America just signalled it is walking away from the Iran war
3 days ago · 10 November 2026Share
President Donald Trump poses for his official portrait at The White House, in Washington, D.C., on Friday, October 6, 2017. File photo. Shealeah Craighead · Public domain
Donald Trump just said this war is basically over.
And JD Vance, the Vice President, met the same Qatari team separately, same day.
So what did Trump actually say? He says quote "the war militarily is effectively over".
He also said America is just keeping it the status quo. And that a return to US strikes on Iran is quite unlikely.
That's the president saying the fighting part is already done.
So what's the actual deal on the table?
It's a two-day plan. Day one, Washington lifts its naval blockade on Iran and unfreezes some Iranian assets. In return, Iran lets IAEA inspectors into the nuclear sites that got hit during the war.
Day two, Iran reopens the Strait of Hormuz. And that opens the door to bigger nuclear talks.
None of this is signed. It's still a proposal. Qatar is the one carrying it back and forth between Washington and Tehran.
Iran sounds cautiously on board too. Esmaeil Baghaei, who speaks for Iran's Foreign Ministry, calls it quote "the most reasonable framework available". Abbas Araghchi, Iran's Foreign Minister, said two days ago that Tehran is still waiting on Washington to respond to its own proposal.
But here's the gear change.
Marco Rubio, the US Secretary of State, is not singing from the same page. Two days ago he said talks had made little progress. He said some of Iran's demands were not realistic.
So one man in this administration says it's nearly done. Another says it's barely moving.
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Skyline, Doha, Qatar. File photo. Zairon · CC BY 4.0
And there's pressure pulling the other way too.
Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel's Prime Minister, is reported by the Financial Times to be calling Trump every single day, pushing him to restart military action against Iran. The same report says people inside and outside the White House who don't want the war back are working to counter him. It says regional leaders have been telling Trump to avoid escalating and to keep talking instead.
A separate source close to the Israeli side, speaking to the Times of Israel, says Netanyahu does want the war resumed, but denies there's currently a push to talk Trump into it.
And it's not just Netanyahu pushing back on diplomacy. Mohsen Rezaei, the secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, says the US should stop manufacturing what he calls fake news about imaginary talks, and should just accept Iran's seven conditions instead.
Other leaders in the region are weighing in too.
Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey's President, says he raised concerns with Trump about renewed attacks on Iran destabilising the region. And four days ago, Iraq's Prime Minister, Ali Faleh al-Zaidi, made an unannounced trip to Tehran. He met Masoud Pezeshkian, Iran's President, and Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, the speaker of Iran's Parliament.
Trump pointed to the Gulf states too. He says Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain and Kuwait would all rather keep things exactly as they are, blockade and all, than see this war start back up.
Trump says he's in no rush to resume strikes. He's satisfied with how the blockade is working. But he says American forces are still ready to act if needed.
And one thing he says is not up for negotiation at all: stopping Iran getting a nuclear weapon.
There's a domestic angle too. This push comes right after last week's US midterm elections, where Republican losses have piled political pressure on Trump to wind the war down. Democrats take control of both chambers of Congress in January. They've already said they'll use their control of the money to try to force an end to it.
So what don't we know?
Whether Rubio's harder tone is a real split inside the administration, or just a negotiating tactic. What's actually in Iran's full proposal beyond these two days. And whether the Gulf states would even accept a final deal.
Right now, the war hasn't restarted. The blockade hasn't been lifted. Both sides say they're talking.
Neither side agrees on how close that talking actually is to anything real.
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