Iran’s ceasefire with the United States reportedly turned on a dramatic final-hour intervention from Mojtaba Khamenei, the country’s still-unseen new supreme leader, whom sources said gave negotiators the green light to move toward a deal as President Donald Trump’s deadline — and the threat of a much broader U.S. bombardment — loomed.
U.S. and Israeli officials learned Monday that Mojtaba had, for the first time since the conflict began, instructed negotiators to move toward an agreement, according to Axios, which cited Israeli, regional, and other sources familiar with the talks. “Without his green light, there wouldn’t have been a deal,” one regional source told the outlet, which said his approval was viewed by multiple sources as a “breakthrough.” The report describes a volatile final stretch in which Trump publicly warned that “a whole civilization will die tonight” (ahead of his 8 p.m. Eastern Tuesday deadline for Iran to agree to reopen the Strait of Hormuz), even as diplomacy accelerated behind the scenes to avert a far wider escalation.
