The U.S. and Iran have returned to exchanging intense strikes.
President Donald Trump announced "major combat operations" against Iran on Feb. 28, with massive joint U.S.-Israeli strikes targeting military, government and infrastructure sites.
Delegations from the U.S. and Iran entered negotiations in June aimed at a war-ending deal based on a memorandum of understanding signed by both countries.
The U.S. and Iran have nonetheless continued to exchange relatively limited strikes despite the signing of the memorandum and amid the continuation of peace talks, with the strategic Strait of Hormuz the primary flashpoint.
U.S. Central Command said it redirected two commercial vessels attempting to run the blockade.
"Since restarting the naval blockade against Iranian ports 17 hours ago, U.S. forces have redirected 2 commercial vessels attempting to run the blockade. The U.S. military remains vigilant and prepared to ensure full compliance," CENTCOM said in a statement Wednesday.
Talks held in Rome between representatives of Israel and Lebanon have ended on Wednesday following “two days of productive and positive discussions,” a State Department official said.
“We agreed on the structure and guidelines for the pilot zone process, to be finalized and implemented in the coming days,” the official said.
The official said the parties will now move on to expand technical talks, which will focus on implementing all areas of the framework agreed upon last month and ultimately reaching a comprehensive deal between Israel and Lebanon.
-ABC News' Shannon K. Kingston
President Donald Trump said that he wants to see Israeli forces get out of southern Lebanon and floated tasking the new Syrian government with confronting Hezbollah during an interview with Fox News on Tuesday.
“Well, redeploy. It's another word because, we're getting along very well with Lebanon. Israel is dealing with them very nicely,” Trump said during the interview.
The president added that getting out of Lebanon would free up the U.S. and Israel to focus on Iran.
“It would be good to get out, I think. And I think you might see things get a little bit calmer because we have to focus our energy on the big leagues. The big leagues are Iran,” he said.
Trump then proposed that Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa could possibly go and deal with Hezbollah — noting that he thinks Syria would be more precise than the Israelis.
“He would go in and take care of Hezbollah, and he'd do it in a different way. He wouldn't knock down buildings. I hated to see buildings knocked down,” Trump said of al-Sharaa, a former leader of a Syrian affiliate of the U.S.-designated terror group, al-Qaeda.
Just last week, the U.S. removed Syria's designation as a state sponsor of terrorism for the first time since 1979
“I think it'd be more precise, yeah, I think. And I can tell you. I know he'd like to do it,” Trump said.
CENTCOM said in a post to X that it had completed a 90-minute wave of strikes on Iran, which targeted what it said were "coastal defense systems and cruise missile storage and launch sites on Greater Tunb Island."
-ABC News' Shannon K. Kingston
