The timing of the truce agreement between the U.S. and Iran reveals a shift in Washington’s approach to the crisis in the Gulf. The Trump administration, which initially presented its February escalation as a way to reshape the balance of power with Tehran, eventually found itself forced to contain the fire before it started to inflict deeper damage at the political, economic, and security levels. In this sense, the agreement is more of a way out of a predicament that the tools of hard power have failed to tackle, rather than the crowning of an American victory.
It is striking that the Memorandum of Understanding was announced amid political confusion in Washington, reflected in domestic obsession with the image of the president and the spectacle of power, as well as to coincide with the G7 summit. This overlap between symbolism and strategy gave the agreement a dual character: in official discourse, it was presented as a historic achievement opening a new path toward stability, but in the technical reading of the texts that were circulated, it seemed more like a costly rehashing of old pledges, with financial and political concessions that grant Iran greater prospects for restoring its regional position.
From Regime Change to Safe Exit
The wording of the agreement, as announced, reveals a clear shift in American priorities. There is little sign of the ambitions represented in the first Trump administration’s strategy of “maximum pressure” and the accompanying efforts to change the regime’s behavior or push it toward collapse. In their place is the more realistic goal of reducing escalation, securing energy markets, allaying the fears of allies, and ensuring the safety of shipping lanes. This transformation cannot be separated from the cost of the confrontation — nor from Washington’s awareness that a protracted crisis would compound the pressure on the global economy, raise the costs of insurance and shipping, and place a long strategic stranglehold on the Gulf.
As such, the agreement serves as a formula for a managed withdrawal from the escalation, rather than as a framework for reshaping the U.S. relationship with Iran. According to the MoU, Washington did not obtain any substantial concessions on the nuclear file or Tehran’s regional role. Nor did the Islamic Republic make any political concession that would affect either its domestic clout or its regional tools. What was achieved in practice was a temporary halt to the deterioration, while keeping the main subjects open for subsequent rounds of negotiation.
Herein lies the basic dilemma. The MoU, which has been promoted as ending the crisis, carries within it the seeds of a crisis deferred. It relieves direct pressure on the parties, but does not eliminate the underlying sources of risk. It restrains military activity, but leaves the questions of missiles, proxies, navigation, and nuclear oversight in a gray area. Hence, Washington appears less as having imposed its conditions than having accepted a settlement allowing it to pull out of the escalation, while maintaining the rhetoric of victory at home.
Rehashing the JCPOA — with a Surcharge
The most embarrassing paradox appears when we compare the MoU’s language on the nuclear file with that of the 2015 nuclear agreement known as the JCPOA. The wording of Iran’s pledge not to seek a nuclear weapon is a near-facsimile of the same phrase in the 2015 accord — which Trump, during his first term, had described as the “worst deal ever negotiated” by the U.S. This similarity is more than a linguistic observation. Political agreements are evaluated in terms of what they add to previous texts, not through their ability to imitate them at a higher price. The result is that the current administration has, in practice, returned to the logic of Iran’s previous pledges, without — as yet — presenting stricter verification mechanisms, deeper restrictions on the nuclear program, or guarantees that would prevent the crisis from repeating . This gives rise to a gaping chasm between a political discourse that talks about a stronger agreement, and a technical text that recycles almost the same commitments.
This contradiction becomes even clearer when looking at the financial aspect of the agreement. The MoU would allow Iran to access large sums of its frozen assets or restricted revenues. A similar measure sparked a political storm during the Obama era, which was widely attacked for releasing $1.7 billion. Today’s talk of releasing approximately $24 billion makes the settlement far more costly from a political and strategic standpoint. Washington appears to be not content with rehashing its pledges under the JCPOA; rather, it is paying a higher price for pledges that appear no more solid.
This financial largesse gives the agreement a highly sensitive regional dimension. The money that will enter the Iranian economy will not be restricted to addressing its domestic needs. Part of it will help restore the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)’s activities, whether in developing missile and drone capabilities, or in restoring Iran’s networks of influence in Iraq, Lebanon, and Yemen. Accordingly, Tehran’s opponents view the agreement as indirectly financing a new round of reconstruction for Iranian power, under the label of peace and reconstruction.
