'We have control of Iranian skies’, US President Donald Trump says

Straight to breaking news, the very latest on that Middle East crisis between Iran and Israel.

Donald Trump has just posted on social media, there it is on your screen, we now have complete and total control of the skies over Iran.

Iran had good sky trackers and other defensive equipment and plenty of it, but it doesn't compare to American-made, conceived and manufactured stuff

Nobody does it better than good old USA, he concludes in that post.

Let's speak to our diplomatic correspondent, James Landale.

He's there at the G7 gathering, and also our North America correspondent, Namia Iqbal.

She's there live for us at the White House.

So Namia, let me start with you.

and that post, and it is the first word of that post that is getting a lot of attention.

He says, we now have complete and total control of the skies.

It underlines how intertwined the US and Israel are on this.

It does, but it doesn't give any more clarity on what President Trump plans to do next.

What he's doing there is flexing U.S. might, but does this now mean that the U.S. is going to get all out involved with Israel and strike, or is it...

A SCARE TACTIC TO TRY AND GET IRAN AROUND THE NEGOTIATING TABLE.

NOW, WE DON'T EVEN KNOW IF THAT IS STILL SOMETHING THAT THEY ARE PLANNING FOR.

WE KNOW THAT THERE WERE MEANT TO BE THE SIX ROUND OF TALKS BETWEEN IRAN AND THE U.S.

WHEN IT COMES TO NUCLEAR ON SUNDAY, THAT'S NOW BEEN STOPPED.

BUT THERE ARE SOME SUGGESTIONS

President Trump would still want Steve Witkoff, his Middle East envoy, and the Vice President, J.D.

Vance, to be involved in those talks.

And speaking of the Vice President, J.D.

Vance, he's put out a very long post on X in which he has outlined the concerns that the Trump administration has.

But he's also referred to, just if I can just pick out the bit that he said, he says, of course, people are right to be worried about foreign entanglement after the last 25 years of idiotic foreign policy.

And that's obviously

speaking or appealing to the base, the base that voted for Trump and millions of others on his no wars platform.

But what does this mean going forward?

I don't think we're any clearer on what the U.S. plans to do next when it comes to what's happening in Iran.

Let's cross to the G7 and to James.

And of course, Donald Trump left that gathering early.

In terms of all of those other issues that the gathering wanted to discuss, whether it was tariffs and trade, whether it was the Middle East directly with Donald Trump or President Zelensky on Ukraine, give me a sense of the mood where you are.

Well, this is like a birthday party where the birthday party boy has gone home.

Donald Trump turned 79 at the weekend.

And there are a lot of leaders here all dressed up, nowhere to go.

If you think about it, on the second day of a summit like this, you get all the guests, the non-G7 leaders who've come, the leaders of India, Brazil, South Korea and elsewhere, who've all come here.

to have conversations, not just with each other and other world leaders, but with Donald Trump.

And you mentioned President Zelensky.

He, of course, is the central one of that, because these events matter, these summits, because they are a chance for world leaders to sit down face-to-face with Donald Trump to actually shape some of his thinking, to actually have a conversation that can get things into his head that doesn't have to go through other advisers and mediators.

And they were all hoping not just to shape some of his thinking on Iran, but also his thinking on Ukraine, and specifically to try and put more pressure on Russia.

And although the Canadians and the Europeans and others are announcing some more sanctions today, and there will be conversations with President Zelensky, Donald Trump left last night making absolutely clear that he is very skeptical of him putting more sanctions on Russia because he said it damages the United States economy.

I think there's a sense of deflation here.

I think there's a sense also, as Nomi was saying, continued puzzlement and bemusement about precisely what the president intends to do over Israel and Iran, because the messaging is confused and it is mixed.

Let me come back to you because we were talking an hour or so ago about that exchange on Air Force One with a CBS correspondent who put to the president that his own national intelligence director had said that Iran wasn't heading towards creating a nuclear device.

And he said, I don't care what she said.

I think.

They were very close.

So there was a very, very interesting exchange there.

