Oil rally hardens Tehran's stance on US talks

The escalation accelerated after President Donald Trump warned that the United States would destroy an Iranian bridge or power plant for every attack on shipping in the Strait of Hormuz.

Iranian officials responded not by narrowing the confrontation but by broadening it, signaling that any future conflict would no longer be confined to military targets or the strategic waterway itself.

Until recently, Iranian messaging had focused largely on asserting its authority over the Strait of Hormuz and threatening commercial shipping.

Since Trump's warning, however, officials and state media have increasingly portrayed bridges, power grids, oil infrastructure and other civilian facilities across the region as legitimate targets in a broader campaign of reciprocal retaliation.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi responded on Wednesday by declaring that Iran would follow an "eye for an eye" doctrine.

"I believe any attack on Iran's bridges, power plants or civilian infrastructure will be met with a powerful and decisive response," he said, warning that retaliation would target not only US assets but also any regional country facilitating such attacks.

On Thursday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio escalated the rhetoric further, saying Trump's Iran policy amounted to "a head for an eye" and warning Tehran it would pay a heavy price for attacks on Americans or US interests.

Iran's chief negotiator, Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, dismissed Washington's warnings and declared that the confrontation had entered an "either all or none" phase.

"If Iran is prevented from exporting oil or securing its domestic infrastructure, no infrastructure in the region will be safe, and no one will be able to sell oil," he warned.

His remarks reflected a growing effort to frame attacks on Persian Gulf energy infrastructure not simply as retaliation but as an integral part of Iran's deterrence strategy.

State and IRGC-linked media quickly amplified that message.

The IRGC-linked Tasnim News Agency quoted senior military sources as saying Iran had a "steel determination" to control the Strait of Hormuz and would strike multiple energy targets across the region in response to any attack on Iranian bridges or power plants.

State television likewise warned that Trump's infrastructure threats "will have no result other than the expansion of the war."

The rhetoric broadened further after Trump said he was considering strikes on Iran's nuclear facilities under Pickaxe Mountain.

In response, the Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters warned such an attack would constitute an existential escalation, compelling Iran to target "all interests of America, its allies and supporters" throughout the Middle East.

Not everyone in Tehran supported the increasingly confrontational tone.

Former Iranian ambassador to Germany Hossein Mousavian argued that "continued military confrontation between Iran and the United States will produce no winner and will instead drag the region and the global economy into a costly war of attrition."

Writing in Rouydad24, he said the only viable exit lay in "an immediate return to diplomacy, an agreement on the security of the Strait of Hormuz, and the achievement of a durable nuclear deal."

Yet those voices remain overshadowed by an increasingly reciprocal exchange of threats.

Rubio has warned that Iran "will have to pay a price" if it continues attacking US interests, while Iranian hardliners increasingly argue that accepting a ceasefire itself was a strategic mistake.

Lawmaker Abolfazl Abutorabi told Didban Iran that Washington would have "kissed our boots" had Tehran continued fighting for another two weeks.

The increasingly symmetrical rhetoric suggests both governments are treating attacks on civilian and energy infrastructure not as exceptional acts of escalation but as legitimate retaliation, lowering the threshold for a conflict that could spread well beyond the battlefield and the Strait of Hormuz.

The debate gained fresh momentum after Trump warned Tuesday that the United States would target the deeply buried facility, known in Persian as Mount Kolang Gaz La, if Iran sought to restore its nuclear program there.

Advocates of this view argue that the recent wars demonstrated that conventional military capabilities alone no longer provide sufficient deterrence, making a nuclear option increasingly necessary. Others stop short of openly advocating nuclear weapons but argue that Iran should at least leave the NPT in response to growing US threats.

The arguments echo comments made by Fereydoun Abbasi, the former head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran and a politician closely associated with Saeed Jalili’s hardline camp, months before he was killed in Israeli strikes during the 12-day war in June 2025.

In January 2025, Abbasi argued that under the new security environment, “the dangers of not building a bomb and lacking strong deterrence are far greater than the costs of acquiring it,” warning that weak deterrence would only encourage direct aggression.

