US president abandons threat for Iran to surrender or face destruction with last-minute intervention led by Pakistan
Trump’s announcement of the ceasefire agreement came less than two hours before the US president’s self-imposed 8pm Eastern time deadline to bomb Iran’s power plants and bridges in a move that legal scholars, as well as officials from numerous countries and the pope, had warned could constitute war crimes.
Just hours earlier, Trump had written on Truth Social: “A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don’t want that to happen, but it probably will.” American B-52 bombers were reported to be en route to Iran before the ceasefire agreement was announced.
But by Tuesday evening, Trump announced that a ceasefire agreement had been mediated through Pakistan, whose prime minister, Shehbaz Sharif, had requested the two-week peace in order to “allow diplomacy to run its course”.
Trump wrote in a post that “subject to the Islamic Republic of Iran agreeing to the COMPLETE, IMMEDIATE, and SAFE OPENING of the Strait of Hormuz, I agree to suspend the bombing and attack of Iran for a period of two weeks”.
In a separate post later, the US president called Tuesday “a big day for world peace” on a social media post, claiming that Iran had “had enough”. He said the US would be “helping with the traffic buildup” in the strait of Hormuz and that “big money will be made” as Iran begins reconstruction.
For several hours afterwards, Israel’s position or agreement with the deal was unclear. But just before midnight ET, the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said Israel backed the US ceasefire with Iran but that the deal did not cover fighting against Hezbollah in Lebanon. His office said Israel also supported US efforts to ensure Iran no longer posed a nuclear or missile threat.
Pakistan’s prime minister had previously said that the agreed-upon ceasefire covered “everywhere including Lebanon”.
The ceasefire process was clouded in uncertainty after Iran released two different versions of the 10-point plan intended to be the basis for negotiations, and which Trump said was a “workable basis on which to negotiate”.
In the version released in Farsi, Iran included the phrase “acceptance of enrichment” for its nuclear program. But for reasons that remain unclear, that phrase was missing in English versions shared by Iranian diplomats to journalists.
Pakistan has invited the US and Iran to talks in Islamabad on Friday. Tehran said it would attend, but Washington has yet to publicly accept the invitation.
In a telephone call with Agence France-Presse, Trump said he believed China had persuaded Iran to negotiate, and said Tehran’s enriched uranium would be “perfectly taken care of”, without providing more detail.
In the two-week ceasefire, Trump said, he believed the US and Iran could negotiate over the 10-point proposal that would allow an armistice to be “finalized and consummated”.
“This will be a double sided CEASEFIRE!” he continued. “The reason for doing so is that we have already met and exceeded all Military objectives, and are very far along with a definitive Agreement concerning Longterm PEACE with Iran, and PEACE in the Middle East.”
Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, issued a statement shortly after Trump’s announcement saying Iran had agreed to the ceasefire. “For a period of two weeks, safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz will be possible via coordinating with Iran’s Armed Forces,” he wrote.
Oil prices dived, stocks surged and the dollar was knocked back on Wednesday as a two-week Middle East ceasefire sparked a relief rally, fueled by hopes that oil and gas flows through the strait of Hormuz could resume.
Despite the provisional ceasefire, attacks continued across the region in the hours after Trump’s announcement. Before the deadline, airstrikes hit two bridges and a train station in Iran, and the US hit military infrastructure on Kharg Island, a key hub for Iranian oil production.
The sudden about-face will allow Trump to step back as the US war in Iran has dragged on for five weeks with little sign that Tehran is ready to surrender or release its hold on the strait, a conduit for a fifth of the global energy supply, where traffic has slowed to a trickle.
Trump had earlier rejected the 10-point plan as “not good enough” but the president has set deadlines before and allowed them to pass over the five weeks of the conflict. Yet he insisted on Tuesday the ensuing hours would be “one of the most important moments in the long and complex history of the World” unless “something revolutionarily wonderful” happened, with “less radicalized minds” in Iran’s leadership.
News of the provisional ceasefire deal was welcomed but with a note of caution elsewhere.
