Iām no professional, but I think I can spot the signs of a toxic relationship. Threats of violence. Desperately defending the partnerās behavior. Cutting you off from your friends. Draining your resources. Gaslighting. By most of these measures, Vice President JD Vance is in a toxic relationship with the Islamic Republic.
Coming out of the talks in Switzerland yesterday, Vance hailed a āgood foundationā for ending the regional war. He claimed Iran had agreed to let the International Atomic Energy Agency back into the countryāonly for Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei to state flatly that Tehran had not negotiated on its nuclear program and had accepted no new commitments.
Then there's the intimidation. Even as it talked peace, Iran kept a hand on the regionās throat, threatening to shut the Strait of Hormuz in response to Israelās actions. Trump answered threat with threat, warning Tehran it āwonāt even make it backā to its own country if it closed the strait. And when Iran turned the same pressure on the talks themselvesāthreatening to storm out of the summit over insults from TrumpāVance ran interference, waving it off as mere āsocial media threatsā and insisting all was fine because, after all, theyād kept talking late into the night.
Next comes the lopsided exchange. Yesterday, the US Treasury issued a general license letting Iran freely sell crude oil and petrochemicals through the 60-day negotiation period, while talks continued on releasing frozen assetsāa potential economic windfall worth billions. And what did Washington get in return on the nuclear file? According to the Iranians, nothing. Vance even tried to pass off appeasement as boundary-setting, reportedly insisting the freed-up money could only go toward American wheat and soybeans. Iran didnāt bother to counter. Its officials simply made clear theyāll spend their money however they please.
Then thereās the isolation. Iran has maneuvered the US into a Lebanon ādeconflictionā mechanism built around Washington, Qatar, Pakistan and Tehranābut not Israel, the country actually being shot at. On its face, thatās a loss for Israel. But Tehran may have overplayed its hand. Unlike Hezbollah, and contrary to Iranās assumptions, Israel is not a U.S. puppetāand a seat at this table would have been more trap than prize. Inside the mechanism, Israel would face constant, hard-to-refuse pressure to stand down; outside it, those calls are far easier to ignore. An invitation would have forced Israel into an awkward bind: either sign on to a framework stacked against it, or openly reject Trumpās solution. By shutting Israel out, Iran inadvertently spared it that choice.
And throughout, Iran works to pin the blame on Israel, casting the closest U.S. ally as the saboteur out to wreck the deal. Vance seems to be falling for it, explaining away ceasefire violations as the work of rogue commanders: Hezbollah supposedly didnāt mean it.
On the ground, the story is far from Vanceās excuses. Iran is reportedly funneling IRGC officers into southern Lebanese towns to rebuild Hezbollahās command structure, all while Israel is left blindfoldedāforced to pass its messages secondhand through the United States.
As Netanyahu surely understands, when a friend is trapped in a toxic relationship, lecturing them about how awful their partner is rarely works; it only breeds resentment. The best you can do is hope they see it for themselves. And given how brazenly Iran is behaving, Iām growing optimistic that they will.
So all thatās left to say is: JD Vance, I hope you get help.
Olha o que aconteceu ao vivo na cobertura da Copa na Band HAHAHAHAHAHA
O repórter nĆ£o sabia, mas entrevistou justamente quem nĆ£o devia šššš
Foi o Italo Sena @senaitalo98, que fez um negócio muito constrangedor hahahahahahaha
To Trump: In the Middle East, loyalty is currency. If you abandon your closest friend halfway through a fight and cut deals behind their back while leaving them exposed, don't expect anyone to trust your guarantees again. You told the world, "The U.S. and Israel carried out an operation against Iran," then walked away and left your ally standing alone.
In the Middle East, we don't judge friends by speeches; we judge them by who stays when the missiles fly. A person who abandons an ally halfway and cuts deals behind their back is not someone you call in a crisis.
You will say it's about American interests. Fine. But others also have interests, and they have memories. You can call it "America's interests." We call it something else: leaving your friends in the storm.
Before asking, "Why don't they defend themselves?" remember that countries like Israel did and are still doing so alone.
