Trump Agrees to Ceasefire With Iran, Backs Off Threat of Sweeping Strikes

President Donald Trump announced that he has agreed to a proposal for a two-week ceasefire with Iran, stepping back from his earlier threats of potentially devastating strikes that he had warned could result in the death of a “whole civilization.”

Read more: Would Trump’s Threatened Attacks on Iran’s Infrastructure Be a War Crime?

The abrupt pivot came just two hours before an 8 p.m. deadline he imposed for Iran to meet a set of demands centered on reopening the Strait of Hormuz, the strategic waterway through which roughly a fifth of the world’s oil supply passes.

In a post on Truth Social, Trump said he would suspend its attacks on Iran for two weeks if the Iranian leaders agreed “to the COMPLETE, IMMEDIATE, and SAFE OPENING of the Strait of Hormuz,” a framework that Pakistani officials proposed. 

Iran agrees to a ceasefire and talks

Iran’s Supreme National Security Council said in a statement that it had accepted the two-week ceasefire and would participate in talks with the U.S., though it noted the pause did not amount to a permanent end to the war.

“If attacks against Iran are halted, our Powerful Armed Forces will cease their defensive operations,” the statement said. “For a period of two weeks, safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz will be possible via coordination with Iran’s Armed Forces and with due consideration of technical limitations.”

The ceasefire marked a sudden de-escalation after a day of extraordinary threats in which Trump warned that “a whole civilization will die tonight” if Iran did not agree to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. Since the early weeks of the war, Iran has effectively choked off traffic through the passage, triggering a global energy shock that has sent fuel prices soaring and rattled financial markets.

Trump had previously suggested the United States could rapidly destroy Iran’s bridges, power plants, and other infrastructure—a campaign that military and legal experts warned could devastate civilian life in a nation of roughly 85 million people and risk violating international law. 

Why did Trump pull back?

The decision to walk back his threat underscored a familiar pattern in Trump’s presidency: issuing maximalist threats, only to recalibrate as the risks of carrying them out come into sharper focus. It also reflected the competing pressures bearing down on a White House that has spent weeks edging closer to a wider war while searching for a way out of it.

TIME previously reported that Trump has grown increasingly eager to find an off-ramp. Polling has shown declining public support for the war, while rising fuel prices and market volatility have alarmed Republican lawmakers ahead of the midterm elections. At the same time, the President has been reluctant to end the conflict without being able to claim a decisive victory.

By Tuesday evening, that off-ramp appeared to materialize in part through mediation by Pakistani officials. Trump said that he made his decision after speaking with Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and army chief Gen. Asim Munir, who urged him to delay military action and proposed the two-week ceasefire framework that became the basis of the agreement.

“Pakistan, in all sincerity, requests the Iranian brothers to open Strait of Hormuz for a corresponding period of two weeks as a goodwill gesture,” Sharif wrote in a message on social media just hours before the ceasefire was announced. 

Most significant pause since conflict began

The ceasefire marks the most significant pause in a war that began on Feb. 28, when the United States and Israel launched a sweeping campaign against Iran’s military leadership, nuclear program and strategic infrastructure. Iran has responded with missile and drone attacks across the region, including strikes on Israel and Gulf Arab states, while using its control over the Strait of Hormuz to disrupt global shipping and drive up economic pressure.

While Trump has at various points declared the U.S. already “won” the war, he has also argued that the conflict cannot end until the Strait is reopened. 

The conflict appeared to be edging closer to a dangerous new phase as U.S. and Israeli forces carried out additional strikes on Iranian targets Tuesday, including military infrastructure on Kharg Island, while Iran fired missiles toward regional adversaries.

In Tehran and other cities, some residents formed human chains around bridges and power plants in symbolic acts of protection.

Iran had previously rejected a 45-day ceasefire proposal advanced by regional mediators, insisting that any agreement must ultimately lead to a permanent end to hostilities, rather than a temporary pause.

The two week ceasefire buys time for what Trump described in his post as a “definitive Agreement concerning Longterm PEACE,” though the contours of such a deal remain unclear. Trump said that Iran had presented a “workable” 10-point proposal and that “almost all” major points of contention had been resolved in principle, suggesting that negotiators were close to a breakthrough.