Abbasi also maintained that Iran had long ago crossed the scientific and technical threshold required to build a nuclear weapon, arguing that the remaining obstacle was no longer technical but rather “a strategic decision.”

In his view, when threats from Israel and its allies become existential, missile deterrence and reliance on regional allies are no longer sufficient, leaving the country increasingly vulnerable without a nuclear deterrent.

Social media campaign targets negotiating officials

Many hardline social media users now argue that Iran should build a nuclear bomb as quickly as possible. They have also criticized officials they describe as “eager for negotiations”—including President Masoud Pezeshkian, Parliament Speaker Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi—for failing to put withdrawal from the NPT on the government’s agenda.

One X user writing under the name Ayyar reacted to Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei’s statement that Iran remained committed to the NPT.

“Just hours after Baghaei declared that Iran is still a member of the NPT, Trump threatened to bomb the Pickaxe Mountain nuclear facility,” the user wrote. “They killed the country’s leader along with thousands of Iranians and repeatedly struck our nuclear facilities. What exactly must the enemy do before we leave the NPT? Are you asleep?”

Another user, writing under the name Sam, argued: “Why are we afraid of leaving the NPT? Afraid of a global consensus against Iran? Staying in the treaty hasn’t prevented that. We have no choice but to build nuclear weapons for comprehensive deterrence. Nuclear weapons could be the final answer.”

Another account, Seyed Mehrdad, wrote: “The answer to a nuclear threat is not threatening regional infrastructure. Deterrence lies in leaving the NPT and conducting a live nuclear test.”

Other users argued that Iran should not remain without nuclear weapons if countries such as Turkey or Saudi Arabia eventually acquire them, insisting that “missile power alone cannot guarantee deterrence.”

Another post claimed that nuclear-capable bombers would not threaten Iran if the country already possessed nuclear weapons, reflecting a broader argument among hardliners that only an atomic arsenal could prevent further US or Israeli attacks.

Debate spreads beyond social media

The discussion has also spread into conservative media. On June 28, the IRGC-affiliated Fars News Agency published an opinion piece titled “There Is No Alternative but to Build an Atomic Bomb,” arguing that Iran required nuclear deterrence to secure the “peace of mind” necessary to resolve other disputes through negotiations.

Fars later clarified that the article had appeared in its interactive opinion section and did not represent the agency’s official editorial position.

Other conservative outlets, including Kayhan, and hardline members of parliament have generally avoided explicitly endorsing nuclear weapons. They have, however, increasingly referred to concepts such as “redefining deterrence,” “reviewing nuclear commitments” and “revising the country’s defense doctrine.”

Calls for NPT withdrawal intensify

Trump’s latest warning against Pickaxe Mountain has also prompted some conservative figures to publicly raise the possibility of leaving the NPT.

Political analyst Mohammad Hossein Khoshvaght, who has close ties to the late supreme leader’s family, questioned whether conventional responses to US attacks would simply encourage further aggression, asking whether such a cycle could continue “until Iran is brought down.”

Former senior Revolutionary Guards commander Ghorbanali Salavatian urged Iranian authorities to formally notify international organizations that Iran would withdraw from the NPT if the United States attacked Pickaxe Mountain.

He added that such a withdrawal should occur “without delay” if an attack took place.

Khamenei’s fatwa returns to focus

The debate has also reopened questions surrounding the religious prohibition on nuclear weapons issued by the late Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.

Following Khamenei’s death, some social media users argued that Mojtaba Khamenei, as the new supreme leader, should revoke or revise his father’s fatwa declaring nuclear weapons religiously forbidden in light of the changed security environment.

One user wrote in March that because Ali Khamenei was no longer a living source of emulation, his fatwa was no longer binding. The user described the pursuit of nuclear deterrence as “a national demand and the right of the Iranian people.”

The issue had already surfaced in September 2025, when 70 members of parliament argued that Khamenei’s previous ruling should be changed or reinterpreted and demanded authorization for the development and possession of an atomic bomb to establish “nuclear deterrence.”

