US, Iran agree to two-week ceasefire as Trump seizes diplomatic offramp
Wednesday, 8 April 2026
The United States and Iran have agreed to a two week ceasefire which includes the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz.
US President Donald Trump pulled back on his threats to launch devastating strikes on Iran late Tuesday, swerving to deescalate the war less than two hours before the deadline he set for Tehran to capitulate or else a “whole civilisation will die.”
He said Iran had proposed a “workable” 10-point peace plan that could help end the war launched by the U.S. and Israel in February, but he later called it fraudulent without elaborating. Neither Iran nor the US said when the ceasefire would begin.
Iran’s Supreme National Security Council said it would negotiate with the United States in Islamabad beginning Friday.
“It is emphasised that this does not signify the termination of the war,” its statement said. “Our hands remain upon the trigger, and should the slightest error be committed by the enemy, it shall be met with full force.”
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Pro-government demonstrators in the streets of Iran’s capital Wednesday morning after the ceasefire was announced screamed: “Death to America, death to Israel, death to compromisers!”
Organisers tried at one point to calm demonstrators, but they continued the chants.
They also burned American and Israeli flags in the street.
It shows the ongoing anger from hard-liners, who had been preparing for what many assumed would be an apocalyptical battle with the U.S.
When does the ceasefire start?
Neither Iran nor the United States has offered any time for the ceasefire to begin. A US official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military operations, said American forces had halted offensive operations. Iran continued to fire at Gulf Arab states and Israel, despite Pakistan saying the ceasefire had immediately taken hold.
What does it mean for the Strait?
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said passage through the strait would be allowed for the next two weeks under Iranian military management.
Part of the Iranian peace proposal was charging US$2m per ship to pass the strait.
The foreign minister said that ships would be allowed to pass through the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf, over the next two weeks under coordination from Iran’s military.
About a fifth of the world’s oil transits the strait in peacetime.
Araghchi wrote in a statement that: “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.”
Before the war, there were no “technical limitations.” Over 100 ships a day passed through the water in Iranian and Omani territorial waters in a decades-old traffic system.
The two-week ceasefire plan includes allowing both Iran and Oman to charge fees on ships transiting through the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf, a regional official said Wednesday.
The official said Iran would use the money it raised for reconstruction. It wasn’t immediately clear what Oman would use its money for.
The strait is in the territorial waters of both Oman and Iran. The world had considered the passage an international waterway and never paid tolls before.
The official, who had been directly involved in the negotiations, spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.
World reacts
In a statement Wednesday morning, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said it supports Trump’s decision to suspend strikes against Iran for two weeks, but that it doesn’t include the war with Hezbollah in Lebanon.
It said the ceasefire is subject to Iran immediately opening the Strait of Hormuz and stopping all attacks on the U.S., Israel and countries in the region.
The statement said Israel also supports U.S. efforts to ensure Iran no longer poses a nuclear or missile threat.
The Australian government says it “welcomes the agreement by the United States, Israel and Iran to a two-week ceasefire to negotiate a resolution to the conflict in the Middle East.”
“The Australian government has been calling for de-escalation and an end to the conflict for some time now,” Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Foreign Minister Penny Wong said in a joint statement Wednesday.
“Iran’s de facto closure of the Strait of Hormuz, coupled with its attacks on commercial vessels, civilian infrastructure, and oil and gas facilities, is causing unprecedented energy supply shocks and impacting oil and fuel prices,” they added.
They said Australia had been working with international partners in support of diplomatic efforts to reopen the Strait of Hormuz so critical supplies can flow to those who need it, including the most vulnerable.
In Japan Minoru Kihara, Japan’s chief cabinet secretary, said his nation “welcomes the announcement as a positive development. We hope they reach an agreement.”
NZ Prime Minister Christopher Luxon said it was a welcome development, while Foreign Minister Winston Peters said it was encouraging.
Earlier Trump threats raised alarms
In a post on his social media site, Trump said that he would suspend attacks on Iran for two weeks provided Tehran agreed “to the COMPLETE, IMMEDIATE, and SAFE OPENING' of the strait.
Even as the ceasefire was announced, missile alerts continued in the United Arab Emirates and Israel early Wednesday, hinting at the chaos surrounding the diplomatic moves.
Since the war began, Trump has repeatedly backed off deadlines just before they expire.
In doing so again Tuesday, Trump said he had come to the decision “based on conversations” with Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Gen. Asim Munir, Pakistan’s powerful army chief. Sharif, in a post on X hours earlier, urged Trump to extend his deadline by two weeks to allow diplomacy to advance. He used the same post to ask Iran to open the strait for two weeks.
The president said in his social media post that Iran has presented “a workable basis on which to negotiate.”
“Almost all of the various points of past contention have been agreed to between the United States and Iran, but a two week period will allow the Agreement to be finalized and consummated,” Trump said.
Trump keeps an off-ramp open
“A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again,” if a deal isn’t reached, Trump said in an online post Tuesday morning. But he also seemed to keep open the possibility of an off-ramp, saying that “maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen.”
Earlier, Iranian official Alireza Rahimi issued a video message calling on “all young people, athletes, artists, students and university students and their professors” to form human chains around power plants.
Iranians have formed human chains in the past around nuclear sites at times of heightened tensions with the West. State media posted videos online that showed hundreds of flag-waving people massed at two bridges and at a power plant hundreds of kilometers (miles) from Tehran, though it was not clear how widespread the practice was.
“They’re not allowed to do that,” Trump said in a phone call with NBC News.
A general in Iran's Revolutionary Guard general warned that Iran would “deprive the U.S. and its allies of the region’s oil and gas for years” and expand its attacks across the Gulf region if Trump carries out his threat.
In Tehran, the mood was bleak. A young teacher said that many opponents of Iran's Islamic system had hoped Trump's attacks would quickly topple it. As the war drags on, she fears U.S. and Israeli strikes will spread chaos.
“If we don’t have the internet, and if we don’t have electricity, water, and gas, we’re really going back to the Stone Age, as Trump said,” she told The Associated Press, speaking on the condition of anonymity for her safety.