MIDEAST BRIEFING: A possible deal, Iranian attacks on the UAE, and the US trying to call two Iranian bluffs at once. Also, promising elections in the West Bank amid an ongoing disaster in Gaza.
Amid the confusion and mounting tensions over a possible renewal of the war comes a report suggesting the United States and Iran may be moving toward a diplomatic off-ramp that could dramatically ease the crisis — while also reviving many of the same controversies that surrounded the Obama-era nuclear deal. According to Axios, an emerging one-page memorandum of understanding would include Iran temporarily suspending uranium enrichment in exchange for phased sanctions relief and broader de-escalation measures around the Strait of Hormuz.
Obviously, if finalized this could quickly lower the immediate risk of a wider regional war and calm global energy markets, and it will end a period of instability, tension and danger for millions of people. But it would also be a decidedly mixed bag, and will draw fierce criticism for failing to force any meaningful strategic transformation inside Iran. Rather than dismantling Tehran’s regional terrorist infrastructure or weakening the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the deal would provide the regime with economic breathing room and renewed legitimacy — despite having massacred tens of thousands of protesters in January, which sparked the conflict to begin with.
Iran would be totally validated in its strategy of blocking the Strait of Hormuz to rattle world markets, and therefore would be sure to do it again whenever threatened in the future — and it would retain the ability to project influence via proxy militias like Hezbollah across Lebanon, Iraq, Yemen and the Palestinian areas. And the tactic may start to crop up in other maritime choke points globally.
This comes days after the ceasefire declared last month, after some 40 days of US-Israeli bombardment of regime targets, seemed to be falling apart. The Iranians — now clearly ruled by the radicals of the Revolutionary Guards — seemed to grow maximally brazen as a result of their success in converting the conflict into the “War of Hormuz.” In this reframed war, Iran demonstrated that it can disrupt global energy flows, rattle markets, and expose divisions in the West (as Trump, in his disdain for the Europeans, did not consult with them before launching the war). That seems to be the reason Iran did not negotiate from weakness or even caution, but rather like a side that believes it has leverage and intends to use it.
Hence the Iranians do not seem to be offering concessions — not beyond the narrowest discussion of the nuclear file. On the broader issues — proxy militias, ballistic missiles, democratic reforms perhaps — Iran is giving nothing.
The US has essentially been trying to call two Iranian bluffs at once. The first is that Iran can absorb sustained economic pressure and a total counter-blockade of its ports without breaking. The second is that Iran’s mafia-with-a-flag (to quote Garry Kasparov) would rather not have the war resume. It was certainly at least feigning indifference — and if the Axios report is true, it worked.
Iran will have proven that the West is not ready for a major war and will break first. To make the point, this week it hit at what it believes to be the region’s weakest link, the UAE. (Iran believes this because the UAE is an epically successful sandlot with a business model that depends on no taxes and total stability, with great amenities that are not being bombed by jihadists.)
If the reported deal does not materialize, a return to “kinetic action” would have among its objective the removal of the new hardline IRGC leadership cadre in hopes of a transition to a different cohort — a “third regime” that might be more pragmatic. One that might, indeed, live in the konwn Euclidean universe – as, say, President Massoud Pezeshkian, a heart surgeon by training, seems to. Good luck.
The Price of Collapse: How One Decision Unleashed Iran’s Nuclear Threshold
Pay attention to the shocking piece about Iran’s nuclear enrichment in the New York Times, by David Sanger and William Broad. It is an indictment not just of Iran, but of the strategic failure that helped create the current crisis: Trump’s disastrous 2018 decision to walk away from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action unleashed Iran’s nuclear program. At the time, Iran had less than a single bomb’s worth of enriched uranium. Today, according to the report, it has roughly 11 tons across varying levels of enrichment — an industrial-scale stockpile that dwarfs what existed before. Iran has moved from a constrained program under tight inspection to what is effectively a threshold nuclear state, with material that — if further enriched, slightly — could produce scores of weapons.
Inconveniently, no one outside the regime seems to really know where much of it is. After the 2025 strikes on sites like Natanz and Fordow, significant quantities of enriched uranium may have been moved, buried, or hidden in hardened underground facilities. These are not easy targets. And the military campaign — while posting huge tactical successes — has not solved the problem. Intelligence assessments suggest that Iran’s timeline to a bomb has not fundamentally changed; at best, it has been delayed modestly.
All this puts paid to the idea that Iran is not pursuing a nuclear weapon – these are lies. There is no other reason to have ever enriched at a 60 percent level, which Iran does not even deny it did. And incredibly, the regime has mortgaged a large part of its future on nuclear capability. The report assesses that $1 trillion dollars was spent or lost because of this thirty-year conflict with the world; that is about four years’ worth of Iran’s pre-war GDP (which itself is pathetic – less than half of Israel’s with a population almost nine times larger).
Notice that the politics of the revelation are not so predictable or clear. On one hand, yes, it makes clear that Trump’s canning of the JCPOA was one of the stupidest acts in memory – largely caused by his hatred of anything Obama did, and compelled by lies and machinations from Netanyahu (of course, the Trump 2.0 agenda has dramatically raised the bar on that superlative). On the other hand, it makes clear that there is an emergency to deal with, and in that way can be seen as justifying the war, and the blockade.