The lawmakers argued that while the use of nuclear weapons could remain religiously forbidden, producing and possessing them solely for deterrence should be treated differently.

Official position remains unchanged

Before Ali Khamenei’s death, Iranian officials and nuclear negotiators consistently maintained that his fatwa was a permanent religious ruling rather than a temporary political decision.

According to their interpretation, not only the production and use of nuclear weapons but even their possession solely for deterrence is forbidden under Islamic law. They argued that Iran’s deterrence should instead rest on missile capabilities, technological advances and human capital.

Under Shiite jurisprudence, however, a new marja, or source of emulation, may issue rulings that differ from those of his predecessors.

Araghchi acknowledged this possibility in an interview with Al Jazeera in April, saying any change to the nuclear fatwa would depend on the position adopted by Iran’s new supreme leader.

For now, the government’s formal position remains unchanged. Baghaei said Monday that Iran remained a member of the NPT and recognized its obligations under the treaty, although he added that Tehran continually reviewed its foreign policy and national security options.

Baghaei also said Wednesday that no nuclear activity was taking place at Pickaxe Mountain, accusing Washington of using the site as a “fabricated pretext” for further attacks and sabotage.

On Sunday morning, authorities sealed several well-known cafés on Sanaei Street in central Tehran, with reports of similar closures in nearby Iranshahr. Among them were Dobar, 1401, Sam Café, Jo Café and Café Man.

The website Emtedad reported that each café was given a different explanation. Some were told it was because of hijab. Others because they served sandwiches. Others because they had chairs on the pavement.

The variety of reasons almost felt more revealing than any single one.

Hamed, who manages one of the affected cafés, says staff had already been warned that officials would come to seal the premises before inspectors even arrived.

"They told us they were coming," he says. "Now I'm trying to work out how we're supposed to pay wages, rent and everything else. First there was the war. Now this. Every few weeks there's another blow for small businesses and ordinary people."

The official explanations seemed almost secondary. The decision, many felt, had already been made.

Sanaei has become a familiar place in these dispatches because it represents something increasingly scarce in Tehran: a refuge. Its cafés are not cheap, often more expensive than many young people can comfortably afford. Yet they remain full. Students spend hours over a single coffee. Couples linger. Friends argue about politics, music and migration.

After weeks of war, blackouts and an internet that barely functioned, the street had slowly begun to feel alive again. For a few weeks, Sanaei almost felt like itself again. That, many people now believe, was precisely the problem.

Shiva, 33, who regularly meets friends there, says cafés are more than businesses. They are among the last places where the city still feels like a city.

"The war could have brought people together," she says. "Instead, it feels as though they're using its aftermath to settle scores with people they don't see as loyal."

Whether that is the authorities' intention is impossible to know. What is striking is how many people independently reached almost the same conclusion.

Many believe the authorities fear respite almost as much as dissent. When a city begins to relax, people gather, talk, laugh and slowly reclaim public life. Moments like Sunday's, they believe, are periodic reminders that no part of that life exists beyond the state's reach.

Ladan, a 28-year-old nurse who rarely visits Sanaei anymore because cafés have become too expensive, nevertheless took the closures personally.

"It almost feels as though someone decided the war hadn't put enough pressure on people," she says. "So they went after the places where people still gathered. It's difficult not to feel that ordinary life itself has become the target."

That helps explain why the closures provoked such bitterness. It was not the inconvenience, but the contempt. Many people felt that after months of war, inflation, blackouts and uncertainty, the authorities' instinct was still not to ask what society needed, but to remind society who remained in charge.

The Islamic Republic has already lost many of the social battles it once fought so fiercely, at least in Tehran. Compulsory hijab is openly challenged. Young men and women mix freely. Cafés remain among the few places where a generation battered by protests, repression and war can still carve out something resembling an ordinary life.

But losing the social argument is not the same as losing the power to enforce it. That may be the real message behind Sunday's closures: not that chairs on the pavement or sandwiches suddenly became intolerable, but that almost any pretext can be enough to take away a business, a meeting place or simply somewhere people had begun to feel at ease.

