The United States and Iran are scheduled to sign an initial agreement in Geneva on Friday to end the war against Iran, begin a 60-day negotiation process and reopen the Strait of Hormuz.
Pakistan, which has led the way in mediating peace talks, will host the signing in Switzerland.
But neither side has yet released details of the agreement, so it is unclear how far Iran and the United States have reached agreement on key issues, or even whether they will discuss them in future talks.
US President Donald Trump has indicated that Iran’s nuclear program will be part of the final deal, but has made no mention of other previous US demands, such as dismantling Iran’s ballistic missile program and ending support for regional proxy armed groups.
“The only thing that really matters to me is that Iran will never have a nuclear weapon, and that’s clearly stated,” President Trump told reporters at the Group of Seven (G7) summit in France on Tuesday.
President Trump added that if Iran tries to acquire nuclear weapons, “hell will rain on us.”
Relations between the United States and Iran have been fractured and in turmoil since President Trump took office in 2015, when he withdrew from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), the nuclear deal with Iran.
When President Trump withdrew the U.S. from the JCPOA, a mid-June 2018 Gallup poll showed his approval rating at about 45 percent, matching or close to Trump’s previous high. However, a Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted in June found his approval rating at just 35%, near an all-time low in the poll.
Here’s how relations between Iran and the US have deteriorated under the Trump administration.
May 2018: US withdraws from JCPOA
On May 8, President Trump announced that the United States would withdraw from the JCPOA, the Iran nuclear deal signed with several countries including Iran in 2015, fulfilling a campaign promise. European Union, China, France, Germany, Russia, and the United Kingdom.
The deal, brokered by then-U.S. President Barack Obama, capped uranium enrichment at Iran’s Fordow nuclear facility at 3.67 percent. This is enough for energy production, but far from weapons-grade. Iran also agreed to “convert” the Fordow facility into a nuclear, physics and technology center in exchange for not storing nuclear materials there. In return, the United States and other Western countries lifted sanctions on Iran.
The agreement took several years to negotiate and included input from nuclear experts. Even though independent inspections confirmed that Iran stuck to its side of the deal in subsequent years, President Trump described it as a “terrible deal” without going into specific details about what he didn’t like.
“I’ve made it clear that the United States is no longer a party to the agreement unless it can be amended,” Trump said.
“The Iran deal is fundamentally flawed.”
After the US withdrew, Iran called Trump’s actions “unacceptable” and said it would bypass the US and negotiate with other signatories to the deal.
On May 21, the U.S. government issued new demands for Iran to make fundamental changes, ranging from completely abandoning its nuclear program to withdrawing from the war in Syria, or face tough economic sanctions.
The Trump administration offered a total of 12 demands, outlined by then-U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. These were rejected by Tehran.
August 2018: US imposes new sanctions on Iran
On August 7, the United States imposed the first round of new sanctions against Iran, which had previously been lifted as part of the international nuclear deal. The sanctions barred transactions with a wide range of Iranian business and production sectors, from aviation to carpets to pistachios to gold.
November 2018: US imposes additional sanctions
On November 5, the United States announced new sanctions, this time specifically targeting Iran’s major oil and banking sectors.
April 2019: President Trump designates the Revolutionary Guards as a “foreign terrorist organization”
On April 8, President Trump designated Iran’s elite parallel force, the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), as a “foreign terrorist organization” (FTO), marking the first time that the U.S. government has officially designated the military of another country as a “terrorist” group.
This designation led to broad economic and travel sanctions against the Revolutionary Guards under U.S. law. In retaliation, the Iranian government labeled Washington a “state sponsor of terrorism” and called Washington’s military presence in the region a “terrorist group.” The United States has 19 military bases in the Middle East, with 40,000 to 50,000 soldiers stationed there.
May 2019: Iran withdraws from JCPOA
On May 5, President Trump’s National Security Advisor John Bolton announced that the United States would send an aircraft carrier strike group and US Air Force bombers to the Middle East “in response to a number of alarming and escalating signals and warnings.”
Three days later, Iran also announced that it would withdraw from the JCPOA. Iran has said it is preparing to increase production of enriched uranium and heavy water to levels exceeding limits set in the nuclear deal.
This was followed by a series of regional land and sea attacks blamed on Tehran.
In December 2019, a rocket attack on an Iraqi military base killed a U.S. contractor and injured several U.S. service members along with an Iraqi serviceman. U.S. officials blamed the Iranian-backed Iraqi militant group Kataib Hezbollah for the attack.