Zarif’s Offer — and Why It’s Impossible
Pay attention also to an article in Foreign Affairs by former Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif, who was the lead Iranian negotiator for the JCPOA, In it he lays out a framework for ending the war – from a regime stooge, yes, but from one who is at least not part of the IRGC. If the report about an emerging framework is correct, then Zarif’s position would in effect have prevailed.
It rests on the premise that the world should be prepared to accept a limited, civilian nuclear program in Iran – and leave the regime alone, ending its economic and financial isolation (a.k.a., the sanctions). The first part is defensible, the second part is abhorrent but also strangely defensible. It is the unsaid part that for many is a deal-breaker. Let’s examine.
First, on the nuclear issue. Iran, as a signatory to the Non-Proliferation Treaty, has in theory the right to enrich at a civilian level, for research of medical purposes and so on. It’s not automatic, because bad faith can get in the way of that right, but if the inspection regime is tough enough, this should be on the table. Trump’s insistence on “no enrichment” is either unfair or, more likely, a bargaining chip.
But the unfreezing of assets, removal of sanctions and extension of life to the regime? This is very hard to take. It’s defensible because the West does not go around deposing every government that abuses its own people – you’d have to attack not only Azerbaijan and North Korea and Rwanda and Cuba but also China and of course Russia. Still, a regime that just killed many thousands of protestors starts to test the limits of that sovereignty-based idea. And then there is the fact that it also abuses its region. This is the unsaid part.
Iran has actually been attacking the region for decades via its network of proxy militias, some of the full-on jihadist, which have fomented war and misery in Syria and Lebanon, in Yemen, and in the Palestinian areas, and caused no end to problems in Iraq and to a degree in Jordan as well. Hezbollah in Lebanon/Syria and Hamas with its permanent war with Israel have been especially devastating. Hamas is the main reason there is no Palestinian state, and Hezbollah has absolutely devastated Lebanon, making a mockery of any notion of sovereignty in that country. It would be conservative to attach a million deaths to these groups. And the Zarif plan would allow Iran to continue this madness.
Does Zarif speak for anyone, still? What complicates the picture is that “the regime” is not a single, coherent actor. Iran’s system is a dense web of overlapping institutions, personalities, and power centers, in which authority is diffuse and often negotiated rather than dictated. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps itself is not a monolith; it spans military, economic, and political domains, and does not reliably speak with one voice. Figures who appear as hard-liners in one context may act as pragmatic dealmakers in another, and individuals straddle the civilian–military divide in ways that defy Western categories. Even senior officials derive influence from multiple, sometimes competing, institutional bases, and decision-making can reflect a messy process of bargaining among factions rather than a clear chain of command.
A Quiet Signal from the West Bank
Buried in the headlines about war, diplomacy, and regional brinkmanship was a small-seeming but important development: Palestinian municipal elections that might appear routine think are routine, but are anything but.
West Bank turnout hovered around 56 percent, a figure that suggests not enthusiasm so much as persistence. People showed up. They voted. Civic life, battered but intact, continued. That alone is notable after years of political paralysis and amid the aftershocks of a devastating regional conflict.
Candidates were required to accept the program of the Palestine Liberation Organization—recognition of Israel and the renunciation of armed struggle. In effect, the elections were conducted within a framework that explicitly privileges diplomacy over violence, sidelining Hamas and other rejectionist actors.
Despite the constraints, there was no boycott, and voters participated in a system anchored, however imperfectly, in the logic of coexistence. That is a signal that Israel would be wise to heed. The current Israeli leadership wouldn’t know wisdom if it hit them on the head.
The leadership of Mahmoud Abbas is hardly inspiring. He is aging, cautious, and widely seen as corrupt and ineffective. But he has been courageous in recognizing Israel, in explaining that a return of Palestinians to pre-state areas is not in the cards, and with sticking to the peace framework despite the disaster in Gaza.
And in Gaza, a mess: no reconstruction, no meaningful aid surge, and no political horizon — because Hamas will not budge. As long as it refuses to disarm, the basic conditions for rebuilding remain absent, and civilians continue to bear the cost of that stalemate. Meanwhile, reports point to frequent clashes between Hamas and local clan-based militias, groups competing over dwindling resources, access to aid, and control of neighborhoods. These are not organized political alternatives so much as fragmented actors emerging in the vacuum created by war and economic collapse. There are also indications of infighting within these militias themselves, with casualties reported in disputes over cooperation and authority — and of kidnappings and arbitrary detentions carried out by Hamas against members of prominent families.
So life for the Gazans is a misery. What follows is a debate on how to proceed.
Inside Story: The Gaza Blockage (and the Flotilla)
Israeli forces in recent days intercepted a Gaza-bound flotilla and detained several activists, prompting renewed controversy over the blockade. Israelis dismissed the effort as a PR stunt and a provocation, saying the operation was conducted lawfully and that any aid would ultimately be transferred to Gaza.
The incident has drawn criticism from European figures and activists, who argue the detentions reflect a heavier-handed Israeli approach and broader frustration with the blockade. Israeli commentators, however, say the move risks handing a public-relations victory to critics while doing little to change the underlying dynamics of the conflict. And it was the subject of an Al Jazeera debate between me and Lynn Boylan, MEP for Dublin and Chair of the European Parliament Delegation for Relations with Palestine, and Heidi Matthews, Assistant Professor at York University in Canada.
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