The summit meeting in Beijing between Donald Trump and Xi Jinping offered no resolution on the question of Iran. Xi pledged to help. But Chinese state media confirmed nothing.
Tehran responded by appointing a Revolutionary Guard hardliner as its point man on China. Three Gulf leaders then asked Trump to postpone a strike scheduled for the next day. He agreed. The U.S. military is still on standby.
Also this week: the war inside Iran’s own armed forces, the Gulf states that quietly struck back, and a 45-day ceasefire extension between Israel and Lebanon that resolved nothing.
Two of America’s most seasoned diplomats in the region join us this week on “The Diplomat” podcast. Ambassador Ryan Crocker’s greatest fear: Iran will overplay its hand.
Dalshad Hussein, Alex Willemyns, Sakina Abdalla, and Abubakar Siddique contributed to the Agenda this week.
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Washington Signals
After Beijing
The Trump-Xi summit has ended. Tehran responded by appointing a hardliner with credentials from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as its special representative for China affairs. Days later, three Gulf leaders asked Trump to hold off on a military strike scheduled for the following day.
Those three developments tell the story of what the Beijing summit actually produced.
President Donald Trump posted on Truth Social that Qatari Emir Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, and UAE President Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan had asked him to delay a planned military attack on Iran, citing serious negotiations underway. Trump said he agreed, but Washington is prepared for “a full, large-scale assault of Iran, on a moment’s notice” if a deal is not reached. His condition: “NO NUCLEAR WEAPONS FOR IRAN.”
MBN Iran Briefing Podcast
Expert conversations unpacking the latest developments in Iran and how they are reshaping security, energy markets, and geopolitics across the Middle East.
That post followed Trump’s visit to Beijing, where he told reporters that President Xi Jinping offered to help reopen the Strait of Hormuz and pledged that China would not provide military equipment to Iran. Chinese state media confirmed neither commitment.
A senior State Department official told MBN the gap was expected. “President Xi offered help on reopening the Strait of Hormuz and pledged that China would not provide military equipment to Iran. Those are positive statements. But we are realistic about what a summit readout can capture and what it cannot.”
What followed was the appointment of Iranian Parliamentary Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, who had participated in ceasefire talks with Washington, as Tehran’s point man on China. “That is not a signal of accommodation,” the official told MBN. “That is Tehran doubling down on its relationship with Beijing as a hedge against Washington.”
Three Gulf leaders are now publicly on record asking Washington not to strike Iran. The U.S. military is on standby. A lasting peace remains a distant goal.
Quote of the Day
“My experience with the Chinese is sometimes you get a lot of promises, but you gotta look for the follow-up.”
– U.S. Ambassador to China Nicholas Burns, speaking on CNN, May 14
Security Watch
Iran’s Other War
Mohammad Baqer Saad Dawood al-Saadi, an Iraqi militia commander now in FBI custody, has been charged with planning attacks on Jewish sites in the United States. Photo: U.S. Department of Justice
More than two months into the war, the feared wave of Iranian terrorist attacks has not materialized. But experts say that doesn’t mean the threat has passed.
Western counterterrorism officials are examining more than a dozen attacks or disrupted plots across North America and Europe since Feb. 28. On May 15, the United States Department of Justice indicted Mohammad Baqer Saad Dawood al-Saedi, believed to be a commander of Kataib Hezbollah, the Iran-backed Iraqi militia, for planning approximately 20 attacks on Jewish institutions across Europe and North America. Authorities link him to a previously unknown group called “Soldiers of the Right Hand,” connected to at least 11 plots in Britain, the Netherlands, France, and Belgium.
Britain raised its terrorism threat level to “very high” after a series of attacks. London’s Metropolitan Police deployed more than 100 counterterrorism officers to protect Jewish communities. MI5, Britain’s domestic intelligence service, said it had tracked more than 20 lethal Iranian-backed plots in a single year.
Matthew Levitt of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy told MBN that Iran is interested in raising the cost of the war through small attacks that pressure democratic societies without triggering a direct response. A Pentagon official told MBN the United States is still trying to determine whether Tehran is directing these incidents or whether groups are acting independently. “Frankly, no one can answer that right now,” the official said.
Not every analyst agrees. Alex Vatanka of the Middle East Institute told MBN that Iran does not currently see itself as desperate enough to rely on terrorism. “Terrorism is the act of the desperate small man who cannot drop bombs on you from 30,000 feet,” he said. “Iran does not see itself that way right now.”
Colin Clarke of the Soufan Center, a New York-based counterterrorism research organization, offered the final word. “The fundamental problem with a sleeper cell is that we do not know it exists until it starts operating.”
Read the full piece here.
Iran Watch
The War Inside
While American and Israeli strikes hit Iran from above, a second conflict was intensifying on the ground, between Iran’s own armed forces.
Three former Kurdish officers from the Iranian regular army, including a retired brigadier general, all currently residing inside Iran, told MBN that armed confrontations broke out between units of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and army personnel in at least six Iranian cities during the 40-day war that began on Feb. 28, resulting in casualties on both sides. Guard intelligence subsequently detained dozens of army officers. Many remain in custody.
This is not a new rivalry. It is an old one that has just gotten worse.
