A month into the US-Israel-Iran war, a familiar fog has descended over West Asia: one side talking peace, the other denying there is any peace to be talked. The explosive report from the Wall Street Journal details that US President Donald Trump has privately told aides he is willing to end the military campaign against Iran even if the Strait of Hormuz remains largely closed has upended assumptions about what Washington actually wants from this conflict. But Tehran, with equal firmness, insists there is nothing to end, because there has been no negotiation in the first place.
The WSJ report, citing administration officials, said Trump and his team assessed that reopening the Strait of Hormuz immediately would push the conflict beyond his preferred timeline of four to six weeks. As a result, the President has concluded that the US would wind down hostilities after achieving its core objectives: crippling Iran’s navy and degrading its missile stockpiles. The plan, as reported, is to then lean on diplomatic pressure and allied muscle, particularly from European and Gulf partners, to eventually force Tehran into reopening the waterway.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed the broad thrust of the report, telling reporters that reopening the Strait was not among the “core objectives” of winning the war. Secretary of State Marco Rubio struck a more assertive tone, asserting that the Strait would reopen “one way or another,” whether through Iranian compliance with international law or through coordinated allied action.
Trump himself, in a Truth Social post, said “great progress” had been made toward ending the war, but threatened to obliterate Iran’s power plants, oil infrastructure, and Kharg Island if a deal was not reached.
From Tehran, that framing is being rejected in its entirety. Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baqaei stated categorically that no negotiations had taken place during the 31 days of fighting. His words were unambiguous: what has occurred is not dialogue but a submission of proposals by the United States, delivered through intermediaries including Pakistan, and those proposals have been characterised as “excessive and unreasonable.”
The Iranian Consulate General in Mumbai echoed this, stating that there had been no direct talks with the US and that Pakistan’s diplomatic forums were Islamabad’s own initiative, not Tehran’s.
Iran also flatly rejected Washington’s 15-point peace proposal, calling it “one-sided” and “unrealistic.” Tehran’s counteroffer, presented through back channels, reportedly demands economic control over the Strait of Hormuz, war reparations, and an end to attacks on Iran’s regional allies in Lebanon and Iraq. Taken together, the gap between the two sides’ stated positions is not merely wide, it is foundational. Trump’s administration speaks of deal-making; Iran speaks of American aggression that must be resisted.
The contradiction runs deeper than diplomatic posturing. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, speaking to Newsmax, said Israel and the US were “beyond the halfway point” in achieving their objectives, which he framed as preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons capable of reaching American cities. Netanyahu suggested long-term solutions for the Strait could involve rerouting Gulf energy pipelines westward through Saudi Arabia to the Red Sea, bypassing Iran’s geographic leverage entirely. Meanwhile, Gulf states, according to the Associated Press, have urged Washington to continue strikes until Iran ceases to pose a threat to the region.
What makes this moment particularly volatile is the asymmetric nature of Iran’s remaining leverage. Even as the US-Israel campaign has degraded Iran’s naval and missile capabilities significantly, Tehran’s control over the Strait of Hormuz, through which roughly a fifth of the world’s oil passes, gives it outsized economic influence. The US national average retail price of gasoline crossed four dollars a gallon for the first time in over three years this week, a number that will not be lost on voters heading into midterm season. Trump’s apparent willingness to leave the Strait question for later may be less a strategic concession than a political calculation.
As of now, the most precise characterisation of the situation comes not from either capital but from Iran’s own foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, who said an exchange of messages through “friendly countries” does not amount to negotiations. The war, in its fifth week, continues. The Strait remains largely closed. And the distance between Trump’s dealmaking confidence and Iran’s categorical denials suggests that whatever comes next, it will not be simple.
