President Trump told reporters in Ankara on Wednesday that he believes the ceasefire with Iran has collapsed, capping a NATO summit trip marked by overnight military exchanges between the U.S. and Iran. "I think it's over. I don't want to deal with them anymore. They're scum," Trump said, according to NPR. He did not rule out further negotiations toward a permanent resolution.

The comments came as Trump finished a two-day NATO summit in Turkey and held a closing press conference. Events moved rapidly in the lead-up. Three commercial ships were attacked in the Strait of Hormuz on Tuesday, July 7. The U.S. responded with strikes on more than 80 Iranian targets and reinstated oil sanctions on Iran, according to CNN. Washington said the strikes were retaliation for prior Iranian aggression. Iran's Revolutionary Guard said it responded with missiles and drones aimed at Kuwait and Bahrain. The Associated Press reported that the U.S. military launched its strikes while Trump was still in meetings with NATO leaders in Turkey—the exchange of fire unfolded on the summit's schedule rather than after it concluded.

The ceasefire Trump now says has ended had a documented history. Reuters reported on May 28 that Iran and the U.S. had agreed to extend a ceasefire for 60 days, contingent on Trump's approval, citing four sources familiar with the talks. That report came after an earlier round of U.S.-Iran strikes following Trump's public dismissal of a separate report about a Hormuz-related deal. A Truth Social post attributed to Trump's account referenced a "double sided CEASEFIRE" lasting two weeks, though the post carries no clear date tying it to the current sequence. What the record shows is a ceasefire framework that had already been extended, tested, and publicly disputed by Trump before Wednesday's collapse.

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, speaking at the summit, said the new U.S. attack on Iran was "absolutely necessary." His comment sits against a broader alliance backdrop that Reuters flagged on July 3: European leaders arrived in Ankara hoping to move past tensions with Trump over Iran policy and Greenland, seeking a summit focused on shared goals rather than reopening transatlantic disagreements. Whether that goal held after Wednesday's exchange of fire is an open question the alliance will have to address in coming statements.

The Ankara gathering also included a bilateral issue separate from Iran but relevant to the broader U.S.-Turkey-NATO relationship. Trump met with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday and discussed a potential sale of F-35 fighter jets to Turkey, despite an existing congressional ban stemming from Ankara's earlier purchase of the Russian S-400 air defense system. The White House video library shows Trump's arrival at the presidential palace ahead of the summit, dated July 7 and running just under 31 minutes—a record of the same visit that included both the Erdogan meeting and Trump's ceasefire comments.

The current strikes are not the first time this administration has framed military action against Iran in expansive terms. In March, the White House announced Operation Epic Fury, describing it as designed to "crush" the Iranian regime and end its nuclear threat. That announcement predates the ceasefire Reuters reported in May, meaning the diplomatic and military tracks have run on separate, sometimes contradictory paths for months. A NATO transcript from a March 26 press conference also referenced Iranian missile strikes on Turkey and drone attacks on British bases in Cyprus, suggesting the regional conflict Trump's team is now responding to did not begin this week.

For officials assessing any U.S.-Iran arrangement's durability, the pattern to watch is the gap between what ceasefire agreements say on paper and what actually happens on the ground. The May extension was reported as pending Trump's approval—a condition that left the deal's legal and political standing unclear even before Tuesday's Hormuz attacks. Trump's Wednesday comments did not formally end anything in writing; he offered a personal view ("I think it's over") while leaving room for renewed talks. That distinction matters for allies and markets, since a presidential opinion shared with reporters in Ankara carries different weight than a formal notice of withdrawal from an agreement whose exact terms have never been made fully public.

The immediate military situation—U.S. strikes on Iranian targets, Iranian missiles and drones aimed at Kuwait and Bahrain, attacks on commercial ships in one of the world's busiest oil shipping lanes—puts the security concerns of Gulf states back in focus. NATO had hoped to minimize discussion of these tensions in Ankara. Rutte's "absolutely necessary" framing suggests the alliance is not stepping back from the U.S. strikes, even as individual European governments consider how renewed conflict affects their own shipping and energy interests in the Gulf heading into the second half of 2026.