Negotiations between the United States and Iran are expected to take place in Oman on Saturday, with the Iranian nuclear issue as the primary focus. This is not the first time the Gulf sultanate, overlooking the Strait of Hormuz, has hosted these negotiations. Oman was also the site of negotiations that led to the signing of the Iranian nuclear agreement with the administration of President Barack Obama in 2015.
Uncertainty regarding the talks remains. President Donald Trump has said that direct talks with Iran will take place, while Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, said that they would be indirect.
The talks are taking place amid President Trump’s threats to bomb Iran and impose additional sanctions on its oil sector if diplomatic efforts fail. Tehran is also facing internal pressures due to the deteriorating economic situation and divisions among the various influential parties in Iran.
What differs from previous negotiations is that Iran has lost much of its regional influence. The ongoing war in Gaza, which expanded to Lebanon, Syria, and Yemen, has drastically diminished Iran’s regional proxies. Hamas has been almost completely destroyed, and multiple of its leaders have been assassinated, including Ismail Haniyeh in the heart of Tehran and Yahya Sinwar in Gaza.
After the assassination of Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah, the killing of many other Hezbollah’s leaders, and the near-total destruction of the group’s infrastructure, Iran also lost its influence in Lebanon. This was in addition to the fall of Syrian President Bashar Assad, who was aligned with Iran, and the resulting dominance in Syria of Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham, led by Ahmed al-Sharaa.
Iran also withdrew its leaders from Yemen, abandoning its support for the Houthi group, against which US forces are launching airstrikes. Meanwhile, Iranian influence in Iraq has declined significantly, with the disintegration of many of its loyal militias, their shift toward economic activities, and their refusal to engage in defending Iran against successive attacks.
On March 5, President Trump sent a letter to Iran’s supreme leader, Ali Khamenei. In a television interview, he said that he had written, “I hope you will negotiate, because if we have to intervene militarily, it would be a terrible thing.”
Since then, the president has continued to push for talks while escalating sanctions and suggesting a military strike by Israel or the United States against Iranian nuclear sites.
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian has rejected direct negotiations with the United States over Tehran’s nuclear program, saying that the US must first act to rebuild Iran’s trust.
“We are not avoiding talks,” he said in televised remarks during a cabinet meeting. “It is our broken promises that have caused us problems so far.”
Supreme Leader Khamenei said in a statement: “They are threatening to commit sabotage, but we are not entirely certain that it will happen. We do not believe it is very likely that trouble will come from abroad. However, if it does happen, they will undoubtedly face a strong retaliatory strike.”
According to a report from the state-run Tehran Times in early April, Iran has prepared missiles “capable of striking sites linked to the United States” and has increased its naval capacities.
Why Oman?
According to a source from the Iraqi Foreign Ministry who spoke to The Media Line, Iraq offered to host the talks between the US and Iran. “The US administration rejected the request, considering it a non-neutral and unsafe country for such negotiations, and that the Iraqi government is taking orders from Iran,” the source said.
Unlike Iraq, Oman is broadly seen as a neutral country. It refused to participate in Operation Decisive Storm in 2015, which was led by Saudi Arabia against the Houthis in Yemen. It also maintains good relations with the United States, Europe, Iran, Russia, China, and other major powers.
Oman’s ruling family adheres to the Ibadi sect, which differs from both the Sunni sect to which all Arab countries’ rulers adhere and the Shiite sect of Iran. This distances it from the sectarian divisions in the region. It is also geographically close to Iran, sharing the Strait of Hormuz.
Although Oman is a member of the Gulf Cooperation Council, which generally has an uneasy relationship with Iran, it has enjoyed good relations with Iran for more than two decades and has not entered into the Gulf-Iran conflict. Rather, it has attempted to mediate numerous times between other Gulf states and Tehran. It previously mediated dialogue between Egypt and Iran, and in 2016, it hosted talks between Washington and the Houthis.
Omani journalist Ahmed Al-Jawhari emphasized that Oman is “not a party to the negotiations.” “It is merely presenting common ground and trying to bring viewpoints closer together,” he told The Media Line. “The sultanate of Oman has always been a mediator in conflicts and tries to resolve them through the negotiating table.”
He characterized the Omani environment as one with “complete confidentiality and freedom” without pressure exerted on any party.
Will the talks succeed?
Moqtada Maqdisi, an Iranian political analyst, said that Iran “resorts to war” only when attempts to seek negotiations and peace have failed. “We are not warmongers, but peaceniks,” he told The Media Line.
“The problem with these negotiations is that America is always threatening,” he continued. “You cannot use the carrot and stick approach against Iran. We are not a weak country, but a strong one, and we can repel any attacks against it. We have not been able to break the siege over the past years. We have fought long wars, and our internal front is cohesive.”
Maqdisi rejected the idea that Iran has lost regional influence. “The resistance is still present and will remain until all its goals are achieved. Hezbollah will regain its strength, Hamas will too, and the Houthi Ansar Allah are destroying ships that aid Israel in killing the Palestinian people. Iraq is still strong, and Iran is still strong,” he said.
“We have allies who will not abandon us,” Maqdisi said. “All countries reject President Donald Trump’s aggressive policy, and we have all seen how upset they are by his attempt to destabilize the global economy.”
The ball is now in America’s court, he said. “If it wants the negotiations to succeed, it must abandon its arrogance, respect Iran, and not attempt to impose any conditions on it. It must recognize that Iran is an important country in the region and the world, and deal with it accordingly,” he cautioned.
Saudi political analyst Khaled Al-Dosari expressed skepticism about how successful the negotiations will be. In the US, there’s clarity around the intended outcomes of the talks—getting Iran to halt its ballistic missile program, avoid obtaining nuclear weapons, and stop supporting armed groups in the region—but in Iran, there’s internal disagreement about the agenda, Al-Dosari said.
“Iran always uses negotiations to buy time. It always tries to evade and uses all means to achieve this. We may see an announcement from Tehran that it is close to fully enriching uranium, in order to gain more in these negotiations,” he added.
If Iran doesn’t take advantage of these negotiations, it will face the same fate as many of its proxies, he warned. “The US and Israel are very serious about preventing Tehran from continuing its approach, even if it costs them a war or an airstrike,” he said, noting that Israel has successfully carried out dozens of intelligence and assassination operations against Iran.
Iraqi political analyst Mohammed al-Najfi, on the other hand, predicted that the negotiations would succeed.
“Iran will make all the required concessions, given that it has lost everything in the region,” he said. “Hezbollah and Bashar Assad no longer exist. The militias in Iraq have disintegrated and fear Trump’s sanctions, and the Houthis in Yemen are receiving daily blows.”
Like Al-Dosari, he pointed to internal decisions within Iran. “Tehran will try to save itself, but the Iranian Revolutionary Guard may have other ideas,” he said. “And we may witness provocative operations from it in the Arabian Gulf during these negotiations, especially since it is the most hardline faction within the Iranian leadership, refuses to make any concessions, and believes that President Donald Trump must be punished for the killing of Iranian Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani in 2020.”