Iranian Dissidents Abroad on American Negotiations with Iran

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Steve Witkoff is in charge of the American negotiations with Iran now being conducted in Oman. He’s a real estate billionaire with no diplomatic experience, and without much knowledge of Iran, or of Islam, or of the permanent war being waged by Muslims against the Jewish state, that his task requires. He seems intent on making a deal, putting his trust in people who are masters of deception and delay. The Iranians are intent on drawing those negotiations out, while they continue to go ahead with their enrichment of uranium to 60% purity, one step below weapons-grade.

Iranians in exile, who are determined to bring down the current regime of Muslim fanatics, are alarmed, as is Israel, at the prospect of Witkoff making a bad deal instead of walking away from the negotiations, when the Iranians clearly have no intention of giving up their nuclear program. Witkoff seems not to grasp that Iran is weak in every way, and is desperate for the Americans to lift their sanctions. Iran’s economy is collapsing. More than one-third of the country lives below the poverty line. In 1979, when Khomeini came to power, the exchange rate was 42,000 rials to the dollar; today it is 800,000 rials to the dollar.

Militarily, too, Iran is weaker than it has ever been. Israel has devastated Hamas, Iran’s proxy in Gaza. It has destroyed Hezbollah, Iran’s proxy in Lebanon, and 80% of its vast store of rockets and missiles. By destroying Hezbollah, Israel made possible the overthrow of Bashar Assad, Iran’s closest ally, who has been replaced by a regime run by Sunni Muslims for whom Iran is a permanent enemy. Since Ahmed al-Sharaa became Syria’s de facto ruler, the IDF has managed to destroy 90% of the weapons that Assad’s army had left behind when they fled from the victorious rebels. The IDF in Gaza has devastated Hamas, another Iranian ally and proxy. Only the Houthis in Yemen, another proxy of Iran, are still able to occasionally launch drones at shipping, but the Americans on March 15 began Operation Rough Rider, consisting of large-scale attacks on the Houthis’ military bases, ports, weapons stores, and fighters, and they show no signs of stopping. Iran has thus seen tens of billions of dollars in weapons and cash that it had provided to Hezbollah, Hamas, the Houthis, and Syria disappear.

Now the Iranians in exile have expressed their apprehensions over these negotiations, and given their advice on how best to deal with the Iranian regime. More on their views can be found in an article here: “Iranian voices warn of dangers as joint nuclear talks progress – opinion,” by Zina Rakhamilova, Jerusalem Post, April 30, 2025:

As nuclear negotiations with the Islamic regime advance behind closed doors, those of us on the front lines, Israelis and Iranians alike, know exactly what’s at risk: our very survival.

The third round of nuclear talks, led by US envoy Steve Witkoff and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, was recently held in Oman, aiming to curb Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief. US officials reported that there is “still much to do, but further progress was made toward reaching a deal,” which, paradoxically, for those of us who understand what’s at stake, only makes the situation even more alarming.

While Donald Trump ran his presidential campaign on the promise of “ending wars” rather than starting them, many believed he would take a much tougher stance to prevent the regime from obtaining a nuclear weapon. Very few, however, could have predicted that his administration would actually sit across the table and negotiate with Iran’s terrorist leaders. Although Israel’s senior leaders have avoided publicly criticizing the Trump administration, there is no doubt they are deeply concerned.

According to reports from Israeli journalists, the Trump administration has repeatedly assured Israeli officials that any agreement would be better than Obama’s 2015 JCPOA agreement. Yet, there remains a genuine fear that Israel could end up trapped in a deal that limits its ability to strike Iran preemptively.

Trump negotiations with Tehran missing Iranian voices

While these negotiations have dominated media coverage, one critical element has been largely missing from the conversation: how the Iranian people itself feels about the talks. To better understand its perspective, I spoke with several Iranian activists from around the world to hear their reactions to, and views on, a potential nuclear agreement.

“It is disappointing to see that yet again, Western democracies have failed to learn the lessons of history,” says Lily Moo, a British-Iranian activist. “This regime will not change its behavior or its DNA. However, it will continue providing false promises and hopes as it has in the past.”

Indeed, many Iranians are outraged that the United States has chosen to engage the regime diplomatically at this moment.

For Gazelle Sharmahd, whose father, Jamshid Sharmahd, an American-German national, was abducted by the regime in 2020 and subsequently executed on October 28, 2024, the negotiations are especially infuriating.

“Every time the West has engaged in talks with jihadists instead of holding them accountable, they’ve empowered terror, crushed uprisings, and betrayed the people of Iran, Israel, Syria, Lebanon, Europe, the US, and the rest of the world,” Gazelle says. She adds, “You don’t negotiate with hostage takers. You end them. Or put them behind bars.”

The New York Times recently revealed that President Trump called off a planned Israeli strike on Tehran. According to these reports, Israel had intended to target Iran’s nuclear facilities as early as May, a move that would have required American backing. However, Trump opted against military action, choosing instead to pursue negotiations.

When asked whether she favors diplomacy or military action to curb the regime’s nuclear program, Mona Jafarian, the co-founder of Femme Azadi, advocated for a path focused on supporting the Iranian people instead.

“The only path to lasting peace is the fall of [Iranian Supreme Leader Ali] Khamenei. And there is only one way to achieve that: support the Iranian people, suffocate the regime, and help them curb the regime’s repressive capabilities as much as possible,” she says….

These are the voices of Iranians in exile. They don’t believe that Iran will ever agree to give up its nuclear program, that it will deceive the Americans as to the monitoring of such a commitment, and that it is the regime itself that has to fall, which would then lead to that nuclear program being halted, the centrifuges being destroyed, and all of the enriched uranium the Iranians had already made would be handed over to the UN, or even better, to the Americans.