With a pivotal round of nuclear discussions set for Saturday in Oman, the United States has stepped up pressure on Iran, demanding that talks address Tehran’s weapons program decisively and without delay. The message, delivered by US envoy Morgan Ortagus in an interview with Saudi outlet Al Arabiya, underscores Washington’s sharpened impatience with the Islamic Republic’s history of prolonging negotiations as it steadily advances its nuclear and regional agendas.
For years, the Iranian regime has pursued parallel tracks: holding protracted diplomatic engagements with the West while continuing to expand uranium enrichment and invest heavily in its ballistic missile and drone capabilities. According to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Iran’s enriched uranium stockpiles now vastly exceed permitted limits, and Western intelligence estimates place Tehran within weeks or months of attaining “breakout” capacity—a technical point at which producing a nuclear weapon becomes a matter of political will rather than engineering challenge.
Ortagus, speaking on behalf of the US diplomatic delegation, stressed Washington’s unwillingness to accept the status quo. “If we’re going to negotiate, it has to be fast. It has to be serious about dismantling their nuclear weapons program.” Her demand marks a departure from prior rounds of extended diplomacy and reflects bipartisan pressure in Washington to enforce red lines and restore deterrence. The US administration, supported by Congress, has signaled that continued stalling by Tehran will be met with increased sanctions and the possibility of more direct action, if necessary.
Oman, whose neutral diplomacy has helped facilitate dialogue dating back to the secret talks that precipitated the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), will again serve as the venue. Unlike previous years, however, the regional context has shifted dramatically. Since the US withdrawal from the JCPOA in 2018 and the subsequent collapse of most monitoring mechanisms, Iran has deepened its military cooperation with Russia, supplied advanced drones used in Ukraine, and ramped up support for terror proxies including Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis, all components of what Israeli and Western officials call “the axis of resistance.”
The October 7, 2023 massacre carried out by Hamas in southern Israel, guided and armed by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), remains a turning point in global consciousness. The attack, explicitly designed to instill trauma reminiscent of the worst crimes against Jews in modern history, was the deadliest single day for Jews since the Holocaust. Documented atrocities included mass murder of civilians, kidnappings, and systematic rape and mutilation. While the international community debates responses, Israel regards Iranian nuclear ambitions as an existential threat, inseparable from the regime’s support for regional terror networks and its calls for Israel’s destruction.
Israeli leaders, across the political spectrum, have made it clear that the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran is a red line. Israel’s history of curbing such threats is well established: it destroyed Iraq’s Osirak reactor in 1981 and Syria’s covert reactor in 2007 in preemptive strikes widely acknowledged to have averted major regional arms races. Israeli defense officials have openly stated that, if faced with a collapsing negotiations process and an imminent Iranian “breakout,” Jerusalem will not hesitate to act militarily—even unilaterally—if its survival is at stake.
For the US, the calculus is complex. The Biden administration, while professing a commitment to diplomacy, has steadily enhanced military cooperation with Israel, sending advanced missile defense batteries and precision munitions to bolster deterrence. Simultaneously, it has imposed successive rounds of sanctions targeting Iran’s energy, financial, and military sectors, while strengthening ties with moderate Arab partners through projects such as the Abraham Accords.
The stakes of the Oman meeting have thus seldom been higher. Should Iran persist in its tactics of delay and obfuscation, the West may face a strategic crossroads: whether to acquiesce to a nuclear threshold Iran and attempt regional containment, or to escalate sanctions and the use of hard power. Regional stability, global nonproliferation norms, and the fate of Iranian-backed terror movements are all on the table.
Oman’s diplomatic challenge is therefore to secure a significant Iranian concession: not merely a freeze or a vague promise of future compromise, but a verifiable and permanent dismantlement of threatening nuclear capabilities. Anything less, Western and especially Israeli officials warn, merely buys Iran more time to perfect its weapons infrastructure behind a screen of dialogue.
The coming talks will be closely watched in capitals from Washington to Jerusalem, Riyadh to London. For Israel, Iran’s nuclear file is a test not just of international resolve but of the world’s willingness to enforce basic security and moral norms in the post–October 7 order. For the broader West, the Oman summit is a measure of whether diplomacy can still achieve lasting results in the face of calculated, violent opposition from Tehran and its proxies.
As the international community braces for the outcome, one reality remains clear: Israel’s right to defend itself, and to prevent genocidal threats from materializing, is not contingent on diplomatic timelines or world opinion. When faced with existential danger, Israel has acted—and will act—decisively, in partnership with like-minded states determined to prevent the next catastrophe. The Oman summit, then, may not only shape the future of nuclear nonproliferation, but the fate of security and diplomacy in the Middle East itself.
