On June 10, 2026, President Trump told reporters in the Oval Office that the United States would keep striking Iran. “We're going to be attacking them – attacking them very hard,” he said. “We were really close to a deal, but they keep tapping us along, they keep playing us for suckers.” He also urged Iran to sign a deal, and negotiators from Qatar traveled to Tehran that day “to meet with the Iranians in an effort to bridge the remaining gaps,” a diplomat told AFP.
The comments came a day after U.S. Air Force and Navy jets struck Iranian air defense, ground control and radar sites near the Strait of Hormuz on the evening of June 9, in what U.S. Central Command called “a proportional response to recent attacks on U.S. forces and international commercial ships.” The strikes followed the loss of a U.S. Army AH-64 Apache helicopter near the strait. Trump wrote on Truth Social that “the Iranians shot down one of our highly sophisticated Apache Helicopters”; both pilots were rescued by an uncrewed boat operated by the U.S. Navy.
How the Apache went down is disputed. U.S. officials said an Iranian drone is believed to have hit the helicopter, and some analysts and officials raised the possibility that the downing was unintentional, the result of a midair collision. Iran did not claim to have downed it; Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi suggested it could have crashed in an accident, and Central Command said the crash was under investigation.
The exchange marked another escalation in the war Trump has waged against Iran, days after Iranian drones struck Kuwait's airport and the U.S. hit Qeshm Island (see Iranian Drones Hit Kuwait's Main Airport, Killing a Passenger, as the U.S. Strikes Qeshm Island in Trump's Widening Iran War).
Correction (October 2, 2026): This entry previously stated as fact that the helicopter was shot down by Iran. The record shows Trump said Iran shot it down and U.S. officials said an Iranian drone is believed to have hit it, while Iran did not claim responsibility and Central Command said the crash was under investigation; the entry now attributes the account. The title previously quoted Trump as saying Iran “played us for suckers”; his words were “they keep playing us for suckers,” and the title has been corrected.