Arduous search for elusive peace

Arduous search for elusive peace | Daily Tribune

Iran’s 10-point proposal is a maximalist opening bid. It demands not merely a cessation of hostilities but a comprehensive restructuring of American power in the Middle East — the withdrawal of US forces from the region, the lifting of all primary and secondary sanctions, formal recognition of Iran’s right to enrich uranium, Iranian control over the Strait of Hormuz, compensation for war damages, and the termination of both UN Security Council and IAEA resolutions.

Taken together, these demands would amount to a historic American capitulation — something no administration in Washington, regardless of political stripe, could realistically accept.

President Trump has already signaled his rejection of key provisions, calling some demands “not good enough.” The United States maintains absolute red lines against Iranian uranium enrichment, and the idea of compensating Iran for a war that Trump sees Tehran itself having provoked through proxy aggression would face insurmountable political resistance at home. The likelihood of the US agreeing to all 10 points is, bluntly, near zero.

The Lebanon question is equally intractable. Israel’s position — that there will be no ceasefire with Lebanon until Hezbollah is fully disarmed — collides head-on with political reality.

Hezbollah is not merely a militia but a deeply embedded political, social, and military force that the Lebanese government neither controls nor can meaningfully confront.

A senior Hezbollah official has already dismissed any notion that Beirut speaks for the group.

For Israel to cease attacks, it demands a condition — Hezbollah’s disarmament — that Lebanon’s government is virtually incapable of delivering.

Meanwhile, Israel Prime Minister Netanyahu’s simultaneous offer to begin talks and promise to continue striking “with force” reflects a logical contradiction at the heart of Israeli strategy: negotiating while bombing rarely produces the goodwill necessary for diplomacy to succeed.

The Strait of Hormuz compounds everything. Iran’s claim that the waterway is “open” while requiring ships to coordinate with its military — in waters reportedly seeded with mines — is a semantic fiction.

Control of the strait gives Iran its most powerful economic lever and relinquishing that leverage, even partially, runs against every instinct of a regime fighting for its survival and regional influence. A genuine demilitarization of the strait would require international monitoring mechanisms that Iran has historically rejected.

Thus, the world sees the Pakistan-hosted peace talks this weekend as facing enormous structural disadvantages. Iran has threatened to boycott if Lebanon remains outside the ceasefire umbrella. European allies are openly pressuring Israel to stop its strikes, straining the transatlantic coalition. And the fundamental asymmetry of interests — Iran seeking recognition and legitimacy, Israel seeking security, the US seeking regional stability without strategic retreat — makes a comprehensive agreement within a short timeframe essentially impossible.

Yet history occasionally surprises. The ceasefire itself, however shaky, would have seemed improbable months ago. The very fact that Pakistan is hosting talks suggests regional actors are motivated to find off-ramps. Economic exhaustion on all sides — Iran’s sanctions-battered economy, Israel’s strained society, America’s war-weary public — creates genuine incentives for de-escalation.

Lasting peace, however, is a different and far more demanding objective altogether. It requires not just the silencing of guns but the resolution of Iran’s nuclear program, the political transformation of Lebanon, a Palestinian settlement, and a fundamental renegotiation of American power in the region. None of that will likely emerge from a weekend summit in Islamabad.

What is realistically achievable now is a durable pause, a managed de-escalation that prevents catastrophic re-escalation, while longer-term frameworks are slowly built.

That, in itself, would be no small achievement in a region where pauses have so often collapsed into renewed catastrophe. Peace, if it comes at all, will be built in years and decades — not in a single weekend.