And it begs the question, who is Donald Trump depending on in terms of his intelligence advice here?

I think it was an extraordinary comment by President Trump, especially given that Tulsi Gabbard is part of his base, so to speak.

In his second term, Donald Trump is very much surrounded by those who subscribe to his MAGA, Make America Great Again belief, which does involve no walls, by the way, unlike his first term, where he had more establishment politicians, as he would see it.

But he's dismissed what she clearly said.

earlier in the year that, yes, there have been constant suggestions, certainly by the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, that Iran is imminently about to have a nuclear weapon, but none of that has ever come to fruition, none of that has ever been true, leading to a lot of criticism by certainly those who don't want any wars in the Middle East or certainly want the US to be involved, that is this similar to when there were claims of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq with Saddam Hussein, for example?

AND SO WHERE HE'S GETTING THAT INFORMATION FROM IT COULD BE FROM THE ISRAELI PRIME MINISTER BENJAMIN NETANYAHU HIMSELF BUT WE'RE NOT QUITE SURE BUT IT DOES UNDERLINE THAT DONALD TRUMP DOES BELIEVE THAT THERE THAT IRAN IS A PROBLEM AND HE DID SAY THAT HE WANTED SOMETHING BIGGER THAN A CEASEFIRE LAST NIGHT WHAT DOES THAT MEAN WE KNOW THAT HE HAS SAID THAT HE IRAN CAN'T HAVE NUCLEAR WEAPON BUT THE ONLY WAY THAT THAT COULD HAPPEN IS IF IF AMERICA DOES GET INVOLVED

INVOLVED IN WHAT'S HAPPENING IN THE MIDDLE EAST.

AND AGAIN, AS WE WERE SAYING AN HOUR AGO, IF DONALD TRUMP DOES MAKE THAT MOVE, AND THERE'S NO INDICATION THAT HE WILL, THAT COULD BE HUGELY LEGACY DEFINING FOR HIM, GIVEN THAT THE PEOPLE WHO VOTED HIM INTO OFFICE, MILLIONS AND MILLIONS OF VOTERS ACROSS THIS COUNTRY, HAD DONE SO LARGELY BECAUSE OF HIS NO WARS MANTRA.

Well, Namir, very interestingly, as you're speaking, the Reuters news agency is reporting that the US military is moving fighter jets to the Middle East and extending deployments of warplanes to bolster defences amid this Israeli-Iran conflict.

That has come from US officials speaking to Reuters.

So, again, we wait to see any of the next moves from the White House.

Let's go back to the G7 and James.

And aside from what is going on in the Middle East, let me come back

to trade and tariffs.

We were listening there to Sakhir Starmer talking about the one deal that has finally got over the line.

Did anyone else sitting around the table there with Donald Trump yesterday, so many different countries where there are tariffs imposed, did anybody feel they had made progress?

Look, at these events, you're not going to have individual negotiations over the minutiae and the precise nature of those conversations because it's not the format that these conversations are had in.

I know the Japanese leader, the new prime minister, has been very keen to make sure that he can make progress on a U.S.-Japan deal on tariffs.

So there are conversations taking place about that.

The way the debate is shaped here

is not about precise numbers, but it's essentially about getting arguments across to the American side.

So you'll have world leaders saying, look, Mr. Trump, if you wish us to join you in dealing with the challenges from countries like China, well, that's easier.

if our economies are flourishing and not if you're damaging them.

In the same way, the Europeans get the argument across saying, look, we accept that we have to spend more on our own defense, that we've been free riding on the Americans for many, many years on this.

But we cannot do that.

We cannot spend more on defense if our economies are being hit by American tariffs.

In other words, that's the nature of the tone of the debate that's had about trade and tariffs here, rather than the minutiae of specific individual tariff rates and what may or may not happen.

But as I say, that is a conversation that has been cut short because Donald Trump is no longer here.

So other leaders here who have not yet had the chance to have that conversation with him are going to have to find another time for that to take place.

James Landale there at the G7.

Thank you.

And thanks to Nomi Iqbal live for us at the White House.