A viral post claiming Iran has “flatly ruled out” negotiating with President Donald Trump and will wait out his term until 2029 racked up more than 300,000 views Monday morning.
The reality may be less definitive.
The post from The Hormuz Letter, a widely followed account covering the war, rests largely on remarks from one adviser in Tehran.
Where the Claim Comes From
The remarks come from Majid Shakeri, an influential conservative analyst who has advised Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf. Ghalibaf has served as Iran’s chief negotiator during the war.
“Trump will not reach an agreement with us. We will accompany him until his term ends,” Shakeri said, per translations of remarks circulated by Iranian media.
He expanded on X, writing that the path to victory is “managing the process of neither war nor peace, up to the point of victory.”
Why It May Be Overstated
Shakeri holds no official government position, and his comments represent one influential view rather than declared Iranian policy.
The post’s bolder claims, such as a demand for $300 billion in war compensation, are attributed only to an unnamed ‘senior Iranian source.
And Iran has not actually stopped talking. Messages are still moving through intermediaries, Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said Sunday, per Reuters. He added that negotiations could restart once Washington stops violating the interim memorandum signed in June.
That is a conditional freeze rather than a three-year vow of silence.
Trump, for his part, sounds content to wait as well. ‘We are only semi-negotiating with them. We are just watching Iran with its huge inflation and the fact they have no money,’ the president told Axios on Sunday.
‘It will work out. It always works out. It’s like a chess game,’ he added.
Araqchi also said a separate agreement with Oman over Strait of Hormuz shipping lanes is in its “final stages.’ Polymarket traders give a 47% chance traffic returns to normal by Dec. 31, down from roughly 60% a week ago.
Traders Price a Long Wait
Polymarket’s “US-Iran Final Nuclear Deal by…?” market, which has drawn more than $14 million in volume, prices a signed final agreement by Aug. 31 at just 1%, and 23% by the end the year.
Taken together, the odds sketch a middle path: reopening the strait is a toss-up, a final deal a long shot. It is more or less the future Shakeri described.
Neither war nor peace.
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