President Donald Trump said Tuesday the US military campaign against Iran may be winding down within weeks, even as strikes on Iranian cities continued and Tehran signalled conditional willingness to halt the fighting.
Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office, Trump estimated American forces could be out of Iran in “two weeks, maybe three,” while insisting the mission was not yet finished. “We want to knock out every single thing they have,” he said. “But we’re finishing the job.” He left open the possibility of a negotiated exit before that timeline, adding that “it’s possible that we’ll make a deal before that.”
Tehran, for its part, offered its clearest public signal yet that it wants the war to end. Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian told European Council President António Costa that Tehran has the “necessary will” to reach a ceasefire — provided its adversaries guarantee the fighting would not resume. The condition echoes Iran’s earlier counterproposal to a 15-point American framework, which demanded a binding mechanism preventing both Israel and the United States from returning to military action.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi told Al Jazeera that communication with US envoy Steve Witkoff is ongoing. “I still receive messages from Steve Witkoff, directly, as before,” he said, “and this does not mean that we are in negotiations.” Washington has not publicly identified who it is engaging with in Iran, while Tehran denies being party to any formal talks.
Financial markets responded to the prospect of an end to the month-long conflict: US stocks surged, and Brent crude futures fell 3.2 percent to close at $103.97 per barrel.
Trump has repeatedly shifted his position on whether the United States intends to escalate — potentially through ground deployments — or pursue a diplomatic exit. On Monday, he threatened to destroy Iran’s oil infrastructure, including its Kharg Island export terminal and possibly water desalination facilities, if a deal was not reached.
On Tuesday, heavy strikes hit Tehran and the central city of Isfahan. Iranian media reported damage to two steel complexes, a Shia religious centre in Zanjan, and a facility that produces cancer medications and anaesthetics — claims AFP could not independently verify.
Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth, speaking after a visit to US troops in the region, said “the upcoming days will be decisive. Iran knows that, and there’s almost nothing they can militarily do about it.”
The war began February 28, when Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu launched the campaign that killed Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, setting off a wave of retaliatory strikes across the region. In a televised address on the eve of Passover, Netanyahu said Israeli forces “will continue to crush the terror regime” in Tehran. “We had to act, and we acted,” he said. “We have changed the face of the Middle East.”
Trump also used the moment to distance the United States from any future role in securing the Strait of Hormuz, which Iran has blockaded and through which roughly one-fifth of global oil normally passes. Countries that rely on the waterway should not count on American protection, he said. “The U.S.A. won’t be there to help you anymore, just like you weren’t there for us,” he wrote on Truth Social. “Iran has been, essentially, decimated. The hard part is done. Go get your own oil!”
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards separately threatened to target infrastructure linked to major American technology companies — including Google, Meta, Apple, Intel, Tesla, and Palantir — starting Wednesday, if further Iranian leaders were killed. The Guards accused 18 named firms of complicity in prior assassinations, warning they “should expect the destruction of their relevant units in exchange for every assassination in Iran.”
Israel meanwhile kept up its campaign against Iranian-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon, where four Israeli soldiers were killed in the south Tuesday. Lebanese health ministry figures put the country’s death toll above 1,200, with more than a million people displaced. Early Wednesday, seven people were killed in Israeli strikes on south Beirut and a nearby area; the Israeli military said it had targeted a senior Hezbollah commander and another senior operative.
For civilians caught in the Iranian capital, the rhythm of ordinary life has become increasingly difficult to hold onto. “When I make it to a cafe table, even for a few minutes, I can almost believe the world hasn’t ended,” said Fatemeh, 27, a dental assistant who spoke to AFP via a messaging app from Paris. “And then I go back home, back to the reality of living through war, with all its darkness and weight.”
