Trump team discusses Iran talks in White House situation room - Axios
US President Donald Trump held a meeting on Tuesday morning in the White House situation room about the ongoing nuclear talks with Tehran, Axios reported citing two sources with direct knowledge.
Trump's envoy Steve Witkoff, Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, CIA director John Ratcliffe, White House national security adviser Mike Waltz and other top officials were in attendance.
The White House sought to avoid an overlap between resumed US-Iran talks previously due to be held in Rome over the weekend and a visit by Vance to the Italian capital, the report added.
Iran said the venue would again be the Omani capital Muscat but the United States has yet to publicly comment on the matter.
Any future agreement with Iran must require the Islamic Republic to fully dismantle its nuclear and missile programs along the lines of Libya’s 2003 disarmament deal and end support for regional armed groups, an Israeli minister said on Tuesday.
“We support any agreement that ensures Iran has fully dismantled its nuclear program—modeled after Libya’s disarmament—ceases its support for terrorism and completely dismantles its missile program," Israel’s innovation minister and Security Cabinet member Gila Gamliel said.
“Iran has made no secret of its intent to destroy the State of Israel. These are not my words—they are saying it themselves, clearly, directly and without shame,” Gamliel told the Jewish News Syndicate, adding that Iranian leaders use similar rhetoric toward the United States.
She credited the shift in Iran’s behavior to the Trump administration’s willingness to use force. “The Iranian regime is skilled at negotiating, stalling and using time to its advantage,” she said.
Gamliel also referred to shared values between Israel and the US, including democracy and the fight against terror financing, and said she believes Washington will not accept any deal short of Iran’s complete disarmament.
The United States faces a formidable adversary in talks with Islamic Republic, a former top US intelligence official told Iran International, and Tehran's aim could be to buy time for its nuclear program.
Norman Roule, a veteran of the Central Intelligence Agency for over 30 years who once oversaw its Iran desk, said Tehran's veteran negotiators could drag out the talks to their advantage while enriching uranium toward levels needed to build a bomb.
“Every day talks drag on, Iran moves closer to the threshold,” he said. “And if it calculates that it gains more from staying on the edge of weaponization than actually building a bomb, it will continue to play this game.”
Tehran has proven adept, Roule said, at “negotiating the negotiation”, or what he described as using drawn-out diplomacy to defuse military threats and reduce sanctions while continuing nuclear development.
As the United States prepares to resume nuclear talks with Iran this weekend, Iran’s leadership would appear to be on the backfoot amid uncertainty over its political succession, economic malaise, regional setbacks and rising international suspicion of its nuclear ambitions.
Iran has historically used negotiations as a pressure valve, Roule said, entering talks only when the threat of military confrontation peaks, with previous talks in 2003, 2012, and 2015 coinciding with an escalated US military presence or regional turmoil.
But this time is different, he argued.
Norman Roule pictured during an interview with Marzia Hussaini at Iran International's office in Washington DC
“This regime is weaker, more isolated, and increasingly unpopular. If Iran keeps using its nuclear program as a shield to avoid pressure on its oppression, terrorism, and hostage-taking, the international community must call its bluff.”
According to Roule, the Trump administration is entering the talks with a clear objective: a permanent end to Iran’s capacity to build a nuclear weapon, without repeating the perceived flaws of the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).
“The 2015 agreement placed temporary and reversible limits on Iran’s nuclear program but gave Tehran permanent sanctions relief,” Roule said. “The result was that Iran used that economic relief to finance terrorism and militias across the region.”
Now, Washington may seek to allow Iran a more limited civilian nuclear capability while barring any path to weaponization and denying access to funds that could revitalize Iran’s destabilizing regional network.
Historic Strain
The talks with Trump are proceeding as Tehran is at is weakest strategic moment since emerging from the punishing Iran-Iraq War in 1988, Roule argued.
Politically, the sudden death of President Ebrahim Raisi in a 2024 helicopter crash removed the only viable successor to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei who shared the veteran leader's ideological alignment and political credentials.
