The Memo: Hawks lament ‘disaster’ on Iran as Trump strains to sell deal

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President Trump tried to make the case for his interim peace deal with Iran on Wednesday, but a lengthy news conference only revealed that no last-minute rabbits would be pulled from the hat to assuage his critics.

Trump’s comments, delivered as he prepared to leave a Group of Seven (G7) summit in France, also exposed just how far the U.S. has shifted from its original war aims as the president avidly seeks to bring the conflict to a close.

An especially startling example came when Trump defended Iran’s right to maintain ballistic missiles — despite the fact that a prior U.S. and Israeli objective had been the destruction of this capacity.

“They have to have some because other people have some. You’ve got to have some,” Trump mused, referring to Iran’s position in relation to other Persian Gulf nations.

The president added that when unnamed advisers told him he needed to wholly eliminate the Iranian conventional arsenal, “I said, ‘Well, what am I going to do? Am I going to let Saudi Arabia have missiles but they can’t have them?’”

Trump cast his push to reopen the Strait of Hormuz as critical for American prosperity. He raised the specter of “economic catastrophe” in the absence of a deal and said he had no desire to end up analogous to former President Herbert Hoover, who is widely blamed for exacerbating the Great Depression.

On the central issue of Iran’s stock of enriched nuclear material, Trump waved away concerns, saying that while the U.S. has “the equipment to get it” and that it would be “psychologically” satisfying to do so, “it’s actually not valuable. Not a lot of value.”

Trump further confirmed that the interim memorandum of understanding (MOU) agreed between American and Iranian negotiators calls for a fund of $300 billion to be set up to help with the cost of Iranian reconstruction. While this would not be directly bankrolled by the U.S., Washington would be involved in the planning and facilitation of the fund, and it appears its Persian Gulf allies would be expected to contribute.

At roughly the same time as Trump was speaking, a senior administration official was on a media call reading the full text of the MOU to reporters. The agreement is expected to be signed in Switzerland on Friday.

The text confirmed by the official shows that the MOU provides for the reopening of the crucial strait by both sides, allows Iran to immediately resume crude oil exports, and includes a provision for the U.S. to unfreeze Iranian assets so long as the deal is implemented.

In return, Iran pledges that it will not “procure or develop” nuclear weapons. Trump is presenting this as a major victory but it in fact merely echoes a promise Iran has made numerous times in the past — including in the deal arrived at during former President Obama’s tenure, known as the JCPOA, which the current president excoriates.

The MOU does say that Iran’s existing stock of highly enriched uranium will, at the least, be subject to dilution on-site under the eyes of the International Atomic Energy Agency. But the relevant paragraph is vague and also notes that a final resolution on “the issue of enrichment” will be punted to a final deal. Skeptics worry this allows Tehran a capacious amount of wiggle room.

Critics on the left and right alike are asking why the war was fought in the first place, if this is to be the shape of its resolution.

The angst is especially sharp among conservative hawks. The staunchly pro-Israel commentator Ben Shapiro called the deal a “disaster” during an interview with Fox News on Wednesday. Another prominent conservative commentator, Erick Erickson, wrote on social media that the accord was “an American surrender.”

It isn’t just the pundit class who are outraged.

Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.), who lost a primary fight last month after Trump backed one of his opponents, blasted what he called “the worst foreign policy blunder in decades.”

Nikki Haley, who served as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations during part of Trump’s first term but went on to run against him in the 2024 presidential primary, wrote on social media that the Iranians will use any funds received to “further their nuclear ambitions and on terrorist proxies against us.”

Haley added, “It’s a huge mistake to pay to rebuild the threat we just destroyed.”

As if all that were not enough to roil the waters on the right, Trump used his news conference to take several jabs at Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his nation’s conduct in Lebanon. The Israeli invasion of Lebanon and its continuing attacks amid battles with Hezbollah pose a serious threat to the U.S.-Iran peace deal — much to Trump’s irritation.

A recent Israeli strike on Beirut was “unnecessary in my book,” the president opined.

Earlier in the news conference, he argued that Israeli actions in Lebanon generally are disproportionate.

“I’m not saying they shouldn’t protect themselves,” the president said. “I’m saying when two drones are shot into the desert and drop harmlessly, you don’t have to knock down buildings in Beirut. They could behave better, and frankly they could do a better job.”

Online, these remarks got the president some mild praise from unusual quarters — commentators, mostly on the left, who have long been appalled at Israel’s conduct in both Gaza and Lebanon.

However, the consternation they caused in Israel was immediately apparent.

“Why on earth would Trump endorse Iran’s ballistic missile program?” ran the front-page headline of an op-ed in The Jerusalem Post.

On the homepage of The Times of Israel, founding editor David Horovitz called Trump’s deal a “catastrophic capitulation.”

There are, of course, defenders of the overall deal within the GOP.

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), a libertarian and a critic of the war, wrote in a post: “I stand with President Trump on peace.”

There are, too, plenty of people in the GOP and the broader MAGA media ecosystem who can be relied upon to back Trump in virtually all circumstances.

But the Iran deal has ignited a firestorm. The question is how soon and how effectively the president and his allies can quench it.

The Memo is a reported column by Niall Stanage.

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Barack Obama

Ben Shapiro

Benjamin Netanyahu

Bill Cassidy

Donald Trump

Erick Erickson

Herbert Hoover

Nikki Haley

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