Iran's Pezeshkian defies Trump's 'annihilate' threat, demands end to US blockade

At the United Nations General Assembly in New York, Iran's President Masoud Pezeshkian stood before the world and rejected an ultimatum. Days earlier, Donald Trump had told the same chamber that he faced a choice: negotiate a deal allowing Iran to rebuild, or "annihilate the Islamic Republic and do it quickly." Pezeshkian's response was measured but uncompromising. "The resistance of the Iranian people will only increase in the face of sanctions, increased pressure, increased bullying," he said. "We will never bow our head or bend the knee."

The conflict between the US and Iran has now stretched nearly seven months, rooted in a cycle of escalation that began in late February when American and Israeli forces launched a joint air campaign against Iranian targets. That strike killed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran's Supreme Leader, in an attack on his residence. Pezeshkian held up photographs at the UN—images of Khamenei, and pictures of more than 175 civilians, two-thirds of them children, killed in missile strikes on a primary school in Minab and a sports complex in Lamerd that same day. The US has denied striking Lamerd and said it is still investigating the Minab attack. "Our innocent people have been the targets of cowardly attacks and aggressions imposed on our country," Pezeshkian told the assembly. "And we defended ourselves with utmost strength."

Iran's retaliation came in February, when it launched deadly missile and drone attacks on Israel and Gulf Arab states hosting US military bases. It also moved to choke off one of the world's most critical shipping lanes. The Strait of Hormuz, through which roughly a fifth of global oil and gas passes annually, became a battleground. Iranian forces attacked commercial vessels moving through the waterway, the Gulf of Oman, and the Arabian Sea. The US responded in April by imposing a blockade on Iranian ports and ships—a move that has become central to the diplomatic impasse. On Wednesday, during Pezeshkian's UN visit, an attack on a cargo ship in the strait killed an Indian sailor, according to Omani and Indian authorities. India's foreign ministry condemned the incident and called for the restoration of unimpeded passage.

Any path to peace, Pezeshkian made clear, must address the blockade directly. "It cannot be the case that everyone benefits from the Strait of Hormuz while we are denied access to shipping through this waterway," he said. This demand sits at the heart of failed negotiations. In June, the US and Iran had reached a preliminary agreement to end the war and reopen the strait, but it collapsed within weeks after Iranian attacks on shipping resumed and the US reinstated its blockade. The core disagreement is control: Iran wants to retain some measure of authority over the strait and collect fees from vessels using it. The US has rejected this outright.

Pezeshkian also addressed the nuclear question, which Trump has made a centerpiece of his demands. Trump argued that the war had prevented Iran from obtaining a nuclear bomb and insisted that Iranian leaders "relinquish their nuclear ambitions." Pezeshkian countered that Iran would not abandon its right to a civilian nuclear program and would not seek to develop weapons. "We say it clearly: no nuclear weapons and no limitations on peaceful nuclear technology," he said. Yet he also signaled openness to dialogue. "We are ready for dialogue and diplomacy and negotiations without accepting the language of force."

The US delegation walked out of the chamber at the start of Pezeshkian's address, offering no immediate response to his remarks. But behind the scenes, movement was occurring. On Tuesday, Iran's Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and US envoy Steve Witkoff held indirect talks brokered by Qatari mediators on the sidelines of the General Assembly—the first such discussions since June. Witkoff expressed hope that the talks would "prove constructive and promising" and said mediators would continue their work. Iran's foreign ministry spokesman Esmail Baqai, however, struck a more skeptical note, saying the talks were "not anything new" and that Araghchi had simply reiterated Iran's conditions: an end to the blockade and the release of frozen Iranian assets.

What emerges from Pezeshkian's UN appearance is a portrait of two sides locked in a standoff, each claiming victimhood and refusing to move first. Trump's threat of annihilation is, from Iran's perspective, the language of bullying—a demand backed by force rather than negotiation. Pezeshkian's insistence on the blockade's removal is, from the US perspective, a non-starter, a demand that would restore Iran's ability to project power in a region where American interests are deeply entrenched. The preliminary agreement reached in June showed that movement was possible, but the collapse of that deal suggests the gap between the two sides remains vast. The question now is whether the resumed indirect talks can bridge it, or whether the cycle of threat and retaliation will continue.