Hamed shrugs when asked whether the cafés will eventually reopen.

"They probably will," he says. "But that's not really the point anymore."

Perhaps he is right. After everything people have lived through, the instinct of those in power still seems to be not to give society a little more room to breathe, but to remind it that even breathing remains a privilege, not a right.

The panel, held at Iran International's Washington headquarters and moderated by Fardad Farahzad, brought together Michael Rubin of the American Enterprise Institute, Ilan Berman of the American Foreign Policy Council, and Iranian-American analyst Fereshteh Pezeshk.

The discussion came amid renewed US strikes, with attacks tearing through bridges and infrastructure across Iran's south.

Is Washington heading for a ground operation?

The question hanging over the room was whether the air campaign is a prelude to something larger. Rubin framed the choice in stark terms.

"When you have a hornet's nest, you have two good options. One is to leave it alone. The other one is to get rid of it," he said. "The last thing you want to do is sit underneath it lightly tapping it with a stick, and we're getting to the point where that stick tapping is over."

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The open question, he added, is "are we heading to boots on the ground? And if we're heading to boots on the ground, are we simply talking about the islands in the Persian Gulf, or are we talking about some of the ports?"

Pezeshk talked about the risks. A move onto Iranian soil, she argued, would be "disastrous," and not only in military terms. "A very good population of Iranians, unlike the rest of the Middle East, are pro-American," she said, describing "a chasm between the people and the Islamic Republic" after the killing on Iran's streets.

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An occupation, she warned, could close that chasm rather than widen it. "The solution is in Tehran, not on the coasts. You've got to resolve that problem."

Berman placed the same question inside American politics, noting that gasoline prices and looming midterm elections are shaping every decision the administration makes.

The task now, he said, is to establish what military planners call escalation dominance, "to show the Iranian regime that they have more firepower and they have politically more will to stay and to fight."

Regime change or transformation?

The most contested idea of the evening came from Berman, who argued that a quieter transformation has already taken place inside the Islamic Republic.

The current rulers, he said, "have a different DNA. They behave differently, they negotiate differently," a shift he traced in part to a war that opened at the very top of the escalation ladder with the killing of the supreme leader.

However, he pointed out that the change has not produced true regime change. “The Trump administration hasn’t dug deep enough... “You haven’t had regime change as most of us have historically thought about it – a transition from the Islamic Republic to a fundamentally different governing system.”

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Rubin pushed the logic toward the machinery of power, describing an effort to peel away the leadership layer by layer. With the Revolutionary Guards numbering well over 100,000, he argued, "somewhere along those ranks there is someone who wants to enrich himself" and would deal with Washington.

But he cautioned that the administration may not know who actually runs the country, comparing its approach to "negotiating with the doorman in a skyscraper rather than negotiating with the owner."

Both men returned to a warning that any transition badly managed could produce something worse.

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Pezeshk offered the strongest caution against treating decapitation strikes as a complete regime-change strategy. “You have to resolve the political issue in Tehran, not the manifestation.”

She pressed the point harder: removing the leadership without a plan for the day after risks chaos. "How do you ensure it's not going to be a Taliban-like power that comes in? Are you working with the opposition? Are you inclusive enough?" She saw little sign of that groundwork.

"The guy sitting in Tehran is going to be there forever until they die. The US president, two and a half years from now, is gone."

The next uprising, and a fumbled chance

If there was a shared conviction, it was that Iran's streets, not its negotiators, will decide the outcome, and that Washington keeps missing its moments there.

Berman described unrest in Iran as a cyclical force, erupting roughly every two and a half years and accelerating. The lesson of the past six months, he said, is that the US was caught flat-footed when it mattered.

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When the internet went dark in January, he recounted, the administration assumed it could "just pierce that veil" with Starlink units and VPNs. Instead it found the jamming, aided by Russia and China, far more robust than expected, and its own tools not prepositioned.

"One of the most important lessons that this last half year has brought is we should be thinking now about the next round of protests, because the next protest is going to start."

