To Deal, or Not to Deal?

To deal, or not to deal. That is the question the Iranians are asking themselves.

There are days they wake up in a state close to wonderment. Today was one of those days.

There was Steve Witkoff, President Trump’s real estate buddy and negotiator in chief, offering them a $300 billion international investment fund. The Ayatollah must have been rubbing his eyebrows or what’s left of them, wondering if he was dreaming. The Iranians had been demanding war reparations but never thought they would get them.

Will somebody give Witkoff the cane? You have to wonder sometimes what he’s thinking.

And then you have the President, one day reassuring Americans that he won’t make a “crummy” deal, won’t make a bad deal, will only make a “great deal,” and if the Iranians don’t like it, he’ll turn it back over to Pistol Pete.

That was Thursday, at the Cabinet meeting in the White House. And then on Friday, you have the President saying on Truth Social that the US and Iran are close to a deal.

“Iran must agree that they will never have a Nuclear Weapon or Bomb. The Hormuz Strait must be immediately open, no tolls, for unrestricted shipping traffic, in both directions…. The enriched material, sometimes referred to as “Nuclear Dust,”… will be unearthed by the United States… in close coordination and conjunction with the islamic Republic of Iran and the IAEA,”

No mention of that $300 billion “sweetener,” as Witkoff reportedly called it. Just sayin.

But if you examine what the President just said, it’s pretty clear he has not changed his negotiating demands.

What about the Iranians?

Earlier this week, Ayatollah Mojtaba – or what’s left of him – tweeted that “Death to America” and “Death to Israel” remain the regime’s rallying cries and would become “common slogans” for Muslim youth across the world. “The region will not return to past conditions, and Washington will no longer have a safe place to station military bases in the region,” he added.

Does that sound like someone about to sign a peace deal?

How about the “moderate” Parliament speaker, Qalibaf, the former commander of the IRGC Air Force? “We get concessions not through talks, but through missiles,” he tweeted on Friday. “In negotiations we only clarify them.”

That doesn’t sound terribly conciliatory either, if you ask me.

Now about that “nuclear dust.” Iran has 450 kg of 60% enriched uranium, which is enough for at least 11 bombs with just a few more spins of the centrifuge. Trump says that the deal must include the turnover of that material, which the Iranians have never agreed to, at least not in public.

Trump has also said they cannot have a nuclear weapon in the future. What does that mean? It means, they must also give up the 9000 kg of low enriched uranium in their stockpile, and destroy their enrichment centrifuges.

As a reminder, the physics of uranium enrichment might appear counter-intuitive. Nuclear power plants require uranium enriched to 3.67%, which is 70% of the enrichment work needed to reach weapons grade. Iran is believed to have around 8500 kilograms of 3.67% uranium in its stockpile.

In addition, Iran has anywhere from 250 kilograms to more than 550 kilograms of uranium enriched to 20%, which is 90% of the enrichment work needed to reach weapons grade. Much of that stockpile was actually taken off the books by the JCPOA (Obama’s “bad nuclear deal,” as Trump calls it). Experts refer to it as the “ghost inventory.”

I think Trump is deliberately blowing hot and cold on the negotiations, and not just because he wants to drop the price of oil and bump up the stock market.

I think he is playing mind games with the Iranians. He is in no hurry to close a deal, and this has caught the Iranians off guard. They think the midterms will force Trump’s hand, but so far they haven’t.

In other words, Trump is beating them at their own negotiating game, and it’s making their heads explode.

Remember, best beloved, that the annual five-day Hajj, or pilgrimage to Mecca, ends on Friday night. The Saudis reportedly asked last week that the United States abstain from combat operations against Iran during the hajj.

I call these negotiations Act III of the Iran war. Even if President Trump says that the US and Iran have agreed to the outlines of a deal, I am willing to bet the Iranians will say no. They can’t help it. It’s how they’re wired.

And if their negotiators say yes, but…?  I’m willing to bet the IRGC will launch more drones against ships, or Israel, or the UAE. It’s just their nature.

And that will lead us directly to Act IV.

Act IV is the resumption of kinetic operations, They will be tremendously violent, if brief, and will shut down the entire country. Their goal will be to convince the Iranian people that the regime cannot possibly survive.

And that will lead us directly to Act V.

This is where the genius of Trump’s long-term strategy will become apparent. Act V is where the Iranian people finally rise up and, with US and Israeli help, seize control of the vast armories of weapons stockpiled by the IRGC and the bassij in every part of the country.

The violence will unfold under US and Israeli overwatch, which means that whenever we see an IRGC or bassij mobilization that threatens the uprising, we take them out. I would imagine we would also take down the Iranian regime broadcasting networks, or hack them and turn them over to the insurgents.

The President said on Thursday he wanted the Saudis, the Omanis, the Kuwaitis, and the Qataris to join the Abraham Accords. Almost jokingly he added, “I think they owe it to us… In fact, maybe I won’t do the deal if they don’t.”

If Act V is as successful as I believe it will be and the Iranian regime falls to a popular uprising, there will be no more roadblock to expanding the Abraham Accords.

The Islamic regime in Iran has been the source of violence and terror for 47 years, not just in the Middle East but around the world. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum called them “terrorists with an oil field.”

We humans are trouble-makers by nature. Just read the Old Testament.

But a world without Islamic Iran could become one of those periods you read about in a single sentence in the Bible. “And for forty years, Israel knew peace.”

I discuss the Iran negotiations, as well as the current state of the Russia-Ukraine war, in this week’s Prophecy Today Weekend. As always, you can listen live at 1 PM on Saturday on 550 AM or 104.9 FM in the Jacksonville, Florida, area and in participating Christian broadcasting networks around the country.

You can also listen using the Jacksonville Way Radio app, or catch the podcast later, here.

Yours in freedom.

©2026 Kenneth R. Timmerman. All rights reserved.

RELATED ARTICLES:

Critically Thinking about Iran: Some facts to consider when negotiating a peace deal

Iranian Cry De Profundis: We Want War to Liberate Us From Tyranny 

U.S. Launches Fresh Defensive Strikes Against Iran

Website: kentimmerman.com

Ken Timmerman’s 14th book of non-fiction, THE IRAN HOUSE: Tales of Revolution, Persecution, War, and Intrigue, can be ordered by clicking here or by viewing my author’s page, here. 

Raising Olives in Provence, can be ordered by clicking here.