US President Donald Trump has lost interest in renewing June’s interim agreement with Iran and prefers to exert economic pressure to secure more favorable terms for ending the war, according to sources who spoke Thursday with The Times of Israel. Trump himself told reporters his new sanctions against Iran could extend to Chinese banks that do business with it, and said there were no talks at all between the US and Iran right now, even as Tehran’s top diplomat hosted his Qatari counterpart, a key mediator, to discuss the Strait of Hormuz.
Former Mossad chief David Barnea, an architect of the US-Israeli war against Iran, meanwhile hailed Trump’s new sanctions but said there would be no choice but to “intensify the economic, diplomatic and operational actions” against the Iranian regime until it falls. The sanctions, which US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent presented on Monday, target Iran’s digital assets and technology, gold, aviation and shipping sectors. Potential secondary sanctions would affect entities in the United Arab Emirates, Hong Kong, China, Singapore and Europe that transport Iranian oil.
A US official who spoke with The Times of Israel said Trump thinks sanctions will lead the Iranian regime to capitulate to more favorable terms on curbing its nuclear program and reopening the Strait of Hormuz. Confirming elements of an earlier Wall Street Journal report, a senior diplomat from one of the mediating countries also said Trump was no longer interested in reviving the June memorandum of understanding, which fell apart within days over disagreements about the strategic waterway.
While mediators Qatar and Pakistan have sought to restore the MOU or negotiate a similar agreement, Trump has informed them he was no longer prepared to accept those terms because the Iranians have “burned” him too many times at the last minute, the diplomat said. The US would need to be willing to wait out Iran for an extended period for Trump’s plan to work, the diplomat added, expressing doubt in the administration’s ability to wait that long, given the war’s unpopularity among American citizens. (Read More)
