President Donald Trump said on Saturday that he was reviewing a new Iranian proposal to end the war, but he also made clear he was far from convinced it would be acceptable.
According to the AP report, Trump said he would provide more detail later and that officials were giving him the exact wording of the proposal. He then posted that he could not imagine it being acceptable because Iran had not yet paid a big enough price for what it had done over the previous 47 years.
The new proposal, reported through semiofficial Iranian outlets Tasnim and Fars, would apparently be a 14-point offer sent via Pakistan in response to a nine-point U.S. proposal. Iran’s state media had not confirmed it. The conversation is continuing anyway, with a three-week ceasefire still holding even as the wider standoff remains tense.
The Strait of Hormuz remains the central pressure point. The AP report says Trump has floated a plan to reopen the waterway, where roughly a fifth of global oil and natural gas trade typically passes, while the U.S. has warned shipping companies that payments to Iran could trigger sanctions. The U.S. has also told carriers that transfers in cash, digital assets, offsets, informal swaps and other in-kind arrangements may draw scrutiny.
The economic pressure is being reinforced at sea. The report says the U.S. has responded with a naval blockade of Iranian ports since April 13 and that Central Command said 48 commercial ships have been told to turn back. That means the diplomatic track and the maritime track are moving at the same time, each shaping the other.
The AP piece also places the negotiations alongside a separate human-rights concern: the health of imprisoned Iranian lawyer Narges Mohammadi. Her foundation and family said her condition was at very high risk after a cardiac crisis, and they said Iranian intelligence was blocking transfer to Tehran for treatment. The Norwegian Nobel Committee has urged her immediate transfer to her medical team.
The combination of military pressure, shipping restrictions, diplomatic proposals and rights concerns shows how broad the conflict has become. It is no longer just about battlefield control. It also touches trade routes, sanctions, prison health, and the question of whether either side believes a deal is still possible.
Trump’s review of Iran’s proposal therefore sits inside a much larger contest over leverage. For now, the signal from Washington is that talks remain open but trust remains thin.
