Trump, Netanyahu discuss Iran nuclear talks dispute
Netanyahu backs diplomacy but warns on Iran nukes; Trump says high-level meeting set for Saturday.
(THE TIMES OF ISRAEL) With Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at his side, US President Donald Trump declared on Monday that his administration was holding direct talks with Iran on its nuclear programme, an assertion quickly denied by Tehran.
At the same time, Trump warned that “If the talks aren’t successful… it’ll be a very bad day for Iran.”
Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office after meeting Netanyahu — who has for years been the leading voice in the world about the dangers of a nuclear Iran — Trump said the talks had started and would continue on Saturday.
“We’re having direct talks with Iran, and they’ve started,” said Trump. “It’ll go on Saturday. We have a very big meeting, and we’ll see what can happen. And I think everybody agrees that doing a deal would be preferable.”
Netanyahu, who flew unexpectedly from Budapest to DC at Trump’s invitation for their meeting, appeared warily supportive of the president’s initiative. At the president’s side, Netanyahu said that if diplomacy could fully eliminate Iran’s nuclear programme, that would be “a good thing,” but it had to be stopped one way or another.
However, a senior Iranian official said soon after Trump’s announcement that any negotiations would be indirect, with Oman acting as intermediary. The Iranian official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters: “The talks will not be direct … It will be with Oman’s mediation.”
Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said later that the nations will hold “indirect high-level” talks in Oman.
“It is as much an opportunity as it is a test. The ball is in America’s court,” he said.
Oman, which maintains good relations with both the US and Iran, has long served as a channel for messages between the rival states.
Iran’s Nournews, affiliated with the country’s top security body, described Trump’s statement about a planned direct meeting as part of a “psychological operation aimed at influencing domestic and international public opinion.”
Citing three Iranian officials, The New York Times reported that Tehran was open to direct talks if the conversation goes well.
Since taking office in January, Trump has reinstated his “maximum pressure” policy, which in his first term saw the United States withdraw from a landmark 2015 agreement on Iran’s nuclear programme and reimpose sanctions on Tehran.
Iran, which is sworn to Israel’s destruction, denies seeking a nuclear weapon, but it has ramped up its enrichment of uranium to 60 percent purity, which has no application beyond nuclear weapons, and has obstructed international inspectors from checking its nuclear facilities.
Trump said on Monday that he hopes to reach a deal because the alternative would be “dangerous territory.”
“I think everybody agrees that doing a deal would be preferable to doing the obvious. The obvious is not something that I want to be involved with, or frankly that Israel wants to be involved with if they can avoid it,” he said, evidently referring to military intervention to tackle the Islamic Republic’s nuclear facilities. “So we’ll see if we can avoid it… It’s getting to be very dangerous territory.”
The US recently moved stealth bombers and an additional aircraft carrier into the Middle East and Indian Ocean, within striking distance of both Yemen — where American jets have been targeting the Iran-backed Houthis — and Iran itself.
“Maybe a deal’s going to be made; that would be great. It would be really great for Iran… We are meeting very importantly on Saturday, at almost the highest level,” Trump said, but refused to specify where the talks would take place or who would represent the US.
Asked how a deal he negotiates with Iran would be different from the 2015 agreement, Trump said: “It’ll be different and maybe a lot stronger.”
During his first presidential term, Trump withdrew the US from the deal between Iran and world powers that placed strict limits on Tehran’s disputed nuclear activities in exchange for sanctions relief. He also reimposed sweeping US sanctions, in a “maximum pressure” campaign he has renewed upon his return to office.
Asked whether the US would take military action to destroy the Iranian nuclear programme if the talks are not successful, Trump said that “Iran will be in great danger” if the talks fail. “I hate to say it. Great danger… It’s not a complicated formula… Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon…. If the talks aren’t successful… it’ll be a very bad day for Iran.”
Netanyahu, speaking moments before Trump, indicated his cautious backing for the move.
“We’re both united in the goal that Iran does not get nuclear weapons,” Netanyahu said. “If it can be done diplomatically, in a full way, the way it was done in Libya, I think that would be a good thing.”
“But whatever happens, we have to make sure that Iran does not have nuclear weapons,” Netanyahu stressed.
A new hostage deal
Netanyahu also said Israel was working on a new deal for the release of hostages and a ceasefire in Gaza.
“We’re working now on another deal that we hope will succeed, and we’re committed to getting all the hostages out,” Netanyahu told reporters.
Netanyahu added that “the hostages are in agony, and we want to get them all out.”
According to London-based Saudi newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat, Egypt has put forward a new proposal for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, though an Israeli official said that Jerusalem has not received any new offer from Cairo.
An informed Egyptian source told the outlet the new proposal provides for the release of eight living hostages and the bodies of eight slain hostages in exchange for the release of a large number of Palestinian terrorists and security prisoners and a truce lasting between 40 and 70 days. The proposal appears to constitute a compromise between a Hamas offer to release five living hostages in return for a 50-day truce and an Israeli demand for the release of 11 living hostages.
The hostages were taken on 7 October 2023, when Hamas led thousands of terrorists in an invasion of southern Israel, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting 251 to the Gaza Strip.
Trump said in the Oval Office that the Gaza war will stop in the not-too-distant future.
“I’d like to see the war stop, and I think the war will stop at some point that won’t be in the too distant future. Right now, we have a problem with hostages. We’re trying to get the hostages out…. It’s a long process. It shouldn’t be that long.”
Netanyahu is working very hard to release the hostages, said Trump, adding that he hopes Israelis appreciate his efforts.
“The Israeli people want the hostages out,” said Trump. “More than anything, they want the hostages out. This man is working very hard with us to do that. I don’t know, I hope he’s being appreciated because he’s been a great leader. He’s working very, very hard on the hostages and many other things… It’s a tough place in the world.”
Netanyahu lauded Trump’s plan, announced during his last visit to the White House in February, to evacuate Gazans while the enclave is reconstructed. Netanyahu said Gazans are being “locked” in the Strip and not allowed to leave despite it being a warzone. “We didn’t lock them in.”
He said there are positive talks with other countries that want to take in Gazans, but declined to name them.
Trump asserted that his vision for Gaza has been well received — though it has been largely rejected publicly by most of the world. At the same time, Trump said, “there are other concepts too.”
“Gaza should never have been given away by Israel, I don’t know why they did it,” Trump said, referring to Israel’s 2005 Disengagement from the Strip.
“I do know, because they were promised peace, but that did not work out,” Trump said. “Gaza is a dangerous death trap.”
A week-long ceasefire in November 2023 saw the release of over 100 hostages, mostly women and children.
In January 2025, another ceasefire began, and during the ensuing weeks, dozens of hostages, alive and dead, were returned in small batches in return for boosted humanitarian aid to Gaza and over 1,000 Palestinian security prisoners held in Israeli prisons.
The sides had agreed to hold talks on a second and third phase that would include the return of all hostages, end the war, and ensure a complete Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip.
However, the truce collapsed after the first stage when Israel refused to enter negotiations on the terms of the subsequent phases, and Hamas refused to extend the first, leading Jerusalem to resume military operations in Gaza.
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