{"id":571781,"date":"2026-04-08T12:49:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-08T12:49:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/571781\/"},"modified":"2026-04-08T12:49:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-08T12:49:08","slug":"us-israel-and-iran-agree-to-a-2-week-ceasefire-but-much-remains-unclear","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/571781\/","title":{"rendered":"US, Israel and Iran agree to a 2-week ceasefire but much remains unclear"},"content":{"rendered":"

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) \u2014 Iran, the United States and Israel agreed to a two-week ceasefire<\/a>, an 11th-hour deal that headed off U.S. President Donald Trump\u2019s threat to unleash<\/a> a bombing campaign that would destroy Iranian civilization. But hours after the announcement, Iran and Gulf Arab countries reported new attacks Wednesday.<\/p>\n

It was not clear if the strikes would scuttle the deal, which U.S. Vice President JD Vance called \u201cfragile.\u201d<\/p>\n

Even before the new attacks, much about the agreement<\/a> was unclear as the sides presented vastly different visions of the terms.<\/p>\n

\u2014 Iran said the deal would allow it to formalize its new practice of charging ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz, a crucial transit lane for oil<\/a>, but the terms were not clear, nor was whether ships would feel safe using it. It also was unclear whether any other country agreed to this condition.<\/p>\n

\u2014 Pakistan, which helped to mediate the deal<\/a>, and others said fighting would pause in Lebanon, where Israel has launched a ground invasion against the Iran-backed Hezbollah militant group. Israel said it would not, and strikes hit Beirut on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

\u2014 The fate of Iran\u2019s missile and nuclear programs \u2014 the elimination of which were major objectives for the U.S. and Israel in going to war \u2014 also remained unclear. Trump said the U.S. would work with Iran to remove buried enriched uranium, though Iran did not confirm that.<\/p>\n

In the streets of Tehran, pro-government demonstrators screamed: \u201cDeath to America, death to Israel, death to compromisers!\u201d after the ceasefire announcement and burned American and Israeli flags. <\/p>\n

The chants underscored the anger animating hard-liners, who have been preparing for what many assumed would be an apocalyptic battle with the United States. Trump warned Tuesday that \u201ca whole civilization will die tonight,\u201d if a deal wasn\u2019t reached.<\/p>\n

Varying reports of ceasefire\u2019s terms<\/p>\n

Trump initially said Iran proposed a \u201cworkable\u201d 10-point plan that could help end the war the U.S. launched with Israel on Feb. 28. But when a version in Farsi emerged that indicated Iran would be allowed to continue enriching uranium \u2014 which is key to building a nuclear weapon \u2014 Trump called it fraudulent without elaborating.<\/p>\n

Vance later said the deal was being misrepresented within Iran, though he didn\u2019t offer details.<\/p>\n

Iran\u2019s demands for ending the war, meanwhile, include a withdrawal of U.S. combat forces from the region, the lifting of sanctions, and the release of its frozen assets.<\/p>\n

In his post Wednesday, Trump said: \u201cWe are, and will be, talking Tariff and Sanctions relief with Iran.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not clear if other Western nations would agree to that \u2014 and the other points are likely nonstarters.<\/p>\n

Pakistan said that talks to hammer out a permanent end to the war could begin in Islamabad as soon as Friday.<\/p>\n

Israel backed the U.S. ceasefire with Iran, but Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said early Wednesday that the deal doesn\u2019t cover fighting against Hezbollah. Israel\u2019s military said later that fighting and ground operations continue.<\/p>\n

Loud booms could be heard throughout Beirut on Wednesday, and smoke rose from several points. It was not immediately clear what was targeted.<\/p>\n

Hezbollah has not confirmed if it will abide by the ceasefire, though the group has said it was open to giving mediators a chance to secure an agreement. An official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to comment publicly, said the group would not stop firing at Israel unless Israel agreed to do the same.<\/p>\n

Iran and Oman will collect shipping fees in Strait of Hormuz<\/p>\n

While Iran could not match the sophistication of U.S. and Israeli weaponry or their dominance in the air, its ability to control the Strait of Hormuz since the war began proved a tremendous strategic advantage: Iranian attacks and threats deterred many commercial ships from passing through the waterway, through which 20% of all traded oil and natural gas passes in peacetime. <\/p>\n

That has roiled the world economy and raised the pressure on Trump<\/a> both at home and abroad to find a way out of the standoff.<\/p>\n

The ceasefire may formalize a system of charging fees<\/a> in the strait that Iran instituted \u2014 and give it a new source of revenue.<\/p>\n

The plan allows for both Iran and Oman to charge ships, according to a regional official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss negotiations they were directly involved in. The official said Iran would use the money it raised for reconstruction. <\/p>\n

That would upend decades of precedent treating the strait as an international waterway that was free to transit and will likely not be acceptable to the Gulf Arab states, which also need to rebuild after repeated Iranian attacks targeting their oil fields. <\/p>\n

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said passage through the strait would be allowed under Iranian military management \u2014 further clouding the picture of who would be allowed to transit the waterway. <\/p>\n