Presidential elections last year saw historically low turnout, signaling popular resignation, and the recent ouster of the Vice President and the Finance Minister pointed to factional infighting.
On the economic front, inflation and the proportion of Iranians living below the poverty line both stand at around 30% while blackouts routinely plunge residents and businesses into the dark.
“This is an economic catastrophe,” he said. “Iran's people are paying the price for decades of mismanagement and isolation.”
Militarily, an Oct. 26 Israeli attack likely knocked out much of Iran's air defenses, capping months of harsh Israeli blows on Tehran's allies Hamas and Hezbollah.
“The ring of fire Iran built around Israel is now broken,” Roule said. “The Quds Force remains, but it is bruised and scattered,” he added, referring to the elite paramilitary force that oversees Tehran's foreign operations.
Moment of reckoning
While Roule emphasized his support for a diplomatic solution, he acknowledged that Israel in particular is closely studying plans for a potential attack
“If Israel delivers a significant strike, it won’t eliminate Iran’s nuclear capability permanently,” he said, “but it could raise the costs so high that Tehran would hesitate to rebuild.”
Still, there was some possibility that Tehran could choose a fundamentally different posture toward the United States.
“This could be the moment the Supreme Leader chooses normalization over confrontation,” Roule said. “The Iranian people — brilliant, resilient — deserve a future that isn’t shaped by threats, militias and sanctions.”
On the first anniversary of Iran's first-ever missile strike on Israel, the Revolutionary Guard's news outlet Fars News on Tuesday released what it called "unseen images of the preparation of drones and missiles, and the command room of Operation True Promise."
The missile and drone strikes launched on April 13 and 14, 2024 were the first time since 1991 Iraqi missile strikes that Israel was directly attacked by another country's military.
The Lebanese state must have a monopoly on weapons in the country and the transfer of Iran-backed Hezbollah's arms to Beirut should proceed via direct talks between the presidency and the group, Lebanon’s president Joseph Aoun said on Tuesday.
“The decision has been made to restrict the possession of weapons to the state,” Aoun told the London-based Al-Araby Al-Jadeed in an interview published ahead of his visit to Qatar, saying the move ought to be carried out this year.
“The implementation process remains to be decided through dialogue, which I see as bilateral between the presidency and Hezbollah.”
Washington has pressed for Hezbollah’s disarmament, but Aoun said he warned US envoy Morgan Ortagus about the risk of triggering civil strife.
Hezbollah receives extensive military and financial support from Iran, including arms, training, and strategic guidance from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. Iranian help has allowed the group to grow into one of the most formidable non-state military organizations on earth.
However, both Iran and Hezbollah have faced strategic setbacks in recent months. Israeli strikes killed many high-ranking Hezbollah commanders and key IRGC personnel in Syria, while Iran’s influence over its proxies in Iraq and Yemen appears to be shifting under regional and international pressure.
Outlining a future security transition, Aoun rejected forming a Hezbollah-only military unit along the lines of Iraq’s Iran-backed Popular Mobilization Forces. Instead, he said Hezbollah members who meet military standards could be absorbed individually into the Lebanese Armed Forces.
Over 150 hardline Iranian lawmakers urged a key decision-making body on Tuesday to block Iran’s accession to the Countering the Financing of Terrorism and Palermo conventions, two key components of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) reform package.
In a letter published Tuesday addressed to the chair of the Expediency Council Sadeq Amoli Larijani, they warned against endorsing the bills “until the threat of the snapback mechanism is fully lifted.”
Snapback refers to the automatic reimposition of UN sanctions under the 2015 nuclear deal framework. The UN snapback mechanism is expected to expire in October 2025—unless a party triggers it beforehand.
Their appeal signals deep resistance in conservative circles to legislation seen as necessary to remove Iran from the FATF blacklist.
The CFT targets terrorism financing while the Palermo convention tackles transnational crime. Their passage has stalled since parliament passed them with reservations.
Larijani recently suggested conditional approval was possible, citing parliamentary safeguards. But MPs insisted even a conditional endorsement could expose Iran to economic penalties.
