Just hours after US President Donald Trump issued a stark threat to erase Iranian civilization, a startling diplomatic reversal has upended tensions in the Middle East: Trump has announced his acceptance of a two-week ceasefire with Iran, built on the framework of a 10-point peace proposal put forward by the Islamic Republic. The US leader has characterized the Iranian plan as a “workable basis” for future negotiations, with key terms including a proposed fee for commercial vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz and the full lifting of all international and US sanctions imposed on Iran.
Notably, discrepancies have emerged between the Persian-language version of the plan released for Iranian audiences and the English-language version distributed to global media, with several high-demand provisions absent from the international iteration. Even as the final outcome of upcoming weeks of negotiations remains deeply uncertain, the tentative agreement already marks a dramatic turnaround for the United States, which joined Israel in a large-scale military offensive against Iran in late February, framed at the time by official rhetoric focused on overthrowing the existing Islamic Republic government.
The proposal has already sparked furious backlash in Israel, where political leaders have decried the terms as an unprecedented national failure. Opposition leader Yair Lapid has labeled the deal the worst “political disaster in all of [Israel’s] history”, with particular outrage directed at the clause calling for an immediate ceasefire in Lebanon and an end to all Israeli military strikes on the country.
Eskandar Sadeghi-Boroujerdi, an Iran historian and lecturer at the University of St Andrews, told Middle East Eye that an initial review of the 10-point framework places it far beyond the scope of the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) — the nuclear deal that Trump unilaterally withdrew from in 2018 — “in almost every dimension”. Unlike the JCPOA, which was strictly limited to nuclear restrictions in exchange for partial, reversible sanctions relief, Sadeghi-Boroujerdi argues this new proposal is far more ambitious: “It is not a nuclear deal. It is a comprehensive restructuring of the regional order in Iran’s favour.”
As global powers react to the news with a mix of cautious relief and deep skepticism, a breakdown of the plan’s core provisions reveals just how far-reaching its implications would be if fully implemented.
For the Trump administration and the global economy, the most urgent priority has been reopening the Strait of Hormuz, the chokepoint through which roughly 20% of the world’s global oil supplies pass. The waterway was effectively closed shortly after the US-Israel military campaign began, triggering massive disruption to energy markets and inflicting widespread damage on the global economy. The de facto closure spurred intense diplomatic pressure on all sides and even preliminary military planning to force the strait open, making its reopening a non-negotiable starting point for any talks.
Trump’s conditional ceasefire agreement calls for the strait to be reopened immediately, but the full 10-point plan goes a step further. Under the proposal, Iran would charge a $2 million transit fee for every vessel passing through the waterway, with proceeds split between Iran and neighboring Oman. All funds collected would be allocated to the reconstruction of Iranian infrastructure, much of which has been destroyed by US and Israeli strikes since the offensive began in February. Iran would also take full responsibility for establishing and enforcing rules for safe passage through the strait. If approved, this arrangement would cement the strait as a critical strategic lever for Iran, dramatically strengthening its regional influence over global energy supplies.
A core demand at the heart of Iran’s proposal is the full lifting of all primary and secondary sanctions imposed on the country. This marks a stark reversal of the policy Trump implemented after his 2018 withdrawal from the JCPOA: at the time, Trump scrapped the nuclear accord, calling it a bad deal, and implemented a harsh “maximum pressure” campaign of sweeping sanctions that crippled Iran’s economy, pushed millions of Iranian citizens into poverty, and inadvertently empowered hardline factions through a booming black market for restricted goods.
US sanctions have been in place in one form or another since 1987, ahead of the end of the Iran-Iraq War. A full removal would therefore represent the most significant shift in US-Iran relations in nearly four decades.
Another non-negotiable pillar for Iran is a binding international guarantee that neither the country nor its regional allied groups will face future military attacks. Iranian leaders have long cited Trump’s well-documented unpredictability as a reason to distrust his public commitments, so a permanent security guarantee is central to any long-term peace deal. While the plan does not explicitly name Israel in the text, analysts widely agree the guarantee is intended to cover Israeli strikes as well — a provision that is almost certain to continue fueling Israeli opposition to the plan.
The proposal also calls for the full withdrawal of all US military forces from “the region” — a vague wording that has sparked debate over its actual scope. The US has maintained a widespread military presence across the Middle East for decades, with many regional allied governments relying on US forces as a core guarantee of their own national security. The version of the plan released to Iranian media references forces deployed specifically to the region near Iran since February’s offensive, but a full withdrawal of all US forces from the entire Middle East would represent an unprecedented change to the regional order that many allied states would oppose heavily. Even after recent Iranian strikes on US assets in the Persian Gulf that have sparked renewed debate over the wisdom of maintaining a forward US presence, a full exit remains a highly contentious outcome.
A further provision calling for an end to all military attacks on Iran’s regional allied groups, broadly referred to as the Axis of Resistance, has added to Israeli anger. The grouping includes Hamas, the Gaza-based political and armed movement, and Hezbollah, the Lebanese political and military organization. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has already publicly rejected the ceasefire call, confirming he has no intention of halting Israel’s ongoing offensive in Lebanon, and Israeli leaders have repeatedly ruled out ending targeted strikes on Hamas.
Two key provisions included in the Persian-language version of the plan are noticeably absent from the English-language version released to international media: the right of Iran to continue domestic nuclear enrichment, and a demand for war reparations from the United States. According to US-based Iranian human rights group HRANA, the US-Israel offensive has killed more than 3,500 Iranians to date, 1,616 of whom are civilians including at least 244 children. Reparations for the widespread destruction and loss of life would be an extremely popular demand among the Iranian public, but the omission from the English text leaves the status of both provisions unclear ahead of negotiations.
Sadeghi-Boroujerdi argues that the gaps between the two versions are not accidental, but a calculated strategic move by both sides to appeal to their domestic audiences while opening space for compromise in upcoming talks scheduled to be held in Islamabad. “The Persian version is considerably more ambitious and detailed. This likely reflects both sides signalling to their respective domestic audiences and staking out maximalist opening positions,” he explained. “The gap between the two versions is itself an indication of how much remains to be bridged in [negotiations] in Islamabad.”