Update, Monday afternoon: After the meetings, President Trump told Reuters that Qatar and Saudi Arabia would rather see a peaceful solution with Iran, but that the United States is ready to resume strikes if necessary. “We’re ready to go anytime we want,” he said, while signaling he is in no rush and is content for now with the naval blockade in the Strait of Hormuz. He announced neither new strikes nor an agreement.
Qatar’s prime minister met President Trump and Vice President JD Vance at the White House on Monday, carrying the latest attempt to end the war with Iran. On the same day, Tehran publicly defended the truce offer that Washington has already rejected, and the secretary of state said no breakthrough is near.
Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani is both Qatar’s prime minister and its foreign minister. He visited Tehran last week and has served as a central mediator since early in the war, carrying messages between the two sides and proposing ways to bridge the gap. Vance led the negotiations that produced a short lived truce in June.
Iran’s offer, as reported by Reuters, would end the American blockade of Iranian ports, lift some sanctions and halt the bombing. In return, Tehran would stop its own blockade of the Strait of Hormuz. Talks on the nuclear program and the remaining sanctions would follow. Iran says the steps could be compressed into two days.
Washington has rejected that plan repeatedly. On Sunday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio called Tehran’s conditions “outrageous and ridiculous and really not realistic,” and said he did not believe a diplomatic breakthrough was imminent. Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman, Esmaeil Baghaei, answered on Monday that the plan is the most reasonable offer on the table. President Masoud Pezeshkian said Tehran is ready to negotiate an end to what he called a prolonged state of neither war nor peace.
The diplomacy runs alongside the military pressure. Trump told CNN on Sunday, as we reported in our story on the interview, that new attacks on Iran are “highly unlikely” if talks make progress. Senior Republicans, Vance among them, have blamed the war in part for their party’s midterm losses, which adds to the pressure in Washington to find an exit. None of that has changed the terms on the table: as of Monday evening, the two sides remain apart on the same points, and no agreement has been announced.
Transparency note: This story is based on Reuters reporting of the meetings and of the statements by Secretary Rubio and the Iranian Foreign Ministry. The proposal’s terms are as described by Reuters from the parties’ public positions.