That same month, U.S. forces retaliated by attacking Kataib Hezbollah strongholds in Iraq and Syria.
January 2020: Assassination of Qassem Soleimani
On January 3, 2020, the US military assassinated Qassem Soleimani, commander of the Revolutionary Guard’s elite Quds Force, in a drone strike while he was in Baghdad. The White House said this was done to thwart future plans to attack Iran and accused Soleimani of “actively developing plans to attack U.S. diplomats and military personnel in Iraq and throughout the region.”
On January 9, 2020, President Trump said Soleimani was killed “because he was trying to blow up our embassy” in Baghdad.
The US also threatened to attack Iranian facilities if Iran attacks US or assets in the region.
In March 2020, a rocket attack on the Taji military base near Baghdad, where U.S. and coalition forces are stationed, killed three soldiers belonging to the U.S.-led coalition. The US has imposed new sanctions on Iran.
On June 29, 2020, the Iranian government issued arrest warrants for President Trump and several of his aides over Soleimani’s murder.
In retaliation for the assassination, Iran also fired a barrage of missiles at military bases in Iraq housing thousands of American and Iraqi troops. More than 100 U.S. service members suffered traumatic brain injuries, according to the Pentagon.
The Revolutionary Guard reportedly shot down a Ukrainian airliner shortly after takeoff from Tehran International Airport, mistaking it for a US cruise missile. All 176 passengers and crew were killed.
2021: Biden resumes diplomacy
Democrat Joe Biden won the 2020 US presidential election, and in April 2021, Iran and the US began indirect negotiations in Vienna, Austria over how to restore the nuclear deal. These and other talks between the Iranian government and European countries have failed to produce a breakthrough.
Previously, in July 2020, a mysterious explosion destroyed a centrifuge manufacturing plant at Iran’s Natanz nuclear enrichment facility. Iran condemned the attack on Israel. In April 2021, Natanz was attacked again in an attack widely believed to be by Israel. That same month, Iran began enriching uranium up to 60 percent. This is the highest purity in history, and technically a fairly short step from 90 percent weapons-grade.
February 2025: President Trump “restores maximum pressure” on Iran
Shortly after President Trump took office for his second term, the White House announced that he had signed a National Security Presidential Memorandum reinstating “maximum pressure” on Tehran, aimed at “denying Iran any path to a nuclear weapon and countering Iran’s negative influence abroad.” The memo lacked details on what this meant, but President Trump suggested the measures could be harsh.
The US president has made it clear that he is reluctant to threaten force and instead seeks a negotiated diplomatic solution.
May 2025: President Trump says the US and Iran are close to a nuclear deal
During President Trump’s trip to the Gulf in May 2025, his diplomatic stance appeared to be in place. President Trump said the United States has been engaged in “very serious negotiations with Iran toward long-term peace.” He added that the United States and the Iranian government had agreed “in some way” to the terms of the nuclear deal.
“We’re probably close to a deal… There are two steps to doing this. There’s a very, very nice step and there’s a violent step, and I don’t want to do the latter,” he said.
Just two days after claiming he was close to a deal with Iran on nuclear weapons, President Trump went on the offensive on social media, writing, “Let no one be fooled! The hundreds of attacks by the Houthis, the evil Yemeni-based mobs and thugs hated by the Yemeni people, all emanate from and are produced by Iran,” Trump wrote.
Tensions have been high for months over Israel’s war in Gaza, with Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthis launching attacks on Israeli-affiliated ships and Israel’s homeland in the Red Sea.
But on May 28, President Trump appeared to reverse his stance again, saying he had told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to refrain from attacking Iran because “we are so close to a (diplomatic) solution (on Iran’s nuclear status) that it would be inappropriate to do so now.”
June 2025: 12 Days War
On June 13, Israel launched an attack on Iran. For 12 days, they attacked nuclear facilities, military facilities, and other government facilities. On June 22, the United States entered the war and attacked three Iranian nuclear facilities.
Iran responded to the U.S. attack by targeting military bases in Qatar housing U.S. forces, causing limited damage. The next day, President Trump announced a ceasefire in the war.
December 2025: New protests erupt in Iran
Protests erupted in Iran after the Iranian rial plummeted to an all-time low of 1.42 million rials to the dollar, exacerbating inflationary pressures and raising the prices of food and other daily necessities.
In January 2026, President Trump called off talks with Iranian officials and said he assured Iranians that unspecified “help is on the way.”
February 2026: War between the US and Israel against Iran begins
On February 28, Israel and the United States launched an attack on Tehran, killing Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Khamenei in the first moments of the conflict, sparking a war.
