Trump sought to underline European irrelevance in the Middle East crisis. Everything rests on what he proposes
Middle East crisis – live updates
Discussing the dilemma facing western diplomats in confronting Iran’s nuclear programme, Henry Kissinger wrote in 2006: “Diplomacy never operates in a vacuum. It persuades not by the eloquence of its practitioners but by assembling a balance of incentives and risks.”
Rarely has the balance of incentives and risks been placed so starkly in front of Iran’s leaders as now.
Donald Trump, either by design or by stumbling ad hoc towards a strategy, has left Iran with a stark choice: either return to the negotiating table and accept the offer of “a deal”, or see Israel – possibly with US support – pulp Iran’s security apparatus, nuclear programme and economy into the ground in what would be the ultimate exercise in maximum pressure, the term the US president gave to his first-term economic sanctions against Tehran.
