Professor Marandi: Tehran Believes NEOCONS Killing Trump Deal

Hinzugefügt: 2026-05-27

[00:00:00]Joining us now to discuss that Iranian perspective is Professor Muhammad Morandi of the University of Tan. Great to see you again, sir.

[00:00:06]>> Good to see you.

[00:00:07]>> Thank you very much for having me.

[00:00:09]>> Yeah, of course. So, let's go ahead and put B1 up on the screen here, guys. So, we've got a report, this one from the Financial Times, that some of Iran's top negotiators have traveled to Qatar amid intensified efforts to secure a deal.

[00:00:23]What is your sense of how real these negotiations are and how close we are to a potential end of this war?

[00:00:31]>> It's very difficult to say. The negotiations in seem to be going well. That is for the potential transfer of Iranian assets that were confiscated by the Americans or blocked by the Americans. They want to make sure that uh the Iranians received assets if uh an agreement is signed. But the night before last, the United States u they bombed two boats killing four Iranian soldiers and uh they were in Iranian waters and there was no reason for them to carry out that assault and that is raising a lot of questions in Thran. And then we see Netanyahu he who is about to escalate and he wants to carpet bomb cities in Lebanon again which reminds us of the previous ceasefire after the 39 days of fighting when there was a ceasefire between Iran and the United States which included Lebanon back then he started to carpet bomb uh cities and he killed hundreds of people within a few minutes in order to wreck the ceasefire. So the belief here is that there is a an effort to undermine any potential deal between the two sides. Mhm. Professor, I do want to ask you about the reception in Thrron to this more recent Trump concession, saying yesterday that the uh preferable solution for enriched uranium is to have it either be down, blended, destroyed on Iranian soil or transported to a third party, presumably Russia or China. This previously was not something that President Trump was willing to accept, at least publicly. How was the reception to that in Tyrron? Is it viewed as a positive concession on the way to a deal or otherwise?

[00:02:19]>> Well, the Iranians are saying that we're not yet there. We're not uh we haven't reached that stage. First, we have to have an agreement and then after the 60 days, if all goes well and the Americans abide by their commitments, then we can move on and discuss uh the the nuclear program as well as sanctions and and other issues that exist between the two sides. But ultimately, the Iranians have said very clearly and repeatedly that they're not going to hand over any enriched uranium to the United States, nor do they plan to send it abroad. So, this is, I would say, on uh as a as an Iranian uh who's looking at events here, I I think that this is a positive step uh in the this is a step in the right direction. But again, we have uh different things happening simultaneously.

[00:03:12]Uh and uh the the murder of the four soldiers, the intensified assaults on civilian targets in Lebanon, uh and this it's difficult to figure out where things are ultimately going. Mhm.

[00:03:27]>> So if I was a betting man, which I'm not, uh I I don't think I could bet either way whether there will be an agreement or there will be uh uh continuation of what we have or or war.

[00:03:41]>> As you indicated, the the concept is that the nuclear file negotiations would be pushed off into the future. But in this initial negotiation, there are a lot of details that remain to be worked out and can put B2 up on the screen which pertains to the status of the straight of Hormuz. So this is from an Iranian foreign ministry spokesperson.

[00:04:00]We are not seeking tolls from the straight of Hormuz. Be careful in choosing words. Fees are charged for the services that Iran and Oman provide in the straight of Hormuz as well as for the implementation of nature and ecosystem protection programs. So not a toll but a fee for services. What is your sense though of what some of the red lines in this initial phase of negotiations are for Iran?

[00:04:23]>> Well, maybe they're trying to appeal to leftists in Europe and uh the left wing of the Democratic Party in the United States with regards to u environmentalist environmentalism.

[00:04:37]But uh I I think that it's uh the Iranians are uh have said many times and I think they're very serious about it that the status of the straight of hormones is not going to go back to what it was before for two reasons. One is that the Iranians feel that they have the right to u uh receive fees rather than tolls uh just like uh Turkey does.

[00:05:02]Uh and uh but second, the Iranians don't want the Americans to be able to rebuild those military bases in the Persian Gulf. And they don't want an Israeli presence or a European presence either.