Pezeshk argued it already had. She credited the January protests, set off in part by an opposition call to the streets, as "one of the biggest protests ever in Iranian history," met with a killing she put at around 40,000. Her frustration was that such a force draws so little attention in Washington.

The Kurds, the islands, and a mafia state

Asked whether the US might arm Kurdish or other groups to open a ground front, the panel was wary. Rubin noted Washington's long reluctance to back separatist movements in the region, and Pezeshk attributed the on-again, off-again talk to "the chaos of the Trump administration."

Berman said officials he had spoken to were "very nervous about the steadfastness and the resolve of these elements."

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Rubin, speaking "as an analyst rather than advocate," sketched where a limited campaign might fall: not the ports, but strategic islands, from Abu Musa and the Tunbs to Kish and Qeshm, "the gateway to Bandar Abbas."

He warned that seizing Iranian territory could backfire by rallying a fiercely nationalist public. The Islamic Republic, he argued, would not be moved by the loss of land the way a normal state would.

"They act like a mafia. They don't care if part of the country is gone as long as they're still in power."

Pezeshk’s argument was that territorial occupation – whether by US forces, Kurdish groups or another regional actor – could unite Iranians around national sovereignty.

Can an ideological system make a lasting deal?

Rubin argued that the Islamic Republic’s political identity limits its ability to reach the kind of pragmatic agreement sought by the Trump administration. Rubin argued that the Islamic Republic’s political identity limits its ability to reach the kind of pragmatic agreement sought by the Trump administration.

Pezeshk was skeptical any lasting deal is possible with a system she sees as ideological to its core.

Persian Gulf states, she said, want development, not confrontation, "they do not want to go back to the 18th century," while the Islamic Republic "has a tolerance for absorbing a lot of pain just because they don't care about their people."

Whether the war ends at the table or on the coast, the panel's consensus held that its true resolution lies elsewhere.

As Rubin put it, the nuclear file, the missiles and the proxies are all "the manifestation of the root cause, which is the Islamic Republic."

The parliamentary Defense Committee approved a government proposal permitting up to eight US tanker aircraft and 250 American military personnel to be stationed at Bezmer Air Base in southeastern Bulgaria, CNN reported.

Bulgarian President Iliana Iotova said on Tuesday hosting up to eight US KC-135 refueling aircraft and 250 military personnel at Bezmer Air Base would not make Bulgaria a party to the war in Iran.

She added that parliamentary approval was required by law and that the government was following the proper procedure.

The United States requested that the deployment run from July 24 to October 1 in support of operations in the Middle East, according to CNN. Aerial refueling tankers allow other military aircraft to remain airborne longer and operate at greater distances.

The report said that US Central Command declined to discuss the proposed deployment, adding, “For operational security reasons, we do not discuss troop movements or speculate on future force posture.”

The move builds on an established military relationship between Sofia and Washington. Under a bilateral Defense Cooperation Agreement signed in 2006, Bulgaria designated Bezmer as a facility for joint use by Bulgarian and US forces.

The agreement provides a framework for an American military presence at the base, but the scale and stated purpose of the latest deployment have brought Bulgaria closer to the confrontation between Washington and Tehran.

Iran warns Sofia against involvement

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei warned Bulgaria not to allow its territory or military facilities to be used in support of US operations targeting Iran.

Baghaei said any participation in planning or carrying out such operations would amount to complicity in what he called “the crime of aggression and war crimes.” He urged Bulgaria’s full parliament to reject the proposal.

Bulgaria’s NATO membership adds a wider security dimension. Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty states that an armed attack on one member is considered an attack on all.

If Bulgaria were attacked, each NATO ally would be required to assist by taking, individually and with the other members, the action it deemed necessary. That response could include the use of armed force, but would not automatically require every ally to enter the conflict in the same way.

In the 11 days since the Islamabad memorandum of understanding expired, Iran has repeatedly attacked Persian Gulf states and other countries in the region, saying it was targeting US military bases used in operations against it.

That record, combined with the emerging diplomatic confrontation between Tehran and Sofia, raises the possibility that Bulgaria could be drawn more directly into the conflict if its territory is used to support US military operations against Iran.