DM

@BrettErickson28 This is not a nuclear deal. Trump is basically having to pay reparations for having started a war on behalf of Israel. The nuclear negotiations come later. Meanwhile, Trump will probably allow Israel to bomb Iran, as it is now doing in Gaza and Lebanon.

A major struggle inside the Trump Administration right now lies in the incompatibility between ideology and reality. For many, getting the United States to launch a war against Iran was their single most important ambition. Wipe out the regime, strengthen Israel, eliminate those that despise America. And it became everything to them. Then, their dreams came true on February 28th when Donald Trump launched Operation Epic Fury. But it quickly fell apart after the Minab bombing that killed more than a hundred schoolchildren, and Iran closed the Strait of Hormuz. Now, almost three months later, the writing is on the wall. The United States is cornered, with no viable pathways to victory. No military options exist, blockade has failed disastrously, and Trump is staring down the barrel of legacy defining failure alongside his closest advisors. Trump, and those around him that built their entire careers dreaming of toppling the Iranian regime, are now doomed to hand them their greatest victory, and that is something that they are unwilling to accept. But it’s the reality they are faced with. With the Trump Administration desperately grasping at straws and clinging to pipe dreams, it is time that they do what is right for the United States, and right for the world. Cut a deal. It will be a bad deal. It will destroy many people’s careers, and it will destroy the legacy of Donald Trump. But not every movie is Rudy. Sometimes the movie is Cool Runnings. A great story that ends in defeat. The Trump Administration needs to understand that their ideology and reality are incompatible with one another. There are no viable pathways to victory. There are no sweetheart deals. There are only concessions that will destroy the administration. But for the sake of the world, the Trump Administration needs to make these concessions.

@SchnockRevue That saxophone solo makes the silly antics of the Stones worth watching.

RIP Sonny Rollins qui, entre dix mille trucs, avait honoré de ses chorus brillants de saxo la dernière GRANDE chanson des Stones. Quelle idée de génie de Jagger de l'inviter.

@glcarlstrom @Rob_Malley A reminder: Israel’s red lines are those set by Witkoff and Jared Kushner at the beginning of the negotiations, which led to Iran being bombed twice. These negotiations will have a similar outcome.

@glcarlstrom @Rob_Malley As for Saudi Arabia, it’s a non-starter. Trump is just trying to extract concessions to please Netanyahu.

Imagining the reaction in Pakistan, two months of trying to mediate a deal hoping it will put them into Trump's good books, only for him to toss this out there at the 11th hour

@glcarlstrom @barbaraslavin1 There’re no negotiations. Trump is stalling because the Hajj is coming up, and he’ll claim they’ve an interim agreement (to agree to negotiate) for a week.

So the only two sticking points are... the two most central issues in the whole negotiation

@gerardtbaker @RoPoppZurich Yes, but there’s been a shift from the PNAC (William Kristol and others) to the FDD, since many of the earlier neocons turned out to be anti-Trump, in the mistaken belief that Trump was an isolationist. Far from it. Trump will always serve the interests of Israel, as will Vance.

So true. The fact that bodies like FDD and people like Marc Thiessen have been shaping administration thinking is such an indictment of US policymaking. It was the same with Iraq when things like FDD (again) and PNAC overrode all informed skepticism about war. We never learn.

@lrozen @marypgkeating I guess they won’t be able to use Prince Sultan Airbase in their next round of bombings when the negotiations fail - which means that Iran will have to concentrate exclusively on the UAE and Israel.

Interesting, from NBC: Trump U-turn on Strait initiative came after Saudi Arabia suspended the U.S. military’s ability to use its bases and airspace to carry out the operation nbcnews.com/politics/white…

@citrinowicz @BabakVahdad The best we can hope for is China and the rest of the world lifting sanctions on Iran, and the US carrying on as if nothing happened, after another round of bombings.

@citrinowicz @BabakVahdad We haven’t heard from Steve Witkoff yet. I doubt his Israeli handlers would allow “uranium enrichment on its own soil.” This has happened over again and again - for medical purposes only, enrichment at an offshore facility - and the end result has always been renewed bombardment.

If this deal is actually signed, it would be a fitting end to a campaign that began as “Epic Fury” and is ending as “Epic Disaster.” What started as a war supposedly aimed at toppling the regime and dismantling its nuclear and ballistic missile capabilities may instead leave Iran’s regime stronger than before — empowered by sanctions relief, still retaining significant missile capabilities, continuing support for its proxies, and almost certainly preserving uranium enrichment on its own soil. And then there’s the additional "bonus" nobody even mentioned at the outset: the Strait of Hormuz is now firmly back at the center of global strategic risk. The truly grim reality is that this may still be the best available option for the administration out of a set of deeply flawed alternatives. At least Iran is unlikely to obtain a nuclear weapon in the immediate future. But the central question remains: what was the strategic logic of launching a war whose end state may ultimately be worse than the conditions that existed before it began? A failure from beginning to end. #iran

@John_Hudson “The push for transparency by Democrats reflects a deeper soul-searching on Israel that is happening within the party, said Jeremy Shapiro, a former Obama administration official.” “Deeper soul-searching” washingtonpost.com/national-secur…

Scoop: More than two dozen House Democrats are pressing the Trump administration to publicly acknowledge Israel’s undeclared nuclear weapons program, a move that would abandon decades of U.S. policy but confirm what has been an open secret among intelligence officials since the late 1960s🧵

@ShanghaiMacro @nikhil_palsingh I think Iran can handle Trump and the assorted clowns in this administration by themselves. China doesn’t carry any weight in the region, and Trump doesn’t want a resolution. He wants and needs badly to be humiliated (as with all his past business ventures).

