From Mideas+
The US has never looked smaller and weaker on the world stage, as JD Vance, Steve Witkoff, and Jared Kushner arrived in Switzerland to begin talks with Iran. The Iran delegation made Vance wait, then when they arrived, Foreign Minister Seyed Abbas Araghchi refused to shake Vance’s hand, pose for a joint photo, or greet him in any way.
… UAE-based Middle East expert Amjah Taha: “This was humiliation. No one in modern history has made America wait and beg for negotiations. This was the moment JD Vance should have returned to Washington. The Islamic regime did this on purpose. Trump, if you don’t understand politics, you should at least understand protocol:
- “The US delegation entered well before the Iranians. In diplomacy, the side with leverage doesn’t wait in the room. You claim to be leading and winning, yet you arrived first. First mistake.”
- “Ghalibaf did not enter while the press was inside. JD Vance did. Another mistake. It looked as though you didn’t just abandon allies, including Israel; you also diminished America’s image by ignoring basic diplomatic protocol.”
- “The Iranian FM entered last and refused to shake hands. We didn’t need photographs to tell us who looked confident and who looked desperate, but these images made it easy for the world to draw its own conclusions.”
… Tasnim: “The Iranian delegation rejected a proposal by US officials and meeting organizers for a handshake and joint photo opportunity at the start of the multilateral talks in Switzerland. Iranian FM Abbas Araghchi and the negotiating team informed organizers that they would not participate in any joint photo session with the US delegation.”
… “Following Iran’s refusal, the live broadcast and photo ceremony proceeded without the Iranian delegation, which entered the venue only after the event concluded. The US delegation requested an additional 5 minutes before the talks began to allow journalists to leave the negotiation site.”
… The meeting abruptly ended after just two hours, with the Iran delegation walking out in protest over Trump’s threatening posts on Truth Social shortly before talks began. Tasnim reported that Iran’s negotiating delegation specifically took issue with Trump’s vow to “hit Iran very hard again, just like we did last week, only harder” if a deal wasn’t agreed to.
… The negotiations were scheduled to last two days. It is unclear whether they will continue past the brief initial meeting. An Iranian source told Reuters that the talks were “paused” in response to the protests but not necessarily canceled. We will see if Trump can avoid threatening Iran with an invasion for a few hours, so maybe things can continue.
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