President Trump is expected to put his Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, in charge of the Iran file, signaling the administration will try diplomacy with the Islamic Republic, Financial Times reported on Thursday.
Sources told FT that Witkoff, who put pressure on Israel to clinch the Gaza ceasefire deal, will be tasked to pursue diplomacy with Iran as part of a broader push to “end the wars” in the Middle East.
During the transition phase, Trump officials told the media that they were planning to return to the “maximum pressure” campaign against Iran that Trump pursued in his first term, pulling out of the Iran nuclear deal, imposing crippling sanctions, and assassinating Iranian Gen. Qasem Soleimani.
But in a sign that Trump may take a different approach, he just fired Brian Hook, an Iran hawk who led the maximum pressure campaign in his previous administration. Hook was tasked with filling out Trump’s State Department for this term but will now have no role in the administration.
Trump officials have also said the new administration will consider strikes on Iran’s nuclear program to prevent Iran from building a nuclear weapon, but there’s still no evidence that Tehran is seeking a bomb, something acknowledged by Biden’s CIA chief, William Burns, in a recent interview.
The hype about Iran’s nuclear program is focused on the enrichment of some uranium at 60% purity, which is still below the 90% needed for weapons-grade. Iran took the step to enrich at 60% in response to an Israeli covert attack on its Natanz nuclear facility in 2021.
Iran is also a signatory to the Non-Proliferation Treaty, unlike Israel, which never signed the NPT and has a covert nuclear stockpile that’s not officially acknowledged by the US.
The 2015 nuclear deal that Trump withdrew from in 2018 capped Iran’s nuclear enrichment at 3.67% in exchange for sanctions relief. Axios reported that Iran made clear to European diplomats in a recent meeting that they want to resume negotiations on a new nuclear deal that will be different from the 2015 agreement.
Pursuing such an agreement would likely face significant resistance from the many Iran hawks in the new administration and among Republicans in Congress, who are already complaining about Witkoff.
“He’s already lifting pressure on Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran, and in the process abandoning American hostages and endangering Israel,” a senior Republican congressional staffer told FT.