Iraq’s foreign ministry called for “serious and sustainable dialogue” between the US and Iran “to address the root causes of the disputes”, while the German foreign minister, Johann Wadephul, said the deal “must be the crucial first step towards lasting peace, for the consequences of the war continuing would be incalculable”.
In Australia, the government warned that the latest developments would not necessarily mean the fuel crisis is over. Oil prices fell as traders bet that the reopening of the strait of Hormuz would help fuel supply resume, but the energy minister, Chris Bowen, told reporters Australians should “not get ahead of ourselves”.
He said: “People shouldn’t take today’s progress and expect prices to fall. We welcome progress, but I don’t think we can say the [strait of Hormuz is] now open.”
A spokesperson for New Zealand’s foreign minister, Winston Peters, welcomed the “encouraging news” but noted “there remains significant important work to be done to secure a lasting ceasefire”.
Japan said it expected the move to result in a “final agreement” after Washington and Tehran begin talks on Friday. Describing the ceasefire as a “positive move”, the chief cabinet secretary, Minoru Kihara, said Tokyo wanted to see a de-escalation on the ground in the region, adding that the prime minister, Sanae Takaichi, was seeking talks with the Iranian president, Masoud Pezeshkian.
A temporary end to hostilities will come as a relief to Japan, which depends on the Middle East for about 90% of its crude oil imports, most of which is transported through the strait of Hormuz.
South Korea’s ministry of foreign affairs said it hoped “negotiations between the two sides will be successfully concluded and that peace and stability in the Middle East will be restored at an early date”, as well as wishes for “free and safe navigation of all vessels through the strait of Hormuz”.
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Anna Moneymaker/Getty
On Tuesday morning, President Donald Trump began a post on his social media platform Truth Social by writing, “A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again.” Trump continued in the post, “I don’t want that to happen, but it probably will.”
The president’s post and other recent threats come in the lead up to an 8 p.m. Tuesday deadline that he has imposed on Iran to reach a deal to open the Strait of Hormuz. The threats have led to concerns from figures including former Fox News Host Tucker Carlson and Anthony Scaramucci, the short-lived White House communications director turned Trump critic, 0f a potential nuclear strike against Iran if the president is unable to open the strait through conventional weaponry and diplomacy.
I asked the White House Tuesday morning if the president is mulling the use of nuclear weapons and if his apocalyptic Truth Social post is intended to convey such a threat. Six minutes later, at 11:19 a.m. eastern time, the White House press office declined to rule out the use of nuclear weapons. Instead, an unnamed official wrote, “We refer you to the President’s TRUTH on this inquiry.”
In a follow-up email, I wrote that the Truth Social post in question is ambiguous and that I would write in this article that “the White House press office declined to comment on whether the president is considering a nuclear attack on Iran,” and that it instead directed me to a post that threatens the imminent death of an entire civilization.
I also asked if the White House would like to provide additional comments or a statement. Two minutes later, at 11:45 a.m., the White House shared a statement attributable to press secretary Karoline Leavitt. “The Iranian regime has until 8PM Eastern Time to meet the moment and make a deal with the United States,” Leavitt said. “Only the President knows where things stand and what he will do.”
The responses from the White House press office were different from an earlier tweet from its rapid response team that criticized a Democratic account for saying that Vice President JD Vance had implied on Tuesday that Trump was considering using nuclear weapons. “Literally nothing [Vance] said here ‘implies’ this, you absolute buffoons,” the rapid response team wrote.
The threat by Trump on Tuesday is yet another escalation from the president in the lead up to his imminent deadline for opening the Strait of Hormuz. On Easter Sunday, Trump wrote that “Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one” before adding “Open the Fuckin’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell.” The language of the post suggested that Trump is considering using conventional weapons to target civilian infrastructure, which is itself a war crime. Trump said on Monday about Iran, “The entire country can be taken out in one night, and that night might be tomorrow night.”
Some of Trump’s biggest backers, including conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, are now warning that the president is no longer fit to serve and should be removed from office by his cabinet. “25TH AMENDMENT!!!,” former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene wrote in response to Trump’s most recent threat. “We cannot kill an entire civilization. This is evil and madness.”
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