Welcome to The Adversarial. Every other week, we’ll provide you with expert analysis on America’s greatest challengers: China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, and jihadists. Read more below.***IranIn the space of less than 11 hours on April 7, President Donald Trump went from warning that “a whole civilization will die tonight” to announcing a two-week ceasefire with Iran. That whiplash-inducing turn was just a taste of the twists that would follow over the coming week. First came a resumption of negotiations mediated by Pakistan. With the presence of Vice President J.D. Vance and Iran’s parliamentary speaker, it marked the highest in-person engagement between the two sides since the 1979 Iranian Revolution. However, the Islamabad meeting failed to produce an agreement. In response, Trump announced that the United States would blockade Iranian shipping, which has continued at low levels even as Tehran managed to largely subdue traffic for everyone else through the Strait of Hormuz.A major threat to the U.S.-Iranian ceasefire came from Israel’s ongoing war against Iran’s proxy Hizballah in Lebanon, which did not end despite the ceasefire between Washington and Tehran. On April 17, a 10-day ceasefire began between Lebanon’s government and Israel’s government, but it is very fragile, as Hizballah was not a direct party in the negotiations and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that Israel would not withdraw its soldiers from southern Lebanon.A few hours after the Lebanon ceasefire began, Iran announced that it was re-opening the Strait of Hormuz, though ships would be required to follow a specific route. Trump praised the move but said that the U.S. blockade of Iranian ports would remain in effect.More than a month of war has, for now, led to an interlude during which Washington is attempting to use increased economic pressure and the prospect of further military action to push Tehran into a deal
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