Tehran, Iran – Iranian officials and state media estimate that they have less interest in negotiations with the United States if they go beyond their agreed terms than before the war, as mediation talks in Pakistan failed.
Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi met senior Pakistani officials in Islamabad on Saturday and left for Oman, later leaving for Russia. The top diplomat, who was not involved with Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf like in the previous round of talks earlier this month, said he had “yet to see if the US is really serious about diplomacy”.
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Envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner were expected to visit Pakistan after the White House said Iran had asked for a second round of direct talks, but US President Donald Trump canceled the visit and reiterated his claim about “infighting and confusion” among Iran’s leadership, saying “we hold all the cards, they hold none”.
“If they want to talk, they just have to call!!!” Trump continued to place responsibility on Iran’s leadership in an online post.
Amid a nearly two-month state-imposed internet shutdown in Iran, officials and supporters of the Islamic Republic are insisting they are united in opposing any concessions to Trump.
The US president said earlier this week that he was in no rush to reach an agreement with the Iranian leadership, claiming without evidence that they were fighting among themselves like cats and dogs.
Ever since Trump highlighted the alleged differences, military, security, judiciary and government officials in Iran have been issuing synchronized messages with almost identical words to declare complete unity.
The messages, circulated through state media and even using similar graphics and fonts but with different colors, claimed that everyone in the country is a “revolutionary” and bears “absolute obedience” to supreme leader Mojtaba Khamenei.
Authorities also claim that more than 30 million people – a third of Iran’s total population – have registered in the state-run campaign to express their readiness to “sacrifice” their lives if necessary, but they have not provided any documentation to prove this.
The Khatam al-Anbiya central headquarters of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said on Saturday afternoon that the armed forces would retaliate against the US if it continued its “blockade, plunder and plunder” in Iran’s southern waters.
“We are ready and determined to monitor the behavior and activities of enemies in the region and maintain management and control of the strategic Strait of Hormuz and to inflict more serious harm on American-Zionist enemies in case of another aggression,” the statement said.
The IRGC took on a state television presenter on Saturday to broadcast reports about two ships seized days earlier in the strait, saying Iran had taken “complete control” of the waterway.
Iranian officials continue to call on their supporters, including paramilitaries, to take to the streets every night to maintain control.
At a rally in downtown Tehran on Friday night, Messam Motei, a prominent state-backed religious singer linked to the supreme leader’s office, told the crowd that no one caught up in wartime factional infighting “has grown up yet.”
He said, “If any person from any group or faction, especially in the name of being revolutionary, tries to disturb the unity of the people, he will be slapped on the face by the people.”
But in ultra-conservative Mashhad in northeastern Iran, where a shrine considered sacred to Shia Muslims sits along with powerful religious and economic foundations, some people were still campaigning aggressively against the prospect of former reformist and liberal leaders taking power again.
“He has instructed us to maintain unity with the current authorities, not with these two people,” a speaker told the crowd gathered Friday night in a clip shared by state-linked media, a reference to former President Hassan Rouhani and his Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif.
“We are not afraid of B-2s and B-52s; we are afraid of scoundrels who have no regard for the homeland. Wherever Trump messes up, Zarif comes and grumbles,” he said of the diplomat who led nuclear talks that led to the now-defunct landmark deal with world powers in 2015.
Iran’s judiciary has continued to execute dissidents and on Saturday announced the execution of Irfan Kayani, who was arrested during nationwide protests in January that left thousands dead.
The judiciary described him as a “hired knifeman of the Mossad” and said he was accused of destruction of property, arson and more in the city of Tehran.
No nuclear talks?
Iranian state media reports indicate that the US naval blockade of Iran’s ports is weakening the ceasefire extended by Trump and allowing more radical voices to rise to the top in Tehran.
The IRGC-affiliated Tasnim and Fars news agencies argued against allowing any nuclear negotiations with the US, even though Trump and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu launched the war with the primary goal of deterring a nuclear-armed Iran. Tehran has consistently insisted that its nuclear program is peaceful, although some Iranian leaders have called for the development of a bomb.
“The negotiations with the US are solely to end the war, and Iran does not consider the nuclear issue to be part of the negotiations,” Tasnim said. He claimed that times were not on Washington’s side due to turmoil in global markets as a result of the war.
Khamenei has not commented directly on more talks, but Ali Khazarian, another representative of Tehran in the hardline-dominated parliament, told state media on Thursday that Khamenei was “opposed to any expansion of talks” under threats from the US and Israel.
Israel’s Defense Minister Israel Katz echoed Trump’s apocalyptic message earlier this week, saying the armed forces were waiting for the green light from the US to “return Iran to the dark and stone ages by blowing up central energy and power facilities and crushing the national economic infrastructure.”
According to the US military, there are currently three US aircraft carriers and their support ships in the Middle East region, a first since the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
But senior black-turbaned cleric and hardline member of parliament Mahmoud Nabavian, who was part of the larger Iranian delegation at the first round of talks, said including the nuclear issue was a “strategic mistake”.
He told state media that this allowed the US to make demands such as a 20-year freeze on enrichment and sending Iran’s buried highly-enriched uranium abroad.
“From now on, engaging in any negotiations with the US is a complete loss and has no interest for the Iranian nation,” he said earlier this week. He said oil sales were giving the government a “full hand”.
Mohammad Saeedi, the Friday prayer imam in ultra-conservative Qom, south of Tehran, said it would be “meaningless and unfair to sit behind the negotiating table with a symbol of corruption”, referring to the US.
Civil infrastructure at risk
The government of relatively moderate President Massoud Pezeshkian has indicated concern about the potential effects of systematically targeting more civilian infrastructure, particularly power plants, if the war continues.
“We have a simple request to the people: They reduce their electricity and energy consumption. At the moment, we do not need these dear people to sacrifice their lives, but we need to control the consumption,” the President said on Saturday. “They have attacked our infrastructure and blocked us, so people have become dissatisfied.”
Mohammad Allahdad, head of Tavanir, the state-owned mother company that develops and operates Iran’s power grid, told state television that it would reward citizens who report any theft and illegal use of electricity.
First Vice President Mohammadreza Arif said, “We will make Iran more glorious” through unity after previous infrastructure attacks on oil and gas facilities, steel producers, petrochemical companies, aluminum factories, energy facilities as well as airports, naval ports, bridges and railway networks.
Despite the possibility of a resumption of fighting, the government on Saturday reopened Tehran’s Imam Khomeini Airport to limited foreign flights, including people carrying people on hajj pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia.
