Iran hit by resurgent protests as U.S. builds pressure ahead of new nuclear talks

New talks are scheduled for Thursday, according to the country that brokered previous rounds of indirect negotiations.

Oman’s Foreign Minister Badr Albusaidi said in a post on X Sunday that talks were confirmed for Thursday in Geneva “with a positive push to go the extra mile towards finalizing the deal.”

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian offered some optimism Sunday, suggesting the latest talks had “yielded encouraging signals.”

“Iran is committed to peace and stability in the region,” he said in a post on X. However, he warned that Tehran continued to “closely monitor U.S. actions and have made all necessary preparations for any potential scenario.”

Addressing the U.S. threat of military action in a news conference Monday, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said the Islamic Republic would “never be influenced by threats” and would “insist on Iran’s national interests.”

He added that there was “no such thing as a limited attack,” after Trump confirmed he was considering a more limited initial strike to force Tehran into concessions.

Any “act of aggression” would be met with a firm response, Araghchi said. “At the same time that we are in the negotiation room, our military forces will be more alert.”

Araghchi said in an interview that aired Sunday on CBS’ “Face The Nation” that a new meeting would “probably” take place Thursday, adding that he hoped to prepare a “fast deal.”

“I think we’re still very much in a wait and see kind of mode,” said Sanam Vakil, director of the Middle East and North Africa program at the London-based think tank Chatham House.

“We’re lurching between the possibility of strikes and the possibility of a deal and I don’t really have a feeling right now one way or the other,” she told NBC News in a phone interview Monday. It will take a “real willingness to compromise from both parties” and in a “timely manner” in order to avoid military escalation, Vakil added.

As the prospect of a major attack by the U.S. and Israel raised fears of a new conflict in the Middle East, regional powers expressed outrage after the U.S. Ambassador to Israel suggested the country had a biblical right to take over swaths of territory.

“It would be fine if they took it all, but I don’t think that’s what we’re talking about here today,” Mike Huckabee said during an interview with podcaster Tucker Carlson posted to YouTube on Friday.

Huckabee clarified that this was not on the table as “they’re not asking to take all that,” but his comments sparked outrage, with the foreign ministries of over a dozen Arab and Muslim nations expressing their “strong condemnation and profound concern” in a joint statement and issuing a “categorical rejection of such dangerous and inflammatory remarks.”

Iran warned the comments could further “embolden” Israel in “illegal measures against Palestinians as well as its constant aggression against the nations of the region.”