TRUMP PULLS BACK ON THREAT
President claims 'workable' 10-point peace plan proposed
President Donald Trump speaks with reporters Monday at the White House in Washington.
Displaced people wait to receive donated food Monday near their tents in Beirut, Lebanon, after fleeing Israeli bombardment in southern Lebanon.
MIDDLE EAST| WAR IN IRAN
TEHRAN, Iran — President Donald Trump late Tuesday pulled back on his threats to launch devastating strikes on Iran less than two hours before the deadline he set for Tehran to capitulate.
Trump said he would hold off on his threatened attacks on Iranian bridges, power plants and other civilian targets, subject to Tehran agreeing to a two-week ceasefire and reopening the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of the world's oil typically is transported. He also said Iran proposed a "workable" 10-point peace plan that could help end war the U.S. and Israel launched Feb. 28.
Iran's Supreme National Security Council said it accepted a two-week ceasefire in the war and would negotiate with the United States in Islamabad starting Friday.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said passage through the Strait of Hormuz would be allowed for the next two weeks under Iranian military management. It wasn't immediately clear if that meant Iran would loosen its chokehold on the waterway.
In a post on social media, Trump said if Iran agreed "to the COMPLETE, IMMEDIATE, and SAFE OPENING of the Strait of Hormuz" he would "suspend the bombing and attack of Iran for a period of two weeks."
Even as the ceasefire was announced, missile alerts continued in the United Arab Emirates and Israel early Wednesday.
Earlier Trump threats
Trump previously threatened Tuesday that a "whole civilization will die tonight" if Iran failed to meet his latest deadline to strike a deal that includes reopening the strait. Since the war began, Trump repeatedly backed off of deadlines just before they expire.
Trump's threat didn't seem to account for potential harm to civilians, prompting Democrats in Congress, some United Nations officials and scholars in military law to say such strikes would violate international law.
Tehran's representative at the U.N., Amir-Saeid Iravani, said the threats "constitute incitement to war crimes and potentially genocide" and Iran would "take immediate and proportionate reciprocal measures" if Trump launched devastating strikes.
The U.S. and Israel battered Iran with attacks targeting its military capabilities, leadership and nuclear program. Iran responded with strikes on Israel and Gulf Arab neighbors, causing regional chaos and outsized economic and political shock.
Late Tuesday, Pakistan's prime minister urged Trump to extend his deadline by two weeks to allow diplomacy to advance. In a social media post, Shehbaz Sharif, whose country has been leading negotiations, also asked Iran to open the strait for two weeks.
Before the deadline, airstrikes hit two bridges and a train station, and the U.S. hit military infrastructure on Kharg Island, a key hub for Iranian oil production.
Extended deadlines
Since the war began, Trump repeatedly imposed deadlines linked to threats, only to extend them. Tehran previously rejected a 45-day ceasefire proposal by Egyptian, Pakistani and Turkish mediators, saying it wants a permanent end to the war.
Iran's president said 14 million people, including himself, volunteered to fight. That's despite Trump saying U.S. forces could wipe out all bridges in Iran and reduce all power plants to smoking rubble in a matter of hours.
It wasn't clear if airstrikes against Iran on Tuesday were linked to Trump's threats to widen the civilian target list. At least two of the targets were connected to Iran's rail network, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israeli warplanes struck bridges and railways in Iran.
Tehran fired on Israel and Saudi Arabia, prompting the temporary closure of a major bridge.
While Iran can't match the sophistication of U.S. and Israeli weaponry or their dominance in the air, its chokehold on the strait roiled the world economy and raised the pressure on Trump at home and abroad to find a way out of the standoff.
Off-ramp open
"A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again" if a deal isn't reached, Trump said on social media Tuesday morning. Yet, he also seemed to keep open the possibility of an off-ramp, saying, "maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen."
Earlier, Iranian official Alireza Rahimi issued a video message calling on "all young people, athletes, artists, students and university students and their professors" to form human chains around power plants.
Iranians formed human chains in the past around nuclear sites at times of heightened tensions with the West.
State media posted videos online that showed hundreds of flag-waving people amassed at two bridges and at a power plant hundreds of miles from Tehran, though it was not clear how widespread the practice was.
"They're not allowed to do that," Trump said in a phone call with NBC News.
A general in Iran's Revolutionary Guard general warned that Iran would "deprive the U.S. and its allies of the region's oil and gas for years" and expand its attacks across the Gulf region if Trump were to carry out his threat.
Growing criticism
In Rome, Pope Leo XIV said Tuesday the threats were "truly unacceptable" and that such attacks would violate international law.
French Foreign Minister Jean Noël Barrot said attacks targeting civilian and energy infrastructure could constitute a war crime. Such cases are notoriously difficult to prosecute.
Trump said he was "not at all" concerned about committing war crimes.
A spokesman for U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said he was "deeply troubled" by the threats, saying no military objective justified targeting civilian infrastructure.
More than 1,900 people were killed in Iran since the war began, but the government has not updated the toll for days.
In Lebanon, where Israel is fighting Iran-backed Hezbollah militants, more than 1,500 people were killed and more than 1 million people displaced. Eleven Israeli soldiers died there.
In Gulf Arab states and the occupied West Bank, more than two dozen people were killed, while 23 were reported dead in Israel, and 13 U.S. service members were killed.
