Just 90 minutes before President Donald Trump’s 8 p.m. deadline to “wipe out a whole civilization” with massive strikes on Iran’s energy infrastructure and bridges, he granted a two-week extension for diplomacy to continue.
“Subject to the Islamic Republic of Iran agreeing to the COMPLETE, IMMEDIATE and SAFE OPENING of the Strait of Hormuz,” Trump said Tuesday on social media, “I agree to suspend the bombing and attack of Iran for a period of two weeks.”
“We have already met and exceeded all Military objectives, and are very far along with a definitive Agreement concerning Longterm PEACE with Iran,” Trump said. A 10-point proposal received from Tehran, he said, was a “workable basis on which to negotiate.”
Trump added, “This will be a double-sided CEASEFIRE!”
Trump said his decision was in response to an appeal from Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and military chief Gen. Asim Munir, whose government has been serving as mediator between the United States and Iran.
“Diplomatic efforts for peaceful settlement are progressing steadily,” Sharif said in a post on social media. “I earnestly request President Trump to extend the deadline for two weeks.”
In a statement following Trump’s announcement, Sharif said U.S. and Iranian delegations were invited to Islamabad on Friday “to further negotiation for a conclusive agreement to settle all disputes.” He said that the ceasefire would include Lebanon, where Israel is engaged in a massive bombing campaign against Iran-backed Hezbollah.
Pakistan has led a group of mediators, including Egypt and Turkey, that has been looking for an exit to the war that has destabilized the entire region. Trump has forged a particularly close relationship with Munir and, in an interview with Fox News before the extension announcement, described Sharif as “a highly respected man all over.”
After Trump’s announcement, a statement posted by Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, which he attributed to the Supreme National Security Council, said it too was responding to Pakistan’s request and Trump’s “acceptance of the general Framework of Iran’s 10-point proposal for negotiations.”
“If attacks against Iran are halted,” it said, “our Powerful Armed Forces will cease their defensive operations.” For two weeks, it added, “safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz will be possible via coordination” with the Iranian military.
As recently as last weekend, the two sides appeared at an impasse amid mutually exclusive demands. Iran had rejected U.S. insistence that it shut down its nuclear and ballistic missile programs, end its support for regional proxies and reopen the strait, the vital Persian Gulf waterway through which an estimated one-fifth of the world’s energy supplies transit.
In its own 10-point proposal earlier this week, Iran demanded a permanent end to the war, removal of sanctions and ongoing control of the strait, where it would charge ships a toll and use the funds to pay for reconstruction of war damage. It also said Israel must stop its attacks against Iran-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon and cease other regional strikes against its proxies.
Israel, the U.S. partner in the now six-week war, did not immediately comment on Trump’s extension. In recent days, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government has indicated it does not want to stop airstrikes until all of its objectives — including a complete collapse of the regime in Tehran — are achieved.
In a video released Monday, a day after Trump and Netanyahu spoke by telephone, the Israeli leader posted a video saying “together we are continuing to crush Iran’s terror regime … systematically eliminating the Revolutionary Guards’ money machine. … We are eliminating factories, we are eliminating operatives and yes, we continue to eliminate senior officials.”
Israel does not share Trump’s oft-stated belief that regime change in Iran has already been achieved with the killings of most of its senior leaders. While Trump has said those now in charge are “smarter” and less radical than their predecessors, many are considered by experts to be even more hard-line.
Trump has often referred to the brief U.S. military raid that captured Venezuelan strongman Nicolás Maduro as a template for U.S. action in Iran. After removing its leader in Caracas, Trump left the existing regime in power and now refers to it as a great U.S. partner.
“If this two-week ceasefire holds with serious talks, one thing is clear,” said Aaron David Miller, a veteran of Middle East negotiations through both Republican and Democratic administrations. “Regime change is out — legitimizing this regime is in. And the more engagement directly, the more new reality looks more like the old. A brutal, repressive regime has survived the world’s most powerful military.”
While the truce may not sit well with some of the president’s most hawkish supporters and there is no guarantee a negotiated agreement with Iran can be reached in the next two weeks, Trump has his own reasons for wanting to bring an end to a conflict, including the near-doubling of gas prices and a falling approval rating as midterm elections approach.
Following the ceasefire announcement, the price of a barrel of oil immediately plunged by about 14 percent and stock futures surged.
Throughout much of Tuesday, an imminent U.S. assault throughout Iran attack appeared certain. Following Trump’s apocalyptic threat, made early in the morning, Iran said it was calling off talks and threatened “a new stage of warfare.”
As much of the world held its collective breath, countries across the region warned residents to shelter in place. In Washington, Trump’s political opponents questioned his fitness for office and called for his removal.
While Democratic lawmakers said Congress should stop the war from escalating Tuesday, Republicans said little. Both former Republican congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene and the NAACP, along with some Democrats, called for Trump’s removal through the 25th Amendment to the Constitution — under which the president can be removed from power, including by the vice president and a majority of the Cabinet, if they determine him to be “unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office.”
“This is evil and madness,” Greene said on X.
House Democratic leadership said in a statement that Trump was “completely unhinged” and called for lawmakers to “come back into session immediately” and vote on an end to the war.
Rep. Ted Lieu (California), the No. 4 Democrat in House leadership, called on the Pentagon not to obey any orders to eradicate “a whole civilization.”
After the ceasefire announcement, Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-New York) said in a statement he was “glad Trump backed off and is desperately searching for any sort of exit ramp from his ridiculous bluster.”
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