US and Iran have “agreed” upon a ceasefire in principle, but it seems it is open to interpretation. The negotiations have not been unequivocal. Apparently, all parties are to blame—the warring nations and, most of all, the cunning mediator Pakistan, who is desperate to make the ceasefire happen, not out of the goodness of heart, but that is its last chance to get back into the game of global machinations, and, therefore, its last chance at any modicum of international relevance.
Iran opened the Strait of Hormuz in the wake of the ceasefire announcement by US President Donald Trump, but then closed it since Israel continued to pound several cities in Lebanon, including Beirut in its hunt for Hezbollah, Iran’s proxy that attacked Israel earlier. Iran says Lebanon was part of its 10-points conveyed to the US. US and Israel claim they did not agree on anything Lebanon.
Something, certainly, got lost in translation, and/or deliberately omitted by Pakistan in its go-between the two States.
Pakistan, it seems, is selling to both US and Iran what they would and like to buy, not telling the other side what has been bought or what it has sold. In a way, Pakistan is running with the hare, and attempting to hunt with the hound.
Quite ironically, while Shehbaz Sharif expressed concerns over ceasefire “violations” from the conflict zone, since these instances “undermine the spirit of peace process”, it has not come forward to explain as to how the two sides read the text of the ceasefire agreement wrong over the issue of Lebanon. Did Shehbaz Sharif share different versions of the agreement with the two sides?
Earlier, it was Sharif who had gloated on X that all parties had come to a ceasefire arrangement, Lebanon included. “With the greatest humility, I am pleased to announce that the Islamic Republic of Iran and the United States of America, along with their allies, have agreed to an immediate ceasefire everywhere including Lebanon and elsewhere, EFFECTIVE IMMEDIATELY.”
Perhaps, Iran too was dismayed and confused after Israel continued to punish Lebanon despite a two-week ceasefire announcement. Foreign Minister Seyed Araghchi quoted Shehbaz Sharif’s X post to express his anger at the US-Israel complex.
“The Iran–U.S. Ceasefire terms are clear and explicit: the U.S. must choose—ceasefire or continued war via Israel. It cannot have both. The world sees the massacres in Lebanon. The ball is in the U.S. court, and the world is watching whether it will act on its commitments,” Araghci wrote on X, quoting Sharif’s post and highlighting the “including Lebanon” in yellow.
Sharif was all the more left red-faced after White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt publicly declared in a press conference that Lebanon had never been part of the truce conditions. “Lebanon is not part of the ceasefire. That has been related to all parties involved in the ceasefire,” Leavitt says during a press briefing.