After months of diplomacy punctuated by military strikes, the United States and Iran have stopped fighting and signed a memorandum of understanding. The technical grind of nuclear issues and the Strait of Hormuz will consume much of the 60-day period for negotiations. But the deeper question is whether durable stability is possible without addressing the regional disorder and the antagonism between Iran and Israel. A lasting settlement would require a far more ambitious grand bargain linking Iran’s nuclear constraints to a genuine security architecture — one that includes as key features a non-aggression pact between Israel and Iran on the one hand, and between Israel, Lebanon, and Syria on the other.
The challenge is to build enough confidence to ensure the longer process moves ahead. This requires a shift away from coercive diplomacy and toward what negotiators often describe as a “golden bridge” — a framework that allows the parties to compromise while protecting their core interests, without humiliation or strategic vulnerability.
In the first phase, Iran has agreed to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, though it has already shown that it is highly unlikely to relinquish strategic control over the crucial waterway, much of which lies within Iranian territorial waters. The memorandum of understanding says Iran will work with Oman and other Persian Gulf states to develop a broader agreement on the management of the Strait of Hormuz, suggesting Tehran is willing to formalize shared arrangements without ceding sovereign control. Tehran recognizes that passage arrangements could generate revenue and weaken the wider sanctions regime by drawing more international actors into commercial engagement with Iran.
As an incentive for Iran to alter its strategic calculations, a regional fund for humanitarian relief, reconstruction, and environmental protection of the gulf should also be created. The MoU itself points in this direction: it commits the United States and regional partners to developing a “definitive, mutually agreed plan” worth at least $300 billion for reconstruction and economic development in Iran, underlining how central economic incentives are to the bargain. We propose that, as an alternative to Iranian efforts to impose tolls on the Strait, negotiators should establish a United Nations-supervised mechanism financed through limited surcharges on all exports of oil, gas, and oil-based fertilizers passing south through Hormuz. Such surcharges would generate substantial revenues — potentially up to $80 billion annually — without significantly disrupting global markets. The costs would remain far lower than continuing instability and conflict. Both Iran and the Arab Gulf states would participate in levying the surcharges and receive the benefits of the fund under careful monitoring. An international managing agency would guard against corruption and ensure that funds don’t go toward military and weapons expenditures.
The nuclear talks, meanwhile, must address Iran’s stockpile of uranium enriched to 60%, which should be blended down to a maximum of 3.67% U-235, the necessary level for nuclear reactor fuel. Also, the International Atomic Energy Agency must secure expanded access to all sites where it has evidence of nuclear operations at undeclared locations. A regional consortium for civil nuclear energy should also be established to operate fuel-cycle activities under joint production, management, supervision, and control in Iran and participating Arab countries.
Iran increasingly views its nuclear capacity as a deterrent against future attack. It may agree to dilute enriched uranium, suspend enrichment temporarily, and accept expanded IAEA inspections, but it is unlikely to accept permanent arrangements that would eliminate its civilian nuclear infrastructure. A realistic settlement must therefore recognize Iran’s right under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty to maintain a peaceful civilian nuclear program under strict international supervision. Negotiations should focus less on dismantlement and more on transparency and verification against cheating.
The 60 days could also serve as a confidence-building phase in which both sides demonstrate sufficient good faith to engage in a far longer process ahead. The United States, traditionally a lead actor in conflict management in the region, has emerged from the Iran war having exposed the limits of its military and diplomatic power. It is now seen as an unreliable, erratic, and reckless partner; one that appears not to have adequately taken into account its Gulf partners’ security concerns or long-term interests.
In this context, the role of “middle powers” has gained new relevance. Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Oman, Qatar, and Egypt are emerging as both mediators and security partners. The rising influence of these states will increasingly shape conflict management and resolution in the region and beyond. If they seize this moment, they could move away from dependency on the U.S., with its military shield provided through regional bases. Gulf states have now seen how this has simply made them more vulnerable to Iranian military aggression. They could build their own regional equilibrium not through military power but a conflict resolution approach to managing some of these difficult and hostile relationships.
To this end, work should now be done to establish a standing regional negotiating table, with a permanent secretariat. Arab states, Turkey and Pakistan would have a genuine stake in the survival of such a regional arrangement, making it more structurally durable than one imposed by Washington and thus vulnerable to its whims.
Ultimately, Israel and Iran will need to be active participants in any regional structures, but this will take time and diplomatic tact. Neither country would agree to participate publicly at the moment, so quiet backchannels will be essential to ripen these conditions and overcome deep antagonisms. Attempting to include Israel too early risks collapsing the process entirely. Yet, without mechanisms to address Israeli security concerns, stability cannot be achieved. In the first phase, Israel will therefore have to work behind the scenes with the U.S. and encourage it to take into account Israeli concerns on enrichment levels and missile range.
A change of government in Israel following the October 2026 elections could open space for a second phase of less stealthy Israel-Iran confidence-building measures, perhaps channelled through Oman, focused narrowly on preventing miscalculation. Only in a concluding phase, contingent on progress toward Palestinian statehood and Lebanese security and stabilization and Israeli security, does a broader non-aggression framework become conceivable.
The current framework agreement has bought vital time. It opens an opportunity to stop this conflict, which had become repetitive and endless. The 60-day negotiation is significant as a test of whether the parties can shift from the logic of confrontation to the logic of mutual interest. That shift will not happen through pressure alone. It requires a golden bridge, one sturdy enough to bear the weight of Iranian sovereignty, Israeli security, and Gulf reconciliation. The alternative is a return to cycles of retaliation, nuclear escalation, and regional instability. The world has just witnessed those costs. The framework exists. The question is whether there is the political will to build on it.