

Those negotiations would focus on "the continuation of Iran’s peaceful nuclear program, the lifting of unilateral American sanctions and mechanisms for compensation and reparations," IRNA says.

Across weeks of negotiations, there have been repeated contradictory signals from U.S. and Iranian officials on the contents of the draft deal, which President Trump indicated yesterday is close to being signed.

The Israeli military says it launched more than 300 strikes in southern Lebanon over the past week as it ramped up operations in the area in what it has said is a bid to root out Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah.

The IDF outlined the strikes in a statement posted to Telegram saying troops continued to operate in "three arenas simultaneously to remove threats to Israeli civilians," including in Lebanon, Gaza and the occupied West Bank, this week.

In Lebanon, it said the Israeli Air force had killed 80 Hezbollah members and struck approximately 310 targets that it said were related to the Iran-backed Lebanese militant group.

Hezbollah has also continued to fire into northern Israel, citing the defense of the Lebanese people.

According to the Lebanese health ministry, more than 3,700 people have been killed in Lebanon since the wider war consuming the region began in late February. More than 1 million have been displaced amid Israeli evacuation orders and strikes. Twenty-one people have died in Israel since the war with Iran began, according to officials.

An Iranian woman is among around two dozens migrants set to arrive Friday in the Central African Republic on a deportation flight from the United States, lawyers said, in the latest example of the Trump administration’s widely criticized deals with African and Latin American nations to take third-country deportees,

The Central African Republic, a deeply impoverished country plagued by conflict, is one of at least nine other African nations that has agreed to take third-country nationals deported by the U.S. Under a series of often-secret agreements that are part of a broad U.S. crackdown on immigration, the Trump administration has deported thousands of people to nearly two dozen countries that are not their own, advocates say.

It was unclear exactly how many migrants were on the deportation flight that left Louisiana late Thursday on the way to the Central African Republic’s capital Bangui. Among those set to be deported Thursday were people from Iran, Jordan, Armenia, Turkey, Georgia and Afghanistan, according to Ali Rahnama, the head of the Iranian American Legal Defense Fund, who has been in touch with some of the migrants.

Three Iranian women in the U.S. were originally scheduled to be sent to Central African Republic, according to Sahar Jalili Pawelski, one of their immigration lawyers, who said two of them received emergency court orders temporarily stopping their deportation while judges reviewed whether the government was acting legally.

Less than 20 miles off Iran’s shallow coastline sits an island made of hard coral — a natural, geological platform rising from the Persian Gulf that’s perfect for one thing: exporting oil.

President Donald Trump on Thursday renewed threats to seize Kharg Island, which accounts for more than 90% of Iran’s oil exports.

“At some point in the not too distant future, we will be taking Kharg Island, and other oil infrastructure points, and assume total control of their Oil and Gas Markets, much like we have with Venezuela,” Trump wrote on Truth Social, after days of renewed hostilities with Iran.

While he later rowed back after saying a deal to end the war could be signed as soon as this weekend, some analysts have said previously that seizing the island could give the U.S. leverage over Iran.

Read the full story here.

Reuters

Reuters

Pictures out of Marjayoun municipality in southern Lebanon this morning show large plumes of smoke following an Israeli strike.

Questions grew this morning on the status of ongoing negotiations between Washington and Tehran after Trump said he cancelled plans for overnight strikes on Iran as a deal to end the war was expected to be "finalized."

Iranian Foreign Affairs Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei cast doubt on the progress yesterday, saying no "final decision" on a deal had been reached. “Reports regarding an agreement are speculative, and nothing has been finalized," he said.

Trump's assertions about the deal came after he vowed to hit Iran "very hard" overnight, saying Tehran had "taken too long to negotiate a deal that would have been great for them" and that "now they will have to pay the price."

It is not the first time Trump has suggested a deal to end the war and see the Strait of Hormuz reopened could be imminent. Only a few days ago, he appeared optimistic before he ordered fresh strikes on Iran.

Oil prices fell to below $90 a barrel this morning after Trump called off plans for overnight strikes against Iran and said a peace deal was within reach.

U.S. crude oil futures for July delivery fell to $83.85 per barrel, while August futures for international benchmark Brent sank to around $86 per barrel.

It comes after Trump said he had decided not to go forward with overnight strikes against Iran, expressing optimism once again over the possibility of an imminent deal to end the war and see the Strait of Hormuz reopened.

New details on a 14-point draft memorandum being negotiated between the Washington and Tehran have been revealed by Iranian media.

The draft includes "U.S. commitments to lift sanctions, withdraw its forces from areas surrounding Iran, end the maritime blockade, reopen the Strait of Hormuz," according to the semiofficial Mehr's News Agency. Oil sanctions would also be removed and Iran's frozen assets released, the agency said,

The U.S. would be required to present a plan for rebuilding Iran's economy, it added.

Final negotiations would focus on "nuclear and economic issues," Mehr's said, although Trump has vowed that any plan will block Iran from ever obtaining a nuclear weapon.

NBC News could not independently verify the news agency's reporting and Washington has yet to comment on the report.