And also remember that the UAE defended itself, struck back forcefully, and banned the Muslim Brotherhood. Many of your countries in the West did neither.
The lesson is simple. If you can leave your closest friend exposed today, why should anyone trust your promises tomorrow? Maybe it's time for the Middle East to start thinking about alternatives.
And yes, when Iran strikes again, don't assume the Middle East will dial Washington. People don't call someone who might leak information to Turkey or cut a deal with Tehran while their friends are still under fire.
The official terms of the U.S. Memorandum of Understanding are outāand itās worse than anticipated. The official signing ceremony isnāt until Friday, but the agreement was already signed digitally last night during a dinner at the Palace of Versailles. Anyone familiar with the palaceās history knows this makes the MOU the second great surrender signed at Versailles. Except this time, the U.S. is the one capitulating.
Hereās why itās worse than we thought. As the details slowly leaked, it became clear that this agreement is not a pauseāthe status quo held in place while negotiations ran their course. It was a rewind, actively restoring the Islamic Republic. The only question left was how fast it would run, and according to these clauses, faster than we would like.
U.S. officials, including the vice president, previously assured reporters that the agreement provides a ādial,ā with economic and sanctions relief increasing only as Iran demonstrates good behavior and compliance. The text is less specific. The clearest financial concession involves the issuance of oil waivers in Section 10, which on their own will return monthly revenue of $5 billion; meanwhile, Section 11 seems to imply that all of the regimeās assets will be made available immediatelyābest case, that remains credit the Islamic Republic can use only for humanitarian purchases; worst case, it is transferred to them directly. Either way, money is fungible, and besides, Iām not sure exactly what leverage the U.S. assumes it will retain once it has surrendered Iranian assets up front.
As has been clear for the past couple of months, two of the conflictās four goalsāthe funding of proxies and the ending of the ballistic missile programāhave been abandoned. In fact, Trump defended the omission. āIf other countries have them, itās a little bit unfair for them not to have some,ā Trump said in France, where he held a press conference on the sidelines of a Group of Seven summit. āIf Saudi Arabia and Qatar, and they all have some, I would say that in relative proportion, I think itās okayā for Iran to have ballistic missiles as well. I havenāt seen Saudi Arabia firing those missiles at the U.S. recently, but I digress. The JCPOA famously made the same omissionābut at least it didnāt promise the removal of all primary and secondary sanctions on the ballistic missile program and on terror sponsorship. Section 7 provides for the removal of all sanctions pending a final dealāso even if Trump somehow clutches victory from the claws of defeat and secures a strong nuclear deal, Iranās other malign activities can continue without sanction. Indeed, Lebanese and regional sources told Reuters that Iran has promised to increase Hezbollahās funding āas soon as possibleā once the United States unfreezes Iranian assets. Chalk up a point for the JCPOA.
The third of the original four goals fares no better: the MOU codifies the abandonment of the protesters, enshrining noninterference in Iranās āinternal affairsāāthose hoping for an uprising in the next 60 days are likely to be disappointed. That leaves only the nuclear frontāthe last remaining goal, and one whose outcome remains entirely unclear. Zero enrichment was already abandoned by Trump last week, but the MOU goes further, defining the new U.S. minimum not as exporting its enriched uranium, but as on-site down-blending under IAEA supervision. In the case of uranium, what goes down can also go up. Without the material in friendlier, less fanatical hands, āgoodā is not an applicable adjective for the deal.
Not only that, Clause 5 gift-wraps the regimeās trump cardāthe one it has played to such great effect against the U.S. Iranās leverage over Gulf shipping was always its readiest threat, the valve it could squeeze whenever it needed the worldās attention. A serious agreement would have taken that card out of their hands. Instead, the MOU merely gestures at ānegotiating the statusā of the waterway with other states in the regionālanguage that quietly abandons the prior baseline of freedom of the seas and hands the question to bilateral talks between Tehran and its neighbors. That is not a settlement; it is leaving the shopkeepers alone with the mob and telling them to work it out among themselves. The U.S. assiduously avoided the word ātolls,ā so Iran rebranded them āservice fees.ā The honest term is protection moneyāand the only thing Iran is offering protection from is itself.
