"Having failed to achieve his goals in the joint U.S.-Israel war on Iran, Trump is now attempting to disguise the setback as a victory."-Israeli military aggression."

"Enemy forces failed to attain any of their stated objectives and did not approach Iranian territorial waters."

Tehran Times 

 

"[The] immediate and permanent [end to military operations on all fronts, including Lebanon, paving the way to a] final deal [in the next 60 days] extendable with mutual consent."

"[The U.S. Treasury to waive sanctions on Iranian oil exports and the two countries to] refrain from interfering in each other's internal affairs."

Memorandum of Understanding 

A mural in Tehran depicting negotiators, Anadolu via Getty

 

The Iranian regime is ecstatic; their not-without-reason interpretation of the Memorandum of Understanding is a surrender by the United States to the greater bargaining power and wisdom of the Islamic Republic whose tactical brilliance in closing the Strait of Hormuz sent U.S. President Donald Trump's triumphant self-congratulatory messages to the world in a tail-spin of second-think. "Oil-down" this master negotiator acknowledged as he became complicit with the Iranian regime's inexorable hold on power.

 

Sinking the Iranian navy, bombing its air defences and nuclear and missile sites was a clear military victory advantaging the United States over an obdurate, resilient enemy. The death of the totalitarian mastermind Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was a triumph of decapitation, or it would have been in any ordinary theocracy that was not backed by an Islamist-obsessed Republican Guard Corps, having at its service men schooled in a death cult subservient to a hidden Mahdi soon to arrive and demolish undeserving humanity.

 

Then came the blockage of the Strait of Hormuz, the attacks on Gulf oligarchies and the West reeling under an economic shock and rising energy prices, and the game suddenly turned sideways. Hesitating to invade and destroy the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and the remnants of the regime's senior figures the American President held out the white flag of surrender while declaring its military victory, and its reconsideration over replacing the regime to release the Iranian people from its totalitarian bondage.

 

Donald Trump addresses the media at the G7 summit in Evian, France, 17 June 2026. Photograph: Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images

 

The vaunted Memorandum of Understanding which excluded Israel from the partnership between the United States and the Jewish state in reality unleashed Israel from the unbreakable bond of mutual trust, friendship and comradely military functionality. Israel lacks the appeal of wealthy Gulf states whose gilded pomp and oil production figure so large in world prosperity. All the more so when one such as Qatar can bedazzle the U.S. President with its generous shower of lucre and impressive gift-giving.

 

The MOU's "the Islamic Republic of Iran reaffirms that it shall not procure or develop nuclear weapons", and "the disposition of stockpiled enriched material" will be resolved by the International Atomic Energy supervising the process need not be questioned for the surface relief it promises, with the Islamic Republic whose word of honour has become a metaphor for conniving, threatening psychopathy. 

 

"The Islamic Republic of Iran will maintain the current status quo of its nuclear program, and the United States of America will not impose any new sanctions and will not deploy additional forces in the region", according to the Memorandum of Understanding. Why would anyone dare question the reliability of such grandiloquent promises, unless they have had the misfortune of being on the receiving end of Tehran's ballistic missiles?

 

As a reward for its "compliance", the U.S. is prepared to develop a $300-billion plan for "the reconstruction and economic development of the Islamic Republic of Iran" and it will "terminate all types of sanctions", unfreeze Iran's bank accounts, and allow Iranian oil to flow, relinquishing control of the Strait of Hormuz to Iran and Oman.  Truly a victory for the ages.

 

Shipping in the Strait of Hormuz on Wednesday, Anadolu via Getty