When revolutionary leader Ruhollah Khomeini founded the Revolutionary Guard in 1979, three months after coming to power, its explicit purpose was to protect the new Islamic Republic from a potential coup by the regular army, which revolutionary leaders distrusted for its ties to the deposed Shah. Over decades, the Guard expanded its control over Iran’s military, politics, and economy, accumulating vast resources while the regular army was left with aging equipment and limited funding. Resentment built quietly for years.
The death of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei in the February 28 strike removed the one figure who kept those tensions in check. “The divide between the Revolutionary Guards and the Iranian army has become even deeper in the absence of the supreme leader,” Fuad Abu Risala, secretary general of the Arab Front for the Liberation of Ahvaz, an Iranian Arab opposition group advocating for the rights of the Arab minority in southwestern Iran, told MBN. “The army is looking for an opportunity to free itself from the Guards, or perhaps to settle decades of marginalization.”
Researcher Lamar Arkandi, who specializes in extremist movements, put the stakes plainly. “Once fractures begin appearing within the security apparatus itself, Iran moves from a state of tension into a state of structural instability. That is far more dangerous for the regime than ordinary political dissent.”
Read the full investigative piece here
Gulf Watch
From Defense to Offense
The Gulf states are no longer on the sidelines. Three developments this week confirm it.
The Wall Street Journal reported that the United Arab Emirates carried out strikes against Iranian targets, including Iran’s Lavan Island, a strategic oil and military installation in the Persian Gulf, before the Apr. 7 ceasefire was declared, in retaliation for Iranian attacks on Emirati facilities. Reuters, citing two Western officials and two Iranian officials, reported that Saudi Arabia conducted undisclosed strikes inside Iran in response to Iranian attacks on the kingdom during the war, the first time the Saudis have struck Iranian territory directly. Kuwait announced the arrest of at least four members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps who were allegedly planning terrorist attacks on Bubiyan Island, Kuwait’s largest island, located along the country’s northern coast.
The three developments reveal a Gulf that is responding differently than it has in previous confrontations with Iran. Abu Dhabi is moving toward direct military retaliation. Riyadh struck Iran but has kept diplomatic channels open, seeking to contain the escalation. Kuwait is fighting an intelligence war on its own soil.
The Egyptian dimension adds another layer. Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi visited Egyptian fighter jets stationed in the UAE alongside UAE President Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan last week, touring what state media described as an Egyptian fighter detachment deployed to review “operational readiness.” The timing, during an active regional escalation, drew immediate attention.
Analysts are divided on what comes next. Kuwaiti journalist and former diplomat Khaled al-Tarrah told MBN that Gulf states have demonstrated a credible military deterrent. Major General Mohammed al-Qubayban said the presence of Egyptian jets and reported Israeli forces in the Emirates could point toward “limited and specialized military operations rather than a prolonged comprehensive war,” but warned that “any unilateral move outside the American umbrella” could carry dangerous consequences. Mohammed al-Wuhaib, a professor of political philosophy at Kuwait University, told MBN that Gulf policy remains focused on “cautious deterrence” rather than open confrontation.
The Gulf Cooperation Council’s Joint Defense Agreement, the regional mutual defense pact, stipulates that an attack on any member state constitutes an attack on all. Whether that clause is activated, and who decides, is the question the region has not yet had to answer.
The Pentagon announced this week that the cost of the Iran war has risen to roughly $29 billion, nearly $4 billion higher than estimates issued two weeks earlier.
Read the full reporting here
Featured Conversation
Between Chapters
The Iran war is paused, not closed. Two of America’s most experienced diplomats in the region sat down with me to read what is actually happening behind the headlines.
Ambassador Ryan Crocker served as United States Ambassador to Lebanon, Syria, Kuwait, Pakistan, Iraq, and Afghanistan. Ambassador Susan Ziyadeh served as the United States Ambassador to Qatar and held senior postings across the Gulf and the Levant.
On whether the U.S.-Iran talks are actually negotiations: “What is happening is not a negotiation. It is messages being passed through the Pakistanis. Nothing more.” — Ambassador Crocker
On what a realistic deal looks like: “Free and unrestricted navigation through the Strait of Hormuz, as was the case on February 27th, in return for a lifting of the American blockade. Hardly a victory for either side, but it is the only way I can see for getting a semi-secure situation in the Gulf that would permit negotiations to resume.” — Ambassador Crocker
On what Gulf capitals are hoping from the Trump-Xi summit: “They are hoping that the Chinese can inject a sense of realism into the situation. They have tried in many ways to voice their reasons to the president. And you see in their dealings how they are engaging quietly with Iran, because at the end of the day, geography triumphs. This is the neighborhood.” — Ambassador Ziyadeh
On Crocker’s greatest fear: “My greatest fear right now is that Iran will overplay its hand.” — Ambassador Crocker
Joe Kawly
Joe Kawly is Washington Bureau Chief for MBN and a global affairs journalist with more than twenty years covering U.S. foreign policy and Middle East politics.
A CNN Journalism Fellow and Georgetown University graduate, he reports from Washington at the intersection of power and diplomacy, explaining how decisions made in the U.S. capital shape events across the Arab world.
