US and Iran reach peace deal pending Trump approval: officials

President Donald Trump is weighing a 60-day deal agreed upon by U.S. and Iranian negotiators to extend the shaky ceasefire between the warring nations and reopen the Strait of Hormuz while setting up further negotiations towards agreements on Tehran’s nuclear program, U.S. officials confirmed to The Independent on Thursday.

The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, confirmed that American and Iranian negotiators had agreed on a 60-day memorandum of understanding under which Iran would remove mines placed in the strait and agree not to harass any commercial shipping or demand tolls for passage through the key maritime chokepoint. In return, the U.S. would end the blockade it has kept on Iranian ports as shipping through the strait resumes.

The proposed pact also states that Iran would commit not to pursue nuclear weapons and enter into talks about the disposal of its supply of uranium that has already been enriched to near-weapons grade. Those talks would be the first order of business for any negotiations conducted during the 60-day window of the proposed deal.

It additionally declares that the war between Israel and Hezbollah that has devastated much of southern Lebanon would come to an end.

In return for the commitments to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and forswear nuclear weapons development, the U.S. would release frozen Iranian funds and open discussions about sanctions relief, as well as enter discussions on a mechanism to permit Iran to receive humanitarian aid and other needed goods.

According to Axios, which first reported the deal Thursday, Trump was briefed on details of the proposed deal two days ago, at which point he said he needed “a couple of days to think about it.”

News of the tentative deal to end the impasse over the Strait of Hormuz and begin further talks while extending the ceasefire comes less than 24 hours after the U.S. and Iran exchanged limited fire, with the U.S. striking an Iranian drone operation near the Bandar Abbas airport that US officials said had posed a threat to American forces and commercial shipping.

U.S. Central Command also said it had shot down several Iranian drones, while the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps said it had targeted an American base in response to the attack and warned that "a more decisive" response would be triggered by further attacks.

The tentative deal also comes just a day after Trump told reporters at a cabinet meeting that he believed Iran was keen on striking an agreement of some sort.

He said Tehran did not “have a choice” but to do so because “they’re getting clobbered” and the Iranian economy is “in freefall.”

The ongoing conflict with Tehran, which Trump started alongside Israel on February 28, has taken a massive toll on Trump’s political standing ahead of the November midterm elections.

Trump’s approval rating has sunk to new lows amid the continuing conflict with Iran, which has driven gas prices through the roof across the country as the standoff with Tehran over the Strait of Hormuz has choked off global fuel supplies and left energy markets reeling and inflation spiking.

Last week, the polling aggregator RealClearPolitics reported that Trump’s disapproval rating average had spiked to 58.3 percent — higher than the 57.9 percent level it had hit in the days following the riot Trump had fomented at the U.S. Capitol in a last-ditch attempt to avoid leaving office after losing the 2020 election to Joe Biden.

It cited polls from a range of outlets including The Wall Street Journal, Fox News and the Daily Mail as well as Reuters/Ipsos, CBS News, and The New York Times.

A Fox News survey released last week showed Trump’s overall approval rating falling to 39 percent with 61 percent disapproving, including 41 percent who say they “strongly” disapprove. That’s a three-point drop since last month, a full ten points lower than the start of his second term, and a single percentage point above the lowest rating of his first term in October 2017.

According to the same poll, a whopping 91 percent blame Trump’s decision to go to war with Iran for high gas prices that have sent inflation spiking to levels not seen since the Biden administration.

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