Iran…Trump….Evening…3/10/2026…A HOT MESS….

Much is at stake. The war has gone on for almost six weeks, killing thousands, devastating Iran and Lebanon, driving up fuel costs, damaging the world economy and destabilizing the Middle East. A return to hostilities could have ramifications for years in the region and affect President Trump’s political standing at home ahead of the midterm elections.

The announcement that the Iranians had arrived came only hours after Mr. Ghalibaf, who is one of the key figures overseeing the war, cast doubt on the talks even taking place, laying out a new condition for the peace negotiations in a post on X. He demanded the release of unspecified “blocked assets” belonging to Iran “before negotiations begin.”

Over the last three days, the two sides have disagreed about whether the war in Lebanon is covered by the temporary truce announced on Tuesday and whether Iran has honored its promise to reopen the Strait of Hormuz to all ships. Only a small number of ships a day are passing through currently.

President Trump suggested on social media that Iran was overplaying its hand ahead of the talks. “The Iranians don’t seem to realize they have no cards, other than a short term extortion of the World by using International Waterways,” he wrote, referring to Iran’s continued control of the Strait of Hormuz.

Despite a request from Mr. Trump to scale back its assault on Lebanon, Israel on Friday kept up its airstrikes in the southern part of the country, aiming at targets it said were related to Hezbollah, the Iran-backed militant group. The continuing war in Lebanon has exposed significant differences between the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, who has said all of Israel’s goals still haven’t been met, and Mr. Trump, who appears eager to make a deal with Iran to end the war and its damaging economic fallout.

Mr. Vance struck an optimistic but cautious tone as he left for the talks in Islamabad. “I think it’s going to be positive,” he told reporters. But he warned that if the Iranians are “going to try to play us, then they’re going to find that the negotiating team is not that receptive.”

One priority for Mr. Vance will be the full reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, a vital shipping passage for oil and gas that Iran has in effect blockaded since the war started. Iran’s military signaled on Friday that it would maintain control of the passageway, saying in a statement carried by Iranian state media that it would “not give up our legitimate rights in any way.”

Here’s what else we’re covering:

• Inflation rate: The Consumer Price Index jumped 3.3 percent in the year through March, reflecting the rising costs for energy and other goods affected by disruptions in the Middle East. Read more ›

• Strait of Hormuz: Only two ships passed through the Strait of Hormuz on Friday, and hundreds more are waiting on either side of the strait because their owners are still reluctant to attempt to navigate it. U.S. officials said one reason Iran has been unable to get more ships through is it cannot locate all of the mines it laid in the waterway and lacks the capability to remove them.

• Death tolls: The Human Rights Activists News Agency said at least 1,701 civilians, including 254 children, had been killed in Iran as of Wednesday. Lebanon’s health ministry on Friday said that at least 1,953 people had been killed in the latest fighting between Israel and Hezbollah, including 357 in a wave of Israeli strikes on Wednesday. In attacks blamed on Iran, at least 32 people have been killed in Gulf nations. In Israel, at least 20 people had been killed as of Monday. The American death toll stands at 13 service members.

• Diplomacy: Israel and Lebanon’s ambassadors to the United States are expected to meet in Washington next week for direct talks, but a settlement to end the war in Lebanon is not expected imminently. In Pakistan, the authorities have disclosed almost no details about the talks scheduled for this weekend, including where they will be held.

• Displaced in Lebanon: More than a million people — roughly a fifth of the population — have been forced from their homes since the renewed war erupted last month between Israel and Hezbollah. And many have nowhere to go. Take a closer look in photos and video here.….

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The Guardian….

• Iran’s delegation has arrived Islamabad ahead of high-stakes talks with the United States on Saturday, which the Pakistani prime minister described as “make or break” for achieving a permanent ceasefire. The delegation is headed by Iran’s powerful parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, and he is reportedly accompanied by Abbas Araghchi, Iran’s foreign minister, Ali Akbar Ahmadian, secretary of Iran’s defence council, Abdolnaser Hemmati, governor of Iran’s central bank, and several members of the Iranian parliament. Ghalibaf said earlier on Friday that two previously agreed measures – a ceasefire in Lebanon and the release of Iran’s blocked assets – “must be fulfilled before negotiations begin”.

• US vice-president JD Vance, who is en route to Islamabad, said he was “looking forward to negotiations” and expected them to be positive – though he warned Iran not to “play” the US. He is leading the US delegation and will be accompanied by Donald Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner.

• It comes as Trump threatened fresh strikes if talks fail, adding that the Iranians “have no cards” and that the only reason they are alive “is to negotiate”. Trump told the New York Post that the US is loading its warships with the “best weapons” in case talks with Tehran fail. “And if we don’t have a deal, we will be using them and we will be using them very effectively,” he said.