The agreement can also be measured against the goals that were declared during the escalation. It was claimed that war or military pressure would lead to the destruction of Iran’s missile capabilities, limit the influence of its proxies, weaken its navy, undermine its missile industry, prevent it from acquiring a nuclear weapon, and perhaps open the door to domestic political change .
Yet there is a wide gap between these goals and the actual results of the war. Iran’s missile capabilities have been subjected to strikes and disruption, but they have not been eliminated. Its networks of regional influence remained in place, even if they were forced to reposition. As for Iran’s naval forces, its regular assets were damaged, but its speedboats and asymmetric capabilities remained capable of threatening navigation and raising the cost of transit through the Gulf. Damage to its missile industry seems temporary rather than decisive; the money to be released under the MoU will give Tehran the ability to compensate and rebuild, not to mention talk of billions of dollars the U.S. administration has intimated could be paid in the form of a compensation from the Gulf states to Iran.
Regarding the nuclear file, the agreement rests more on political pledges than verification mechanisms that could prevent a gradual drift toward the nuclear threshold. This does not imply that Iran has been given a green light to do so. Rather, it means the issue has been relegated to a realm of deferral, monitoring, and future pressure. As for the goal of regime change, it has been definitively abandoned, and replaced by a logic focused on stabilizing the situation and averting an explosion. Consequently, the U.S. has shifted its objective from altering the power structure in Tehran to managing the risks associated with it.
All this yields political gains for the Iranian regime that cannot be ignored. It has emerged from the escalation with its security apparatus, the IRGC, and its regional networks intact, while also retaining the ability to frame the agreement domestically as a recognition of Iran’s regional role, rather than its defeat. Conversely, Washington’s regional allies have found themselves confronted with a critical question about the value of American guarantees if another major confrontation erupts.
The Hormuz, Lebanon, and Israel
The issue of the Strait of Hormuz is vital to understanding the broader repercussions of the agreement. Washington insists that the Strait will remain open and free for international navigation, whereas the Iranian narrative points to transitional arrangements for 60 days, paving the way for discussions on transit or insurance fees for passing vessels. Merely opening this door alters the nature of the debate. The Strait, long treated as an international waterway that must not be turned into a tool for extortion, has become the subject of political and economic negotiations with a regional power capable of disrupting it or raising the cost of passage. This shift presents the Gulf states with a new calculus. Energy stability is no longer dependent solely on a ceasefire, but also on the extent to which Tehran is willing to refrain from exercising its maritime leverage. Furthermore, insurance companies and shipping markets will assess the agreement based on the actual risks, rather than on American statements. The more the “gray zone” surrounding Hormuz widens, the higher the transit costs, and the Gulf and Asian economies will become more sensitive to any Iranian maneuver.
For Lebanon, the impact of the U.S.-Iran agreement on the country’s south does not signify that a final settlement is close. Rather, the current situation resembles a temporary de-escalation, dictated by calculations that extend well beyond the Lebanese arena itself. A halt or slowdown in Israeli airstrikes will grant Lebanon some breathing space, alleviate the security and psychological pressures on the residents of the south, and create an opportunity for the state to restore, at least partially, its political presence and ability to delivery services. Yet this calm will remain fragile, as it is not grounded in a fundamental resolution of the dynamics that originally triggered the flareup.
The problem in southern Lebanon is not limited to Israeli airstrikes or the recent escalation. Rather, it is rooted in a complex security architecture that has evolved over years. Israel occupies — or maintains a military presence — at several disputed border points, an established equation of deterrence exists between Israel and Hezbollah, while the Lebanese state is attempting to reclaim its position in a region where it has not always held full control over decisions on the ground. Consequently, a temporary ceasefire alone will not be sufficient to stabilize the South as long as the core issues remain unresolved and the balance of power remains divided between the Lebanese state, Hezbollah, and Israel, and compounded by other regional calculations.