[00:05:14]And right now, the the Americans, as we all know, they're forced to use planes to bring in troops and equipment to the region, which is which is much more expensive and causes more damage to the equipment. and they want to continue to make it more difficult for them to uh to maintain their presence. So, I think the Iranians are going to remain uh in charge of the strait. No doubt. I uh I I believe but um but I don't think they're going to do it in a way in which impedes traffic because the Iranians do want business as usual uh to carry on through the straight of hormones. obviously how Iran makes a lot of money and countries friendly to Iran like Iraq or Oman, they also make a lot of money as a result of trade and business in the Persian Gulf.

[00:06:04]>> Mhm. Professor, how does the uh Iran view this more recent addition by the Trump administration to insist that all of the regional countries must recognize Israel via the Abraham Accords as part of some sort of comprehensive ceasefire uh between the United States and Iran? I think the United States really doesn't or Trump at least doesn't really understand that this sort of language especially what we saw in the in his truth social post which he was effectively ordering them to join. Now I don't know what language he used on the phone but the truth social post was insulting to these countries and for these uh family uh uh regimes in the Persian Gulf in particular uh it undermines their uh position among the public especially since they've already been weakened due to war. if they are perceived to be moving towards the Israeli regime, it makes them uh more unpopular and uh when the United States is or Trump is ordering them to take particular stand and they don't respond um that also doesn't look good for them. I don't think though that any of these countries under the current circumstances are going to take any further steps towards uh building relations with the Israeli regime. We know all of them do have relations.

[00:07:33]Qatar, the Saudis, uh all of them have relations, but uh uh Turkey, but I don't think that right now any of them want to have to improve those relations because there's an ongoing genocide. It's been going on now for almost 3 years and now the slaughter has begun in Lebanon too.

[00:07:54]So I don't see that happening and of course Iran is never going to join such an accord because Iran doesn't consider uh the Israeli regime in its current form as an ethnosupreist entity to be legitimate.

[00:08:08]How much how much of a problem is the fact that Israel is insisting on we're going to continue to bomb in Lebanon, you know, celebrating ethnic cleansing there. Um Trump seems to have effectively green lit this at this point. And of course, Netanyahu is not interested in an an end to this war, coming to some sort of a deal or accordion.

[00:08:29]So, how much of this is an obstacle to um you know, that will completely block any progress towards a deal? It will completely block progress because you recall that after the fighting the 39 days of of of hot war when there was a ceasefire one of the conditions was a ceasefire across the region >> and then Netanyahu began the carpet bombing. Iran said until there's a ceasefire we're not going to allow uh those extra ships from countries that are linked to those who were hostile to Iran during the war to pass through the strait. So Netanyahu by violating the ceasefire agreement uh he has been preventing the world from obtaining the energy and the other resources that they get from the Persian Gulf. And I uh I know that the Iranians uh continue to take the same position now. the war in the the the genocidal attacks in Lebanon have to stop otherwise this agreement will simply not work at all and the straight of hormones will not uh go back to normal. uh especially for Iran, uh Lebanon has a particular particularly high status and immoral status because when the genocide began in Gaza, no one but Hezbollah and the resistance went to the aid of Gaza, when they they began uh fighting in northern in in southern Lebanon in order to draw away some of the Israeli troops from Gaza to to ease the pressure on the Gazin population.

[00:10:04]even though they knew that uh they would be uh beaten, they would be bombed and slaughtered and their families would be taken out as a result of this policy.

[00:10:15]But for Iran, this was a heroic stance that Hezbollah took over the past 2 and 1/2 years, more than 2 and 1/2 years.

[00:10:23]And that's why Iran, so for that reason too, is simply not going to accept the war to continue. And if it does, Iran will not allow uh those ships to pass through.

[00:10:34]>> Um I wanted to ask you a little bit of just what is life like in Iran right now? Have things pretty much, you know, resumed to normal daily pace? We can put before up on the screen. This is a report from Reuters. Um that the uh Iranian president has ordered the reopening of international internet access uh within Iran. So uh you know is there a sense of sort of normaly daytoday or things still feel very unsettled? Is there a lot of economic pressure? What is what is day-to-day life like in tyrron right now?