• Meanwhile, Lebanon and Israel have agreed to meet in Washington on Tuesday to discuss a ceasefire and to set a date to begin talks. The date of the meeting was set on Friday night during a phone call between Lebanon’s ambassador to the US, Nada Hamadeh Mouawad, Israel’s ambassador to the US, Yehiel Leiter and the US ambassador to Lebanon, Michael Issa. The conversation on Tuesday will be mediated by the US and take place at the state department.

• Lebanon’s health ministry has updated the death toll from Israel’s most brutal strikes on the country in years on Wednesday to 357 killed. The health ministry said that with rubble removal operations ongoing and “the presence of a very large number of remains, which require time to complete DNA testing and confirm the identities of the victims”, the figure remains “non-final”. It brings the total killed in Lebanon since Israelrenewed its offensive on 2 March to more than 1,953 people. The number of people wounded stands at 6,303, the health ministry added.

• All the while, Israel continues its assault on Lebanon. Lebanon’s president Joseph Aoun said on Friday that 13 state security personnel were killed in an Israeli strike on a governmental building in the southern city of Nabatieh. In a statement, Aoun condemned continued Israeli attacks and said targeting state institutions would not deter Lebanon from defending its sovereignty. An ambulance was also targeted in Tyre, killing two paramedics, Al Jazeera reported.

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The World Bank president, Ajay Banga, has told Reuters that even if a lasting ceasefire happens immediately, there will be a cascading effect on the global economy that will be even worse if the ceasefire fails.

Banga said global growth could lower by 0.3 to 0.4 percentage points if the ceasefire lasts and by as much as 1 percentage point if it fails. Inflation could go up 200 to 300 basis points and go up much further – of up to 0.9 percentage points – if the war continues. The prognosis is even worse for developing countries, according to the World Bank, with inflation of 6.7% possible under the worst-case scenario…..

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ISW…Iran Update Special Report, April 10, 2026

1. The Iranian delegation arrived in Islamabad on April 10 ahead of planned negotiations on April 11. US Vice President JD Vance departed for Pakistan on April 10, operating under strict guidance from President Donald Trump.
2. It will remain difficult to determine whether the Middle East ceasefire conditions are being upheld, given the lack of mutually agreed-upon, written ceasefire documents available to the public.
3. US President Trump warned on Truth Social on April 10 that Iran is engaging in “short‑term extortion” in the Strait of Hormuz and said that its leadership is negotiating only because it has “no cards.”
4. Neither the US nor Iran has signaled any public shift on their stances on key issues in previous negotiations, which include nuclear enrichment limits, the highly enriched uranium stockpile, the missile program, sanctions, and access to frozen assets. Now these sticking points include the Strait of Hormuz as well.
5. The US-Iran ceasefire talks are complicated by the fragmented nature of the Iranian negotiating team, composed of competing political, military, and security factions, rather than a unified delegation with a clear mandate and unified positions.
6. The Kuwaiti Ministry of Defense spokesperson stated on April 10 that Kuwaiti armed forces detected and engaged seven Iranian drones in Kuwaiti airspace over the past 24 hours.
7. Iranian-backed Iraqi militias probably used first-person view (FPV) drones to ambush US Embassy personnel near the Baghdad International Airport on April 8.  The Iraqi authorities’ arrest of an IRGC officer connected to militia attacks on the airport and the claimed FPV drone attack against the same facility is further evidence that the IRGC is providing guidance to the militias and supporting their attacks on US personnel in Iraq.
8. Hezbollah claimed that it conducted 49 attacks targeting Israeli forces in southern Lebanon and  43 attacks targeting IDF infrastructure and Israeli communities in northern and southern Israel between 2:00 PM ET on April 9 and 2:00 PM ET on April 10
9. Iranian banks are in poor condition and are warned that current challenges risk pushing banks toward crisis or bankruptcy. Unspecified political insiders close to the Iranian establishment also told Reuters on April 8 that Iranian officials viewed the economy as Iran’s “Achilles heel” and feared that economic deterioration could threaten the regime’s ability to govern.
10. The Institute for Science and International Security reported on April 9 that Iran likely aims to restrict access to the tunnel complex and delay or complicate any ground operation to reach or seize the highly enriched uranium stored at the Esfahan Nuclear Technology Center (ENTC) in Esfahan Province….

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European airports say they could run out of jet fuel if the Strait of Hormuz doesn’t reopen soon.

Europe could face shortages of jet fuel if ships are not allowed to pass through the Strait of Hormuz soon, an association of airports warned top European Union officials on Thursday.

The warning, from the Airports Council International Europe, came days after President Trump announced a cease-fire agreement with Iran that was supposed to unblock the strait. But ship traffic through the passageway, which lies between Iran and the Arabian Peninsula, remains far below prewar levels.