WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump is betting that a beleaguered Iran is so vulnerable following a tumultuous 18 months in the Middle East that it might finally be ready to abandon its nuclear program.
The renewed push to solve one of the most delicate foreign policy issues facing the White House and the Mideast will begin in earnest Saturday when Trump's Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi gather in Oman.
Trump says he prefers a diplomatic solution, even as he warns that Iran will face “great danger” if talks don't go well. But Iran's nuclear advances since Trump scrapped an Obama-era agreement during his first term make finding a pathway to a deal difficult, and experts warn that the prospects of U.S. military action on Iranian nuclear facilities appear higher than they have been in years.
“His ultimate goal and the ultimate objective is to ensure that Iran can never obtain a nuclear weapon,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters Friday.
“But he’s made it very clear to the Iranians, and his national security team will as well, that all options are on the table and Iran has a choice to make. You can agree to President Trump’s demand or there will be all hell to pay,” she added.
The moment is certainly fraught, but the White House is seeing hopeful signs that the timing might be right. The push comes as Iran has faced a series of enormous setbacks that has ostensibly left Tehran in a weaker negotiating position.
Iran's recent challenges
The military capabilities of Iranian-backed proxy forces Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon have been dramatically degraded by Israeli forces. U.S. airstrikes, meanwhile, targeting Iran-backed Houthi militants in Yemen have hit oil refineries, airports and missile sites.
Israel also carried out strikes against Iran in October that damaged facilities linked to Tehran’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs. And in December, Iran saw Syrian leader Bashar Assad — Tehran's closest Mideast ally — ousted after more than two decades in power.
The leaders of the Islamic Republic also face domestic pressure as years of international sanctions have choked the economy. The U.S. Treasury Department announced a new round of sanctions earlier this week targeting five entities and an individual that American officials say play key roles in Iran's nuclear program.
“All eyes are on Oman by Iranians following this very closely and potentially hoping that this would impact the state of the economy,” said Negar Mortazavi, a senior fellow at the Center for International Policy, a Washington-based think tank.
But it remains to be seen if the U.S. can entice Iran with a big enough carrot for it to make concessions to meet Trump's demands that any potential deal go further in ensuring Tehran doesn't develop nuclear weapons than the agreement forged during Democratic President Barack Obama's administration.
Under the 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, Iran could only maintain a small stockpile of uranium enriched to 3.67%. Today, it has enough to build multiple nuclear weapons if it chooses and has some material enriched up to 60%, a short, technical step away from weapons-grade levels.
It's not clear if talks will be face to face
At the meeting Saturday in Oman’s capital city of Muscat, Iran will be represented by Araghchi and the United States by Witkoff. It's unclear if the two will speak directly.
Trump has said the two sides will have “direct” negotiations. But Iranian officials have insisted that the plan is for “indirect talks,” meaning an intermediary from Oman would shuttle messages between Witkoff's and Araghchi's teams holed up in different rooms.
Either way, the decision for the two sides to talk — announced by Trump in the Oval Office this week alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — came as a bit of a surprise.
Trump has been calling for direct talks, while threatening "consequences" for Iran if it doesn't move to get a deal done.
Iran, meanwhile, has given mixed signals about the utility of the talks, arguing that engaging would be useless under the shadow of threats.
After Trump recently sent a letter to Iran’s supreme leader, 85-year-old Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, calling for direct negotiations, Tehran rejected the entreaty while leaving open the possibility of indirect negotiations.
President Masoud Pezeshkian again pledged this week that Iran's “not after a nuclear bomb” and even suggested Tehran could be open to the prospect of direct American investment in the Islamic Republic if the countries can reach a deal.
That was a departure from Iran’s stance after its 2015 nuclear deal, in which Tehran sought to buy American airplanes but in effect barred U.S. companies from coming into the country.
How much room is there for negotiation?
National security adviser Mike Waltz has said Trump wants the “full dismantlement” of Iran’s nuclear program, adding, “That’s enrichment, that is weaponization, and that is its strategic missile program.”
But Trump left greater space for negotiations: “ The only thing that they can’t have is a nuclear weapon," Trump told reporters as he met with his Cabinet secretaries Wednesday.
Witkoff also has signaled that the administration could be amenable to a deal that is less than full nuclear disarmament.
“Where our red line will be, there can’t be weaponization of your nuclear capability,” Witkoff said in a Wall Street Journal interview published Friday.
Meanwhile, Netanyahu, who met with Trump on Monday, said he would welcome a diplomatic agreement along the lines of Libya’s deal with the international community in 2003. The Israeli leader is known for his hawkish views on Iran and in the past has urged Washington to take military action against Iran.
The Libya deal saw late dictator Moammar Gadhafi give up all of his clandestine nuclear program. Iran has insisted its program, acknowledged to the International Atomic Energy Agency, should continue.
But Trump has notably not embraced Netanyahu's push for the Libya model, said Trita Parsi, executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, another Washington-based think tank.
“If it’s narrow, if it’s focused on the nuclear program, if the goal of the U.S. is to prevent a nuclear weapon, then there is a likelihood for success,” Parsi said. “And it’s under those circumstances that I suspect that you will see talks, perhaps in rather short order, be elevated.”
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Associated Press writer Jon Gambrell in Muscat, Oman, contributed to this report.
