Ceasefire with Tehran Doesn’t Guarantee Peace

Less than 24 hours after President Donald Trump announced a two-week ceasefire with Iran’s ruling regime, the portents that it will last the course are hardly positive.

The White House has already dismissed Tehran’s 10-point proposal for a durable peace, saying that it has been “completely discarded.” As talks loom in Pakistan this weekend, the gaps between their positions remain vast.

Washington’s reported 15-point proposal, though not publicly released, centers on curbing uranium enrichment, limiting ballistic missile capabilities, and rolling back support for proxy groups. Tehran’s 10 points reject those constraints and go further, asserting continued control over the Strait of Hormuz as a core demand, alongside guarantees of non-aggression, full sanctions relief, termination of UN measures, compensation, U.S. troop withdrawal from the region, and an end to attacks against its proxies.

The Islamic Republic has resisted concessions on these issues both during peacetime and war. It is now hailing the ceasefire as a victory, a posture that hardens rather than moderates its negotiating position.

Enrichment Remains a Core Sticking Point

Among the 10 points Tehran is pushing is allowing the Islamic Republic to maintain its uranium enrichment capacity, a position Iranian official have consistently treated as a red line.

By contrast, Trump’s position remained firm across both rounds of negotiations in May 2025 — a few days prior to the 12-Day War in which Israeli and U.S. fighter jets bombed the regime’s key nuclear installations — and in February this year. He again reiterated on April 8 that “there will be no enrichment of uranium,” adding that the United States would work with Iran to remove the roughly 400 kilograms of highly enriched uranium buried after last June’s conflict.

Regime’s Missile Arsenal Remains Cannot Be Ignored

Tehran’s proposal conveniently omits any reference to ballistic missiles, reflecting a position it has consistently treated as non-negotiable.

Iran’s missiles demonstrated ranges of roughly 2,500 miles, far exceeding earlier claims of around 1,200. Israel, and the United Arab Emirates have all pushed for any agreement to address this issue. These projectiles were also launched at Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Turkey and Qatar, leaving them with little reason to be content with such an omission.

Iran’s Ambitions Now Extend to the Strait of Hormuz

A new addition to Tehran’s maximalist demands is that any passage through the Strait of Hormuz be “coordinated with Iran’s armed forces, which grants Iran a unique economic and geopolitical position,” alongside calls for certain vessels to pay a toll.

Iran claimed on April 8 that it had again closed the strait in retaliation for Israeli strikes on Hezbollah in Lebanon, contradicting Trump’s ceasefire announcement centered on keeping the waterway open.

The Iranian People Must Be Part of the Equation

Most notable is Trump’s absence of any mention of the Iranian people, despite earlier arguing the war would help them take control of their own future and claiming the regime had halted executions. Since January, Iran has executed more than 500 people, including public hangings, and arrested thousands.

Ending the war too early is not only a human rights concern. It alienates the Iranians who are the real existential threat to the regime, many of whom saw the conflict as an opportunity and tolerated its costs in the hope it would create conditions to reclaim their country. Losing that leverage means it is only a matter of time before Tehran rebuilds its nuclear and missile capabilities.

As Vice President JD Vance noted, this “fragile truce” depends on Tehran’s compromise. Regime officials have instead said that their “hands are on the trigger.” If negotiations fail, Washington should not hesitate to relaunch a second phase of operations while the regime’s repression apparatus remains degraded.

Janatan Sayeh is a research analyst at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), where he focuses on Iranian domestic affairs and the Islamic Republic’s regional malign influence. For more analysis from the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), please subscribe HERE. Follow FDD on X @FDD and @FDD_Iran. Follow Janatan on X @JanatanSayeh. FDD is a Washington, DC-based, nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.