Staff Reports
Two big moves rattled the Middle East this week: President Donald Trump publicly pressed for a sweeping expansion of the Abraham Accords as part of any Iran deal, and Tehran — after months of near-total internet blackout — allowed a partial reopening. One is a diplomatic power play. The other is a raw measure of how badly ordinary Iranians have been squeezed.
Trump’s hard sell on normalizing Israel across the region
President Trump didn’t whisper this in back channels. He posted on Truth Social and phoned regional leaders, saying he was “mandatorily requesting” countries from Saudi Arabia to Pakistan to sign the Abraham Accords and tie their participation to any agreement with Iran. It was bold, blunt and, predictably, met more than a little resistance—Pakistan outright rejected the demand, and Saudi Arabia reminded Washington that Riyadh wants progress on Palestinian statehood before moving forward.
That tells you everything you need to know: diplomacy isn’t a shopping list you can mark “mandatory” and expect checkout. Asking governments with complex domestic politics and public opposition to Israel to sign up on command is the fastest route to turning a potential quiet ceasefire into a public-relations and policy nightmare.
Iran’s internet flickers back on — and the damage is clear
Meanwhile, Tehran signaled a phased reopening of international internet access after roughly 88 days of shutdown, with traffic metrics showing a measurable uptick from near-zero levels. Former U.S. Iran envoy Brian Hook told Fox viewers the blackout was devastating, citing estimates that as many as a million people had been put out of work — a figure echoed in several reports, even as some outlets put the toll higher when indirect effects are counted.
That’s not abstract. Imagine businesses that relied on online payments, marketplaces, or remote services suddenly frozen for months — payrolls missed, suppliers unpaid, savings gone. For many Iranians the blackout wasn’t a patriotic sacrifice; it was a slow economic choke that made life harder and resentment easier to fuel.
Diplomacy, leverage, and real-world consequences
Linking regional normalization to an Iran deal could be clever politics if everyone played along. But they won’t. Pakistan’s Defence Minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif said the idea “clashes with our fundamental ideologies,” and Riyadh has publicly tied any move to a credible Palestinian outcome. Pressing for a mass sign-on risks turning a narrowly tailored negotiation into a sweeping demand that leaves no room for compromise.
At the same time, Iran’s partial reopening of the internet matters to negotiators. Restoring connectivity relieves economic pressure and gives protesters and business owners more breathing room — and it signals Tehran might be trying to lower domestic heat as talks proceed. That could make Iran more willing to talk, or it could be a tactical pause; either way, real people are the ones paying the price.
So ask yourself: do you want a deal that stitches a fragile ceasefire into a regional peace by consent, or a list of demands declared “mandatory” on social media? There’s a difference between leveraging momentum and pretending you can sign up countries like items on a menu. The lives of ordinary Iranians and the stability of an entire region hang in the balance — and someone needs to decide whether politics or practical statecraft will guide the next move.