Araghchi’s visit to Beijing on May 6—just a week before the Xi–Trump summit—signals that Iran may have moved to the center of US-China strategic bargaining. There is a real possibility that the mid-May meeting will not only further stabilize Sino-US bilateral ties under top-level strategic guidance (元首战略引领), but also help accelerate a resolution of the Iran conflict. It has been some time since the city of Beijing has carried such geopolitical weight.

@websterkaroon Robin is not very bright. He failed to understand that Russia was able to evade sanctions with the help of the Israeli mafia. Here’s an example. occrp.org/en/news/us-san… en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ilan_Shor

Things that have failed to bring the regime to negotiate in "good faith" (think tank slang for making concessions that aren't in its interests): - Sanctioning Iran's Central Bank - Kicking Iran off SWIFT - Sanctioning Iran's oil - Making Iran's currency collapse - Assassinating everyone from Khamenei to Soleimani to Larijani - Carpet bombing Tehran twice in 9 months - Hitting every enrichment site - Bombing the heart of Iran's industry - Wiping out most of Iran's conventional navy None of that worked. They haven't even agreed to the basic stuff like diluting the 60% enrichment stockpile which are the easier parts, let alone the trickier concessions. Oh no but you don't understand the geniuses at the Brookings Institution have it figured out. The blockade will do what all those failed in. Yea ok. The fruit flies infesting my home are more intelligent than these people ...

@FirasMaksad Yes, Israel helped the UAE for altruistic reasons - “they just showed up.” Did @ianbremmer feed you this nonsense?

• The GCC is over as a political entity, polarized with #UAE on one end of the spectrum, #Oman on the other. • For the first time ever, #Israel defended an Arab country, while despite much promise, #Egypt’s vaunted Air Force remained absent. • This, and the aftermath of the #Iran war, will feed further fragmentation, despite all Gulf countries being US allies attacked by Iran. More with @BeckyCNN

@tracyalloway Two different issues. According to some commentators, the UAE wants to leave the GCC and become a full-fledged member of US-Israel axis. Its request for a swap line signals the failure of the US-Israel axis.

It is interesting that the UAE’s withdrawal from OPEC came after recent swap line discussions with Treasury. Wouldn’t want to read too much into it but you could envision Bessent et al thinking of dollar liquidity provision as a useful tool to extract political concessions (rather than an obligation that comes with being the world’s reserve currency)

@JavierBlas Here’s Steve Witkoff pouring his heart out to Mark Levin. youtu.be/bIXxkfbEa7Q?si…

@JavierBlas While Bush relied on JINSA, AEI and PNAC for the war in Iraq (note: not the major oil companies, because if he’d consulted with them, they’d have advised against it), Trump turns to the other neocon outfit, FDD and Mark Levin.

President Trump seems to assume Iran runs of oil storage in three days (so April 29). My sense is that Tehran has longer to keep storing. He also says when storage runs out, "oil lines" would "just explode." Here, I truly have not idea what he's talking about; rolling my eyes.

@SecScottBessent @LiveSquawk @USTreasury That sounds great, Scott. If the talks break down tomorrow (who the hell trusts Witkoff and Jared?), will you have your legs wrapped around their neck in a jiu-jitsu maneuver (ie, w/cryptocurrencies) or will they have you in a chokehold (the global economy)?

Under Economic Fury, @USTreasury will continue to systematically degrade Tehran’s ability to generate, move, and repatriate funds. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control is sanctioning multiple wallets tied to Iran — resulting in the freeze of $344 million in cryptocurrency. We will follow the money that Tehran is desperately attempting to move outside of the country and target all financial lifelines tied to the regime.

@MarkLevineNYC @MetOpera …to establish distinct stylistic profiles for the operas he conducts. He plowed through “Salome” with the same plush, effusive manner he brings to Wagner or Puccini: the score’s ragged edges were blunted, its whiplash contrasts blurred. (2/2) newyorker.com/magazine/2025/…

@MarkLevineNYC @MetOpera “The irony is we are experiencing some of our greatest artistic successes at a time when the economics are proving so difficult," Gelb said. Review by Alex Ross. Yannick Nézet-Séguin, the Met’s chronically overscheduled music director, seems to lack the rehearsal time… (1/2)

Saudi Arabia has just backed out on a deal to provide $200M in much-needed funding to @MetOpera. The reason: Because of the war’s impact on the Saudi economy, they are pulling back on funding commitments. This is a terrible blow to one of our nation’s great cultural pillars. nytimes.com/2026/04/23/art…