Iran says diplomacy remains open
Iran's foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, said Wednesday that his country "continues to give diplomacy a chance to succeed." He spoke after Reuters reported that Tehran had rejected the latest peace proposal from Qatari mediators, according to CBS News.
In a post on X, Araghchi said Iran's armed forces are fully prepared to defend the homeland. He added that Iran remains "in close and ongoing contact with intermediaries to review ideas" that could allow implementation of what he called a 7-Day Plan "in even less than a week."
Reuters also quoted a senior Iranian official who denied that Qatar had presented a new peace proposal to Tehran on Sunday. The official said Qatar had come only with "unacceptable" ideas. The competing accounts leave unclear exactly what was handed over and how Tehran responded.
The background to the seven-day plan
According to CBS News, Iran presented the seven-day plan to the United States shortly after the U.N. General Assembly in September. It called for a seven-day ceasefire followed by a phased reopening of the Strait of Hormuz. President Trump rejected the idea.
A source told Reuters there were concerns that Israel could begin a new bombing campaign after its election. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has threatened new strikes on Iran, according to the source material.
The war has also been costly for the United States. A new estimate from U.S. Central Command, obtained by CBS News, puts the cost to the U.S. military at no less than $47.1 billion as of mid-October.
Israel's election leaves no clear winner
Israelis voted Tuesday in an election shaped heavily by the Iran war. Exit polls projected that a majority of voters had cast ballots against Netanyahu's coalition, but neither side had a clear margin of victory.
With 85% of ballots counted, official data showed Netanyahu's Likud party at 20.8% and the Yashar party of opposition leader Gadi Eisenkot at 16.1%. Local media projected 53 seats for Likud, 48 for Yashar and other opposition parties, and 19 for Arab-led parties. A majority requires 61 of the Knesset's 120 seats, so deals between parties will be needed to choose a prime minister.
Likud posted on Netanyahu's X account that it was demanding a police and Shin Bet investigation into what it called "election theft by the Arab parties." The post did not appear alongside evidence in the CBS News account.
Eisenkot, a former military chief, told supporters that Netanyahu was a caretaker prime minister without a mandate and that the military should serve the state rather than the premier. Defense Minister Israel Katz responded on X, calling Eisenkot's call to senior officers not to obey the directives of the prime minister or of security authorities "an anti-democratic statement detached from reality."
Regional and economic fallout
Hezbollah chief Naim Qassem said the Lebanese group is not concerned with who governs Israel. In a written statement, he said "the resistance will continue" and that there is no room to discuss Hezbollah's disarmament while what he called the occupation and aggression persist. CBS News noted that the group, once dominant in Lebanese politics, has been weakened by two wars with Israel since 2023.
In the Gulf, Kuwait summoned Iran's ambassador, Mohammad Toutounji, after Iran's embassy rejected Kuwait's claim that an Iranian citizen was involved in an assassination plot. Two Kuwaiti judicial sources told AFP that three Shia men had been sentenced to death for plotting to kill Deputy Prime Minister and Interior Minister Fahad al-Yousef, collaborating with Iran and belonging to Hezbollah. The embassy said the person in question had been outside Kuwait for 10 years. Kuwait said the embassy's statement amounted to "blatant interference" in its internal affairs.
In Britain, Treasury chief John Healey used his first budget to offer support with winter energy bills, citing "global economic storms" tied to the Middle East conflict. Measures include a one-off 100-pound ($133) payment to 20 million lower- and middle-income households, an extension of a cut in the sales tax on electricity bills, and the abolition of a charge on gas bills.
