Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, Kathmandu, 19 Ashar – During the talks between the United States and Iran initiated in April, Israel reportedly planned to target Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf. This raised significant concerns in the US, prompting it to send warnings to Tehran through several Middle Eastern allied nations. According to a New York Times report, the US feared that assassinations of these key negotiators could derail the ceasefire and peace process.
At the time, the Trump administration was working to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and achieve an agreement on Iran’s nuclear program. The report highlights that before a meeting convened in Pakistan, where Iranian delegates were at risk of attack, Islamabad provided fighter jet escort protection to ensure the safe arrival of the Iranian delegation’s plane. Following the return journey, security alerts forced an emergency landing in Mashhad, and the delegation traveled overland to Tehran.
The Washington Post reported that senior US officials expressed deep concern over Israel’s alleged plot to assassinate Iran’s top negotiators while the Trump administration was attempting a high-risk deal to end hostilities and reopen the Strait of Hormuz. The US protest against the potential killings of Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf was so intense that the US reportedly warned Iran of Israel’s assassination plans via intermediaries earlier this spring.
“If you kill those individuals, you kill the pragmatists,” one US official stated, speaking anonymously about American perspectives on Israel’s targeted killing campaign. Iran has accused Israel of threatening its Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei and has filed a complaint with the United Nations. US officials interpret the necessity of warning Iran about the possible assassination of its top negotiators as indicative of tensions between the US and Israel and the Trump administration’s limited influence over the Israeli government.