Furthermore, the issue of weapons held outside state authority remains central to Lebanon’s predicament. While the agreement might alleviate the military pressure on Hezbollah, it fails to address questions regarding the movement’s role within the Lebanese state or the limits of its military activity once the current escalation is over. Hezbollah may frame the de-escalation as the result of its deterrence strategy, whereas other Lebanese factions argue that any genuine calm must ultimately strengthen the Lebanese Army and bring security decision-making under one roof. Caught between these competing visions, the South remains suspended between the logic of the state and the logic of the “resistance,” on the one hand, and the imperatives of sovereignty and deterrence, on the other.
The current de-escalation, therefore, appears to be more of a freezing of the conflict than a resolution. It postpones another explosion and mitigates its immediate costs, yet it leaves the underlying causes unresolved. Israel has secured no definitive guarantee against a renewed threat from its north, Hezbollah has not lost its military standing, and the Lebanese state has yet to regain the full capacity to manage its border alone. Consequently, the South is entering an uncertain phase: hostilities are subsiding, but could still return; the rhetoric of de-escalation is gaining ground, even in the absence of the conditions for comprehensive stability.
Lebanon is likely to be among the arenas most affected by the outcome of the U.S.-Iran agreement. Should the settlement evolve into a sustained period of calm, Lebanon could have an opportunity to reorganize the situation in the South, bolster the role of the army, and reopen the debate over the relationship between the state and the use of force, free from the pressures of daily warfare. Conversely, if the agreement proves to be merely a respite between rounds of escalation, southern Lebanon will remain a flashpoint ready to ignite at the first test between Washington and Tehran, or between Israel and the Iranian-led axis. All this renders Lebanon the testing ground for the seriousness of regional de-escalation, rather than merely a peripheral detail of the agreement.
In Israel, the MoU appears to have dealt a political blow to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The Israeli right had bet that the Lebanon front could be decoupled from the Iranian front, and the escalation leveraged to weaken the IRGC and its allies. Instead, the agreement has restored the link between the two fronts to Israel’s disadvantage. It has granted Tehran greater negotiating leverage, provided Hezbollah with breathing space, and deepened the domestic Israeli debate over the limits of reliance on the U.S. security umbrella. Consequently, Tel Aviv views the agreement not merely through the lens of the nuclear program, but also through that of the security of the northern border and its future deterrence against an Iranian network that remains intact.
On the broader geopolitical level, the agreement strikes at one of the most sensitive issues in the international order: the question of nuclear deterrence. Many experts have noted the paradox that Iran, which possesses no nuclear weapons, has faced pressure, threats and attacks, while North Korea — which does possess nuclear weapons — has remained beyond the scope of direct U.S. military action. This comparison carries a harsh message, and may prompt regional and international powers to reassess their security options. In this context, the anxiety in capitals from Riyadh and Abu Dhabi to Tokyo and Seoul stems as much from concerns about the credibility of U.S. security guarantees as it does from the Iranian threat itself.
The U.S.-Iran agreement, therefore, reveals a settlement born out of the need to halt the downward spiral, rather than the capacity to forge a new security order. While it mitigates the risk of direct confrontation, it fails to address the root causes of the conflict. It brings Iran back to the negotiating table with enhanced resources, without forcing a fundamental shift in its security architecture or behavior in the region. Furthermore, it offers Washington a political exit from a costly predicament, yet leaves its allies with a growing sense that the U.S. security umbrella has become increasingly negotiable and sensitive to cost constraints.
Consequently, the settlement appears to be more of an organized deferral of the conflict than a sustainable solution. Washington has traded the logic of decisive resolution for that of management, while Tehran has traded the cost of isolation for the opportunity to catch its breath. Yet the region has remained suspended between a temporary de-escalation and a deferred explosion. The greatest danger is that this phase will ultimately produce an Iran more capable of financing its influence, allies more skeptical of Washington, and a regional order more fragile in the face of the next test—whether that emerges from the Strait of Hormuz, Lebanon, or the nuclear file.