Clause 6, the reconstruction fund, must come as an even more bitter pill for the Gulf alliesāparticularly those who took the U.S. at its word two weeks ago, when it pledged to make āIranian assets [available] to its Gulf allies to support, repair and mitigate future damage that Iran may cause.ā That promise has been inverted. Rather than Iran paying for the damage it inflicts, the MOU drafts a Marshall Plan while the Nazis are still in powerāand leaves France and Britain to foot the bill for German reconstruction.
The most immediate problem for Israel is the first clause: Lebanon, whose status is left unclear by the MOU. A Hezbollah source told Emirati media that Iran had informed Hezbollah that the MOU provides for an Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon over a phased, 60-day period. The same source added that any withdrawal now rests with Israel, which, along with Hezbollah, is not a party to the MOU. A Lebanese political source told the same outlet that Lebanon has received āno official guaranteesā of an Israeli withdrawal and has not yet raised the matter with U.S. officialsāan account that sits at odds with Iranās claim that the MOU plainly obligates Israel to withdraw. Despite U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabeeās assurance that āIsrael doesnāt need Iranās permission to defend itself,ā the agreement has created a circumstance in which increased attacks on the country could pry the U.S. and Israel apart as Israel is compelled to respond.
And note the sequencing, buried in the final clause: negotiations on the substantive terms of the final dealāthe nuclear restrictions, the enrichment ceilings, everything still ostensibly up for grabsāwill only begin after the ceasefire, the blockadeās removal, the maritime opening, the oil waivers, and the unfreezing of assets are already implemented. That ordering gives away the game. This is not the āHormuz for Hormuzā swap the administration is sellingāopen the Strait, lift the blockade, call it even. The concessions that matter to Iran are all front-loaded, banked before Tehran has to concede anything of substance in return. By the time the real bargaining starts, the sanctions relief is flowing, the oil is moving, and the assets are unfrozen. The regime gets restored first and negotiates second. That is the rewind in a single clauseāand it runs fast.
The silver lining, thin as it is, is that the U.S. military is not withdrawing until the conclusion of a final deal. As Trump put it yesterday, āIf I donāt like it, if they donāt behave, weāll go right back to dropping bombs.ā With sanctions relief and waivers already forthcoming, the threat of military action is fast becoming the only stick left in the American arsenal. Do I believe him? Less than I did two months ago, and less still than a week agoābut it remains, at the very least, an option on the table.
Trump, for his part, seemed unbothered by the holes in the deal. At a press conference in Franceāshortly before he declared the agreement āsignedā at VersaillesāFox News correspondent Peter Doocy read him back a famous line of his own: that Iran ānever won a war, but never lost a negotiation.ā Trump asked who had said it. Told it was him, he replied that heād figured as much, then drew the distinction he wanted on the record: this time, Iran ālost militarily.ā
Yes, Mr. President, they always do, thatās the point.
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U.S. intelligence assesses that Iran will be able to block the Strait of Hormuz whenever it wishes from now on. āThis is a weapon stronger than nuclear power.ā (CNN)
Mr. President,
The pager operation against Hezbollah was a masterpiece of modern warfare. Israel also executed a brilliant 12-day operation against Iran that left the regime in shock, its top generals assassinated, and the Ayatollahs held by the throat.
Yet every time Israel had momentum, whether in Gaza, Lebanon, or against Iran, you personally intervened and stopped them at the worst possible moment.
you were personally briefed by Mossad that defeating Iran would take at least a year of consistent pressure. Yet you pushed for quick results, changed the original plan, and turned what could have been a strategic victory into a strategic defeat.
Now, after signing a humiliating deal that buried the Iranian nuclear threat instead of eliminating it, you come out blaming Israel for taking too long and for how it fights.
The question of civilian casualties should be addressed to Hezbollah, not Israel. Hezbollah deliberately operates from within populated civilian areas, using civilians as human shields and endangering their own people.
This strategic failure is not due to Israeli incompetence. The main problem has been your repeated intervention and bad timing.
You donāt get to sabotage the campaign and then blame Israel for the results.