Israel’s military says it is staying at its highest level of alert while U.S.-Iran diplomacy remains stuck on the same two hard problems: Iran’s enriched uranium and who controls the Strait of Hormuz.
The new angle is readiness, not another round of negotiation language. List25 has already covered Iran’s uranium red line, Washington’s Hormuz demands, and the NATO fight over the war. This update moves the story onto Israel’s military posture as diplomacy continues to wobble.
The New York Post, carrying JNS reporting, said IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir told commanders that the Israeli military was at its “highest level of alert” and prepared for possible escalation across multiple fronts.
Zamir said operations would continue “for as long as necessary” in theaters near and far, according to the report. He also said Israel was strengthening forward defensive positions along its borders while continuing to “remove threats” and “deepen the damage to the enemy.”
Why the alert matters now
The timing is the point. The alert language came as U.S. officials were publicly describing some diplomatic movement, but not a deal. The Times of Israel reported that Israel remained on the highest alert over the possibility that fighting could resume, even as Secretary of State Marco Rubio said there were “good signs” in the talks.
Rubio’s optimism came with a large warning label. He said Iran’s plan to impose tolls or a formal control system in the Strait of Hormuz would make a diplomatic deal “unfeasible.” He also said President Donald Trump still had “other options” if diplomacy failed.
That puts Israel’s posture in a sharper frame. The ceasefire has not turned into a settlement. It has created a tense holding pattern where Washington is trying to force terms, Tehran is defending its leverage, and Israel is preparing for the talks to break down.
Uranium and Hormuz are still the deal-breakers
The Straits Times, carrying Reuters reporting, said the United States and Iran remained at odds on May 21 over Tehran’s enriched uranium stockpile and controls on the Strait of Hormuz.
Trump told reporters that the U.S. would eventually recover Iran’s highly enriched uranium. “We will get it. We don’t need it, we don’t want it. We’ll probably destroy it after we get it, but we’re not going to let them have it,” he said, according to Reuters.
Iranian sources told Reuters that Iran’s supreme leader had directed that the uranium should not be sent abroad. That directly clashes with the U.S. demand that Iran lose control of the material as part of any final settlement.
The Hormuz dispute is just as combustible. Trump said he wanted the strait “open” and “free” with no tolls. Rubio called any Iranian tolling system illegal and a threat to the world. Iran, meanwhile, has continued to describe transit through the waterway as something that can be coordinated through Iranian naval channels.
Diplomacy is active, but the battlefield posture has not relaxed
Reuters reported that Pakistan’s Army Chief Asim Munir was possibly headed to Tehran for more mediation, while one source familiar with the talks said intermediaries were trying to speed up communication between the two sides. That keeps diplomacy alive, but it does not remove the risk of renewed fighting.
The same Reuters report said traffic through the strait remains far below prewar levels. Iran’s IRNA news agency said 31 ships had passed in the previous 24 hours in coordination with Iran’s navy, compared with roughly 125 to 140 daily passages before the war.
That is why Israel’s alert status matters. It signals that, behind the public talk of “good signs,” the military assumption is still that escalation could return quickly if the uranium and Hormuz disputes do not move.
The immediate takeaway is blunt: the talks are alive, but Israel is not treating them as stable. Until the uranium stockpile and the future of Hormuz are resolved, the crisis remains one failed message away from another military phase.