The Art of Capitulation: Trump Desperate for Iran Offramp — Top Analyst Hassan Ahmadian

Top Iran analyst Dr. Hassan Ahmadian tells Drop Site that Donald Trump was forced to seek a deal on Iran's terms after meeting the “hard rock” of Iranian resistance. Drop Site’s Jeremy Scahill spoke to Ahmadian, Associate Professor of Middle East Studies at Tehran University on Friday, following President Trump’s announcement that a deal with Iran was imminent.

“The United States has hit the hard rock of a formidable force that stopped its aggression and they have to deal with it,” said Ahmadian. “ President Trump realized that he cannot change the failure, the military failure of the war into a diplomatic win.”

Throughout the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran, Trump has constantly flailed in his campaign to portray it as a historic success. The blunt reality is that what Trump announced as a quick and easy war of regime change rapidly transformed into a quagmire. For the past two months, Trump has struggled to find a way to declare victory, alternating between claims that Iran is begging him for a deal and threats to destroy Iranian civilization.

On Thursday morning, Trump threatened to hit Iran “very hard.” Later in the day, Trump claimed a deal was now at hand, suggesting it could be signed as early as this weekend. “Based on the fact that discussions with the Islamic Republic of Iran have been brought to the highest level of Iranian leadership and approved, I have, as President of the United States of America, cancelled the scheduled strikes and bombings against Iran this evening,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “Discussions and final points have been, in both concept and great detail, approved by all parties involved.”

Trump has made such claims more than three dozen times since the initial two-week ceasefire was signed on April 7, and behind the scenes, Iranian officials maintain they have stood firm in protecting their own red lines in any deal framework.

This time, however, the initial response from Tehran indicates that a deal may well take shape. Scahill and Ahmadian discuss the events leading up to Trump’s announcement on Thursday, Iran’s red lines—including the unfreezing of assets and an end to the war on Lebanon—and how Israel will seek to sabotage a deal while continuing its overt and covert actions targeting Iran. They also discuss the economic impact on Iran and the domestic political situation.