Trump, meanwhile, suggested American warships would be \u201changin\u2019 around\u201d the strait. That could be a potential flashpoint in days to come.<\/p>\n

News of the ceasefire drove oil prices down Wednesday, but they were still higher than before the start of the Iran war, a sign that uncertainty still persists about the conflict. <\/p>\n

Fate of Iran\u2019s nuclear and missile programs remains unclear<\/p>\n

U.S.-Israeli strikes have battered Iran and its leadership<\/a>, but they have not entirely eliminated the threats posed by Tehran\u2019s nuclear program, its ballistic missiles or its support for regional proxies, like Hezbollah. The U.S. and Israel said addressing those threats was a key justification for going to war.<\/p>\n

Trump said Wednesday that the U.S. would work with Iran to \u201cdig up and remove\u201d enriched uranium that was buried under joint U.S-Israeli strikes in June. He added that none of the material had been touched since. Any retrieval is expected to be an intensive undertaking<\/a>.<\/p>\n

There was no confirmation from Iran on that.<\/p>\n

Tehran insisted for years that its nuclear program was peaceful, although it enriched uranium up to 60% purity, a short, technical step from weapons-grade levels.<\/p>\n

Iran referred to its nuclear program differently in two versions of the ceasefire plan that it released. The version in Farsi included the phrase \u201cacceptance of enrichment\u201d for its nuclear program. That phrase was missing in English versions shared by Iranian diplomats with journalists.<\/p>\n

A senior Israeli official said the United States had coordinated the ceasefire with Israel in advance and said Israel\u2019s government credited \u201cthe massive crushing of the regime\u2019s infrastructure\u201d with securing the agreement.<\/p>\n

Speaking on condition of anonymity because they were discussing private diplomatic conversations, the official said Washington had committed to pressing for the removal of nuclear material and dismantling of Iran\u2019s ballistic missile program.<\/p>\n

Airstrikes reported in the hours after the deal is announced<\/p>\n

Shortly after the ceasefire announcement, Bahrain, Israel, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates all issued warnings about incoming missiles from Iran. That fire stopped for a time, then hostilities appeared to restart.<\/p>\n

An oil refinery on Iran\u2019s Lavan Island came under attack, according to Iranian state television. Its report said that firefighters were working to contain the blaze but no one had been hurt. It did not say who launched the attack.<\/p>\n

The island is home to one of the terminals that Iran uses to export oil and gas. <\/p>\n

Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani says the army wasn\u2019t involved in the Lavan attack. The U.S. military\u2019s Central Command did not respond to questions about the strike.<\/p>\n

A short time later, the United Arab Emirates\u2019 air defenses fired at an incoming Iranian missile barrage. Kuwait\u2019s military forces, meanwhile, responded to an \u201cextensive wave\u201d of drone attacks.<\/p>\n

More than 1,900 people had been killed in Iran as of late March, but the government has not updated the war\u2019s toll for days.<\/p>\n

In Lebanon, where Israel is fighting Iran-backed Hezbollah militants, more than 1,500 people have been killed<\/a>. and 1 million people have been displaced<\/a>. Eleven Israeli soldiers have died.<\/p>\n

In Gulf Arab states and the occupied West Bank, more than two dozen people have died, while 23 have been reported dead in Israel, and 13 U.S. service members<\/a> have been killed.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

Gambrell reported from Dubai, United Arab Emirates, Magdy from Cairo and Metz from Ramallah, West Bank. Associated Press writers Edie Lederer at the United Nations, Natalie Melzer in Jerusalem, Abby Sewell in Beirut, and Michelle L. Price and Aamer Madhani in Washington contributed to this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TEHRAN, Iran (AP) \u2014 Iran, the United States and Israel agreed to a two-week ceasefire, an 11th-hour deal…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":571782,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[6740,23,5620,28,12,3321,793,158238,7590,801,1570,228242,803,1569,6009,129,1575,1576,251920,3,2229,21,19,22,20,25,24,964,800,965],"class_list":{"0":"post-571781","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-states","8":"tag-abbas-araghchi","9":"tag-america","10":"tag-benjamin-netanyahu","11":"tag-business","12":"tag-donald-trump","13":"tag-energy-industry","14":"tag-general-news","15":"tag-hezbollah","16":"tag-international-agreements","17":"tag-iran","18":"tag-iran-government","19":"tag-iran-war","20":"tag-israel","21":"tag-israel-government","22":"tag-jd-vance","23":"tag-middle-east","24":"tag-mideast-wars","25":"tag-military-and-defense","26":"tag-nadav-shoshani","27":"tag-news","28":"tag-religion","29":"tag-united-states","30":"tag-united-states-of-america","31":"tag-unitedstates","32":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","33":"tag-us","34":"tag-usa","35":"tag-war-and-unrest","36":"tag-washington-news","37":"tag-world-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571781","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=571781"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571781\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/571782"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=571781"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=571781"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=571781"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}