A Deal Trump and Khamenei Could Make
Iran says it won’t negotiate with the U.S. under pressure. But it has done so in the past – and might again.
What will it take to talk?
Photographer: Anadolu Agency/AnadoluAyatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s Supreme Leader, has long maintained that the U.S. will never be satisfied with Iranian concessions until the Islamic Republic itself is conceded. This view informs the long-standing position of Iranian officials that they will not negotiate with the U.S. under pressure.
Unsurprisingly, the Iranian response to the recent intensification of the Trump administration’s “maximum pressure” campaign has been to test and expose the limits of American resolve, by triggering a series of sabotage and proxy attacks, against oil tankers--two Saudi, one Emirati and one Norwegian—and oil pumping stations in Saudi Arabia.