US President Donald Trump has reopened the prospect of a negotiated solution to the war in the coming days. Just a few hours before the ultimatum he gave Tehran this weekend to open the Strait of Hormuz expired, he has announced a five-day postponement of possible attacks by his forces against Iran’s energy infrastructure. He has also assured that contacts are being developed with Tehran and there are already 15 “important points of agreement” with the regime. But Iran denies there are any talks, attributing Trump’s comments to an attempt to buy time to reduce energy prices.
“I am pleased to report that the United States and Iran have had very positive and productive conversations over the past two days,” . The US president affirms that the decision is “subject” to the “success of the talks” held, according to him, between Washington and Tehran, and in which there are already “important points of agreement.”
This Monday’s are the most positive statements so far about the war from a Trump who has been offering contradictory positions—sometimes on the same day—since the start of the war on February 28. With them, the Republican seems to be looking for a way out of what just hours before, if the mutual threats were fulfilled, seemed an inexorable path to a worsening and expansion of the conflict with dire economic, military and civilian consequences.
In comments when he was preparing to board the presidential plane Air Force OneTrump has assured that contacts are already being developed with Iran, in which Washington has “strong points of agreement” with the adversary country. These telephone conversations began on Sunday, will continue this Monday and are led on the US side by their envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, as noted. Both were already in charge of indirect negotiations with Tehran over the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program on the eve of the start of the war.
Trump has been vague about who represents Iran in those negotiations; He has only specified that he is a “respected” politician, and that he is not
“Very solid”
“We have had very solid conversations, we will see where they lead. We have important points of agreement, I would say almost all of them,” Trump said. “We are close to a real possibility of reaching an agreement.”
Tehran rejects that there are contacts. “The statements by the president of the United States occur within the framework of efforts to reduce energy prices and buy time to implement his military plans,” his Ministry of Foreign Affairs has stated, according to the Mehr agency. Trump alludes to “initiatives by countries in the region to de-escalate tensions, and our response to all of them is clear: we are not the ones who started this war, and all these requests should be made to Washington,” defends the Iranian ministry.
Trump has ironically commented on the denial: “Maybe the report hasn’t reached them. Their communications have been interrupted by the war, you know.” In an interview given to the Fox Business network in parallel to his statements on the plane, the American assured that “Iran really wants to reach an agreement” and that “could happen in the next five days.”
Israel, in February with the goal (which does not seem close) of overthrowing its regime, has reacted with silence to the possibility of an abrupt and negotiated end to the conflict. It is the umpteenth confirmation that, despite the close military cooperation, the times of this conflict are set in Washington, not in Israel.
The responses to Trump’s announcement, through the national press, have consisted more of making it clear that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was aware of the mediation attempts two days ago, and of presenting it as public recognition of a channel of dialogue already open, rather than a change of direction. A few minutes after the Republican’s statements, the Israeli army announced a new wave of attacks against Tehran, but not against the type of facilities on which Trump has placed the moratorium.
Israel, in fact, faced with the possibility of an abrupt end to the war without having overthrown the regime born of the Islamic Revolution of 1979. It is emphasizing military achievements, particularly against the ballistic missile program, and making it clear that – even if the conflict with Tehran ends – it will continue fighting Hezbollah in Lebanon, this Monday to isolate the south of the Litani River (the Shiite bastion where the blue helmets are deployed, ) from the rest of the country. His Defense Minister, Israel Katz, instructed troops on Sunday to leave homes in Lebanese border villages “like in Beit Hanun,” a town in northern Gaza that is now devastated. And the Finance Minister, Bezalel Smotrich, directly asked this Monday not only to take the strip up to the Litani River, but also to annex it.
“Total” destruction
Trump’s change of speech comes after he did not unblock within 48 hours the passage through which around 20% of the world’s oil and liquefied gas circulates. In turn, Tehran had responded with the threat of attacking the water desalination plants and other basic infrastructure of the Arab countries of the Persian Gulf, and taking the war to an even more intense and dangerous point.
The moratorium, according to Trump’s words, would only affect possible attacks against energy infrastructure. The vast majority of US bombings have focused on annihilating the military capabilities of the army and the Revolutionary Guard, especially missile launchers, drones and weapons production centers. On the 3rd, the United States hit almost a hundred military objectives on the Iranian island of Jarg, the heart of its oil industry, but without touching the sector’s facilities.
In the fourth week of the offensive against the Iranian military and political apparatus, Trump has once again demonstrated his ability to pivot – which is already known in the United States by the English acronym TACO for the expression “Trump always cows” – and has given a new turn to the open crisis in the Middle East, which has caused more than 4,000 deaths since last February 28, the majority in Iran and Lebanon, where the Israeli army has once again opened a front against the militia Hezbollah.
The president’s brief message, a hundred words, was enough to make the markets react immediately. After Trump’s announcement, .
The Iranian news agencies Fars and Tasnim have cited various official sources to deny that there are open negotiations between Washington and Tehran. The regime had threatened to respond to any attack on its power plants with similar attacks on facilities in Gulf countries. This Saturday, Iran expanded the range of its attacks with the launch of two medium-range missiles at the British-American military base of Diego García, in the Indian Ocean.
Trump’s message comes in the middle of the . A group of amphibious ships and a Marine expeditionary unit (between 2,200 and 2,500 soldiers) are heading towards the Gulf to join more than a dozen warships and two aircraft carriers already in the area.
More than three weeks after hostilities began, the Iranian armed forces have managed to block in fact the passage through the Strait of Hormuz, only open to a handful of cargo ships from enemy countries. Tehran maintains that before the February 28 offensive, the strait was open and that it remains so except for those who can “benefit” the aggressor countries, in relation to the United States.
In practice, transit through the pass is unfeasible or lacks safety guarantees for the majority of transport vessels and, therefore, for the oil and LNG tankers on which half the world depends.
