Dubai — The Trump administration has presented a 15-point ceasefire proposal to Iran through Pakistani intermediaries, offering to host renewed negotiations, a person briefed on the plan said. According to two Pakistani officials who spoke to The Associated Press, the package addresses sanctions relief, civilian nuclear cooperation, a rollback of parts of Iran’s nuclear program, International Atomic Energy Agency monitoring, missile limits and guarantees for shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.
The move comes as the US bolsters forces in the region, sending at least 1,000 additional troops from the 82nd Airborne Division to supplement roughly 50,000 already deployed and two Marine Expeditionary Units that would add about 5,000 Marines and sailors.
Iran has repeatedly said it is not negotiating with Washington. In a pre-recorded statement aired on state television, Lt. Col. Ebrahim Zolfaghari, a spokesperson for Iran’s Khatam Al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, dismissed the US initiative, saying Americans were effectively negotiating among themselves and asserting that Iran would not reach terms with the United States. He characterized US strategic power as diminished and warned against portraying defeat as an agreement.
President Donald Trump has said the US is in talks with Tehran and told reporters that Iran had offered a cryptic “present” related to oil and gas as a sign that negotiators were engaged with the right counterparts, without providing further detail.
Violence continued across the region. Iranian forces launched about a dozen missile salvos at Israel; Israeli Brig. Gen. Effie Defrin said launches were heavier during the initial days but subsided after Israeli strikes on military headquarters, launch sites and missile production facilities inside Iran. One missile armed with cluster munitions detonated over Lebanon’s Keserwan region — the first reported interception of an Iranian missile over Lebanese airspace in the current fighting — causing some material damage, a Lebanese official said.
An Iranian missile strike in central Israel damaged an apartment floor in Bnei Brak; emergency services reported one man moderately wounded and six people lightly injured. Impacts were reported in at least seven other central Israeli locations.
Iran’s atomic energy agency said a projectile struck the grounds of the Bushehr nuclear power plant; it reported no casualties or technical damage, and the International Atomic Energy Agency confirmed it had been notified.
Israel’s UN ambassador, Danny Danon, said Israel was not part of any reported US-Iran talks and would continue coordinating military operations with the United States. Reports that Iran’s parliamentary speaker, Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, had been proposed as a US contact were denied by Qalibaf, and observers note questions about his influence amid fractures in Iran’s leadership.
Global leaders urged restraint and dialogue. The pope renewed appeals for a ceasefire and humanitarian relief; UN Secretary-General António Guterres condemned settlement expansion and moves toward West Bank annexation; and French President Emmanuel Macron urged Iran to engage in good-faith negotiations, halt attacks on regional targets, protect energy and civilian infrastructure, and restore freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz.
AP reporting contributed to this account.