[00:11:04]>> It is normal. Although there are a couple of policies that I think were very bad and that is that uh after the fighting stopped they they continued to have schools and universities uh university courses online and uh I think we all know what happened during corona and but from but from next week uh schools and university classes will be on campus and at schools. So from next week I'll be on campus teaching my students but during the past few weeks even though there was no fighting um I my classes were online and and during the war of course they were online too.

[00:11:42]So um so we're almost back to normal. We I think we could have been back to normal earlier but uh and internet as you pointed out is going to go back to normal. schools and universities are going to go back to normal. But we have a lot of inflation and uh obviously because of the air strikes on factories on pharmaceutical factories on the um on hospitals, schools and and other infrastructure the the economy is hurting and also the siege itself is having an economic impact because Iran can't import medicine or food from from uh the Persian Gulf easily. is very difficult.

[00:12:22]So there is inflation but the Iranians believe that they will be able to wait out uh outweight um the United States because this uh siege on Iranian ports is a double-edged sword and it's basically a siege on the whole global economy. So Iran says we'll wait and uh until the United States is forced to change. And I think that that policy is working because uh over the past couple of weeks the the American negotiators had a much greater sense of urgency to get this deal done than the Iranians.

[00:12:57]The Iranians are very careful. They're they're slow because they want to make sure that there are no loopholes because they know what happened in the JCPOA. or the the Obama administration took advantage of those loopholes against Iran and they never fulfilled their obligations and then of course Trump later on of course left the deal.

[00:13:18]But the Iranians want to make sure this time round uh we don't have a situation where Iran carries out obligations and then the Americans refrain from carrying out their own. That's the main reason why uh the speaker of parliament is in Doha right now to make sure that money comes to Iran as soon as if an agreement is signed.

[00:13:41]>> Professor, give us some signs uh that we can look for here in the west to actually see that a deal may be happening. You pointed out the speaker there in Doha. However, we've seen numerous trips. We've seen the Pakistani army chief visit Thrron. Then we've saw strikes uh that just happened yesterday.

[00:14:00]So how can we assess the willingness in your country to actually want to sign a deal and same uh for us uh what concessions can we look for from the American side that still remain outstanding? Well, first I should also add that another reason why the speaker of parliament and the chief negotiator is in Doha is also to try to encourage countries in the Persian Gulf that assisted the United States in the war to tilt away from Trump and to establish better ties with Iran. So that that is another reason why it's going. We were pretty close actually and the there was a widespread belief that by now we would have had a deal. But it seems in Thran that um that the neocons and the Zionist lobby in the United States pushed back hard on Trump and we saw him make uh uh some statements that ran against the agreements that they had uh um reached over during the negotiations. So uh during this this 60 days the Americans were supposed to release a substantial segment of Iranian assets that were confiscated. Uh the uh sanctions on the energy sector would be waved. Uh there would be there would be a regional ceasefire and uh the Americans would bear responsibility because in the deal it says the United States and its allies and then Iran and its allies. Um also uh the uh the status of Iran's uh control over the straight of Homos is not questioned. The United States gets a commitment by Iran uh not to develop nuclear weapons which is fine for Iran because Iran has been saying it for decades that they have no intention of developing nuclear weapons. So the Iranians feel that they have a strong hand because of this trade of hormones more than anything else. But uh but everything depends on Trump. It could it could be resolved very quickly by within a day or two. But uh I think that there are lots of pressures in in the United States right now that uh may prevent it from ever happening again. If we go the reason why the ceasefire was wrecked a couple of months ago almost a month a month and a half ago roughly was because of Netanyahu he refused to abide by the ceasefire and if he hadn't done that right we would have had the last month and a half we would have had ships going through the straight of hormones and the global economy would have been in a much better situation now. So it depends on what Netanyahu does in in Lebanon with regards to Lebanon and it depends on whether Trump can is serious and he is willing to stand up to the Zionist lobby.

[00:17:03]>> Professor Morandi, always so useful to have your analysis. Thank you so much for joining us this morning.

[00:17:08]>> Thank you, sir.

[00:17:09]>> Thank you very much for having me.

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