The US-Iran peace deal may be Donald Trump's gain — and Benjamin Netanyahu's problem

United States President Donald Trump declared victory on his 80th birthday, calling for oil to flow through the Strait of Hormuz after the US and Iran announced an interim agreement to end the war in the Middle East.

The agreement will extend the ceasefire for 60 days, with the Strait of Hormuz anticipated to reopen on Friday.

But while Trump is treating the deal like a win, it might be more about optics than a genuine resolution — with the toughest issues kicked down the road and Israel emerging as the "biggest loser" of the deal, according to some experts.

Trump's narrow 'win'

For Trump, the deal's announcement comes as the midterm elections approach in the US, while his domestic popularity wanes.

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Energy and fuel prices have soared in the US following the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz — through which roughly a fifth of global oil and a significant portion of gas normally transits.

Trump has pledged the strait would be "completely opened" from Friday — a concrete, sellable achievement he can take into November's midterms.

Trump's approval rating is sitting at 36 per cent, according to the latest Reuters/Ipsos poll, down from 47 per cent when he started his second term in January 2025.

The four-day poll, which closed on Monday and was based on responses from 1,537 people in the US, gathered responses before and after the deal was announced, with his rating ticking up a percentage point.

Just 24 per cent of Americans currently approve of his handling of the cost of living.

But Bernard Hourcade, a specialist on Iran at France's CNRS research institute, told the Agence France-Presse (AFP) news agency that the deal for the US was "perhaps a media victory, but not a political victory" and that the US had lost global "credibility" through the conflict.

'A huge mistake'

David Smith, associate professor at the University of Sydney's United States Studies Centre, said the peace deal is an "improvement on the current situation", but stopped short of calling it a win.

"It doesn't get the US any more than they had before the war began," Smith told SBS News. "This deal will be an improvement on the current situation for the US, but overall, the US is worse off than they were before the war began."

That's because Iran has demonstrated it can shut the Strait of Hormuz whenever it feels threatened — a card it didn't have before the conflict, and one Smith says it will hold "forever".

Even if oil does start flowing again, Smith says the economic recovery will likely take months. With the midterms about five months away, that recovery might not happen in time to help Republicans.

"I think that by this point, public opinion has really taken the view that this war was a huge mistake," Smith said. "The economic consequences of this war are going to be felt for, I'd say, at least the rest of this year, and that's going to hurt Republicans in the midterms."

Additionally, the bigger strategic goals Trump and Netanyahu cited as justifications for war — ending Iran's nuclear ambitions, destroying its missile capabilities, and toppling its government — are not resolved.

Those questions will instead be deferred during a 60-day negotiation period, with some Israeli officials expecting those discussions could be extended further.

The 'biggest loser'

That deferral could be a big problem for Netanyahu.

Amir Handjani from the US-based Quincy Institute told AFP that Israel had come out as the "biggest loser" in the conflict, both because Israel has lost momentum with Gulf state relationships and lost leverage with its key ally.

Senior Israeli officials also spoke anonymously to Reuters, calling the preliminary agreement "terrible for Israel".

"There is no one in the Israeli leadership who views it otherwise, from the prime minister to the chief of staff," they said.

Jonathan Rynhold, political scientist at Bar-Ilan University near Tel Aviv, added that Netanyahu "will be unable to sell this agreement to the Israeli public".

"The best that he can hope for is that they fail to reach an agreement and the war restarts to Israel's advantage in 60 days," he told Reuters.

Netanyahu, facing looming elections he is projected to lose, has come under fire internally for failing to achieve the war's aims, as well as from Trump, who called him a "very difficult guy" as he slammed Israeli strikes on Lebanon that had threatened to derail the agreement.

A 'dire' political situation

As mounting public pressure faces both leaders, Smith says the dynamic between the US and Israel has become a "weird" and "dire" political situation.

"In the US, you have people who are accusing Trump of being manipulated by Netanyahu. Whereas in Israel, you've got a lot of people accusing Netanyahu of doing whatever Trump wants.

"Each leader is regarded as the puppet of the other one, which is a dire political situation to be in."

He expects the peace plan won't hold for long.

Trump's restraint on Netanyahu has historically lasted only a few weeks at a time, Smith said, and Israel was never actually a party to the Lebanon ceasefire negotiations, making it "no surprise" if fighting resumes there soon.

Speaking at a televised press conference on Monday — his first public remarks since the agreement was announced and an attempt to counter severe criticism over his handling of the war — Netanyahu sought to highlight what he portrayed as the campaign's major achievements.

"The most important thing is that we saved the State of Israel from the threat of nuclear annihilation," Netanyahu said.

"We neutralised their nuclear scientists, decapitated the leaders of the terror regime, crushed the nuclear facilities, destroyed missiles, and destroyed the overwhelming majority of factories producing missiles."

He also said Israeli troops would remain in Lebanon, Gaza, and Syria for "as long as necessary" — potentially signalling that Israel does not consider itself bound by the deal's terms.

— With additional reporting by Agence France-Presse and Reuters.

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