President Donald Trump told reporters at the White House on Friday that he is "not satisfied" with Iran's latest proposal to end the war, casting doubt on whether Tehran's fractured leadership can deliver a workable deal even as diplomats across the region scrambled to keep negotiations alive.
Iran's state-run IRNA news agency reported that Tehran handed its plan to mediators in Pakistan on Thursday night. By Friday afternoon, Trump had already dismissed it, though he stopped short of slamming the door entirely.
The rejection lands at a precarious moment. A three-week ceasefire that began April 7 has largely halted fighting inside Iran, but both sides have accused each other of violations. The Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of the world's traded oil and gas passes in peacetime, remains the subject of a tense standoff, with the U.S. Navy maintaining a blockade that prevents Iranian tankers from reaching open water. And the broader war, which began Feb. 28, has already killed thousands across the Middle East.
Speaking to reporters, Trump pointed to what he described as deep internal divisions within Iran's government as the core obstacle. He told reporters:
"They want to make a deal, I'm not satisfied with it, so we'll see what happens."
He went further, framing the problem not as a lack of willingness but a lack of coherence on Iran's side.
"It's a very disjointed leadership. They all want to make a deal, but they're all messed up."
Trump said he believes Iranian leaders have "made strides" toward unifying around a resolution, but added bluntly: "I'm not sure if they ever get there." He described "tremendous discord" within Iran's power structure and said the regime is "having a tremendous problem getting along with each other."
The president also laid out the stark binary he sees ahead, in characteristically direct terms:
"I mean, do we want to go and just blast the h*** out of them and finish them forever? Or do we want to try and make a deal? I mean, those are the options."
That framing, total destruction or negotiated settlement, with nothing in between, reflects the same posture Trump has maintained since the conflict escalated. He previously turned down an Iranian offer centered on the Strait of Hormuz, demanding nuclear concessions first.
Trump disclosed that he received a briefing Thursday from Adm. Brad Cooper, head of U.S. Central Command. He also said negotiations have continued by phone after he called off his envoys' planned trip to Pakistan last week. That cancellation was itself a sharp pivot; Trump had pulled the plug on the trip and told Iran to pick up the phone instead.
This week, Trump floated a new plan to reopen the Strait of Hormuz passageway used by America's Gulf allies to export oil and gas. The specific terms of that plan were not disclosed.
On the Iranian side, Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi held a flurry of calls Friday with counterparts from Turkey, Egypt, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and Azerbaijan, according to his social media posts. The calls were described as briefings on Iran's latest initiatives to end the war.
European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas also spoke by phone with Araghchi on Friday. Her office said they discussed ongoing diplomatic efforts to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and long-term security arrangements. Kallas has been in contact with the EU's Gulf partners as well.
Pakistan's former ambassador to Washington, Masood Khan, said the continued exchange of proposals shows the U.S. and Iran remain engaged in seeking a diplomatic midpoint. But he warned that harsh threats have fueled fears that military hostilities could resume at any moment. Pakistani officials said efforts to ease tensions between the two countries were continuing.
The current three-week ceasefire, which took effect April 7, has held in broad terms but remains fragile. The earlier path to this pause was itself dramatic. Trump had threatened overwhelming force, then, less than 90 minutes before an 8 p.m. deadline he set for Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, he announced a two-week ceasefire. National Review reported that Trump said at the time he had received a 10-point proposal from Iran and believed it could serve as a basis for negotiating a longer-term peace agreement.
Trump posted on Truth Social that the U.S. had "already met and exceeded all Military objectives" and was "very far along with a definitive Agreement concerning Longterm PEACE with Iran." Iran's Supreme National Security Council accepted that ceasefire and agreed to begin negotiations in Islamabad, as Just The News reported. Iran also agreed to reopen the Strait of Hormuz during the ceasefire period under coordination with its military.
That was then. Now, with Trump publicly dismissing Iran's latest proposal, the question is whether the ceasefire outlasts the current round of talks, or collapses under the weight of mutual distrust.
Trump had earlier declared Iran hostilities "terminated" as the War Powers clock hit 60 days, a move that itself raised questions about the legal and strategic framing of the conflict.
The war's casualty figures are staggering. Since Feb. 28, at least 3,375 people have been killed in Iran. More than 2,600 have died in Lebanon, where new fighting between Israel and the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah broke out just two days after the war started. Twenty-four people have been killed in Israel, more than 20 in Gulf Arab states, and 17 Israeli soldiers have died in Lebanon. Thirteen U.S. service members have been killed throughout the region.
And the danger hasn't stopped with the ceasefire. IRNA reported that an explosion of leftover bombs from strikes during the war killed 14 Revolutionary Guard members. The Nournews website, believed to be close to Iran's security establishment, said the blast occurred near the northern city of Zanjan, northwest of Tehran.
Amid the diplomatic maneuvering, Iran's imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize laureate Narges Mohammadi was urgently transferred from prison to a hospital in northwestern Iran on Friday. The Narges Mohammadi Foundation said the 53-year-old rights lawyer suffered a "catastrophic deterioration" of her health, including two episodes of complete loss of consciousness and a severe cardiac crisis.
The foundation said the transfer came "after 140 days of systematic medical neglect" since her arrest in December. Mohammadi, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2023 while behind bars, was sentenced to seven more years in prison. Her lawyers said she was believed to have suffered a heart attack in late March and that they visited her a few days after the incident.
Mohammadi's case is a reminder of the kind of regime Washington is negotiating with, one that at various points has claimed to accept U.S. terms, only for the situation to shift again.
The specific terms of Iran's rejected proposal have not been made public. What shortcomings Trump identified remain unclear. The identities of the mediators in Pakistan have not been disclosed. And Trump's own new plan for the Strait of Hormuz lacks public detail.
What is clear: the president is willing to keep talking, but only on terms he finds acceptable. He has shown a pattern of sharp escalation followed by abrupt pauses, threatening to "wipe out" a civilization one hour and announcing a ceasefire the next. That unpredictability may be a deliberate negotiating tool. It may also be the only thing keeping a deeply fractured Iranian leadership at the table.
The ceasefire holds for now. The diplomats are still dialing. The warships are still in position. And the president of the United States just told the world he's not impressed with what Iran put on the table.
When the other side's leadership can't agree among themselves, the leverage belongs to the one who can walk away. Trump seems to know that.
