President Donald Trump retreated on Tuesday night from his plans to annihilate, in his words, Iranian civilization, with just more than an hour to spare.
Trump claimed that a 10-point proposal delivered by Iranian officials formed a “workable basis on which to negotiate” a permanent solution to the thorny conflict initiated by the United States and Israel, which began more than five weeks ago and has tested international alliances and roiled global markets.
But even as Trump walked back from the edge of his threat to destroy a “whole civilization” — made just hours beforehand Tuesday morning — it was unclear how long the ceasefire would hold and what came next.
Proposed in-person talks are slated for this Friday in Islamabad, Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif revealed, though it remains unclear whether delegations from the U.S. and Iran have both committed to attend. “There are discussions about in person talks, but nothing is final,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told MS NOW in a statement.
Those discussions, if they materialize, will be a critical test of the ceasefire’s longevity, particularly for Middle Eastern countries that have endured more than 5,000 deaths and experienced nonstop bombardment since the war began. They will also have tremendous consequences for the economy after global oil prices skyrocketed in the wake of Iran’s attacks on commercial shipping.
The Israeli government released a statement Tuesday night saying it agreed to the suspension of hostilities under the terms outlined by Trump. But it noted the ceasefire didn’t include Lebanon, where Israel has waged a major campaign to stamp out Hezbollah, the Iran-backed group.
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The Israeli government released a statement Tuesday night saying it agreed to the suspension of hostilities under the terms outlined by Trump. But it noted the ceasefire didn’t include Lebanon, where Israel has waged a major campaign to stamp out Hezbollah, the Iran-backed group.
“Israel also supports the US effort to ensure that Iran no longer poses a nuclear, missile and terror threat to America, Israel, Iran’s Arab neighbors and the world,” the prime minister’s office stated. “The United States has told Israel that it is committed to achieving these goals, shares by the US, Israel and Israel’s regional allies, in the upcoming negotiations.”
The biggest sticking point is what happens to the Strait of Hormuz, the passageway for 20% of the world’s oil supply that Iran has effectively strangled during the conflict. Trump said the ceasefire was contingent on Iran immediately and safely opening the strait, but a message from the Iranian government shared by Trump said safe passage would only be “possible via coordination with Iran’s Armed Forces.”
Furthermore, details of Iran’s 10-point proposal are still coming to light. The U.S. has repeatedly said that Iran would have to commit to not building a nuclear weapon as part of any final agreement. Iran has also sought guarantees against future attacks and reparations for war-related damages.
Another major hurdle is whether the U.S. would allow Iran to maintain its underground stockpile of uranium. Trump previously said he wanted an end to uranium enrichment, which is used to power nuclear weapons, even for civilian purposes. Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, a close Trump ally, said Tuesday that “every ounce of the approximately 900 lbs. of highly enriched uranium has to be controlled by the U.S. and removed from Iran to prevent them in the future from having a dirty bomb or returning to the enrichment business.” But Trump has also said he “doesn’t care about that” because the remaining Iranian uranium supply is far underground and can be watched by satellite.
White House officials have noted that communication challenges with Iranian officials made talks difficult in recent weeks, and negotiations mostly took place through intermediaries.
Vice President JD Vance became a key player after Iranian officials publicly expressed distrust in Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff and his son-in-law Jared Kushner, who led nuclear talks with Iranians ahead of the U.S. strikes on Feb. 28 that killed Iran’s then-Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.
Still, Kushner and Witkoff remained involved in the negotiations, with Trump calling them along with Vance “unified” ahead of the deal. Last week, Vance delivered a “stern” message to intermediaries to Iran, according to a person familiar with the matter, conveying that Trump was growing “impatient” with the pace of negotiations. Vance signaled that Trump was open to a ceasefire as long as certain demands were met. That message was conveyed at the urging of the president, the person said.
China also played a role in supporting ceasefire talks, according to Chinese embassy spokesperson Liu Pengyu. Foreign Minister Wang Yi initiated 26 phone calls to diplomats from countries including Iran, Israel, Russia and the Gulf states. Since March, Yi has spoken by phone with the Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi at least twice. China’s special envoy to the Middle East also traveled to the region in a mediation effort.
In the days before a deal was announced, Persian Gulf officials expressed slim hopes that a deal would come together before the president’s deadline, which was pushed back four times over the past two weeks. But Trump extended after Pakistani Prime Minister Sharif issued a pleading statement hours beforehand.
Moments after Trump posted on the Truth Social platform he owns, Iran confirmed that it had also agreed to the deal. “Almost all of the various points of past contention have been agreed to between the United States and Iran,” Trump declared in his post.
It was a dramatic turnaround after Trump used incendiary language in several statements in the days prior, including appearing to mock Islam on Easter Sunday. “Praise be to Allah,” he wrote.
White House officials and allies have described the president’s habit of using maximalist rhetoric as an intentional strategy to extract deals. “Sometimes you have to escalate to de-escalate,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told NBC News after Trump’s first 48-hour ultimatum.
Offering a window into his thinking ahead of a deal, Trump made a rare acknowledgement of the negative public sentiment toward the war in Iran inside the U.S., where the majority of Americans disapprove of the conflict, according to polls.
“The American people would like to see us come home,” the president said Monday. “I go around and I check; they’d like to see us win and come home.”
Soorin Kim, David Rohde, Inzamam Rashid and Julia Jester contributed to this report.
Akayla Gardner is a White House correspondent for MS NOW.