On the plains of northwestern Iran, edged by snow-ribboned ridges, spring nudges almond trees into frothy bloom and a fragile ceasefire brings more traffic onto highways, and more Iranians back to their homeland.
“I stayed with my son in Turkey for a month,” a grey-haired banker says as we stand waiting in the departures hall at a Turkish crossing where a late winter’s snow has sent temperatures plunging on that side of the border.
“In my city in the north, the Israeli and American airstrikes mainly hit military targets, not homes and civilian infrastructure,” was his personal summary of five weeks of grievous war, paused by a two-week truce whose end falls in a week’s time.
“I’m a bit scared,” an elderly woman in a headscarf confessed, her face wrinkling into worry. She spoke mournfully of the suffering of young Iranians, from the shells which crashed into crowded residential neighbourhoods, to the threats from Iran’s Basij paramilitary forces who prowl the streets.
“It’s all in God’s hands,” she murmured, lifting her eyes upward.
Others focused on more temporal pressure.
“Of course, the ceasefire won’t hold,” declared a young woman in a bright red puffer jacket and a knitted hat. “Iran will never give up its control of the Strait of Hormuz.”
Later, as we clear Turkish customs and enter the Islamic Republic of Iran, one man next to us exclaims when I ask about this current calm, “Trump will never leave Iran alone; he wants to swallow us!”
It’s hard not to think about the US president and commander-in-chief on the long drive to Tehran – the only way to reach the capital since airports are still shut – because it’s hard not to stare at every bridge that still spans the road, glinting in the spring sun.
On Wednesday, Trump doubled down on his warning that he could destroy every last bridge in Iran, telling Fox Business News: “We could take out every one of their bridges in one hour,” along with every power plant. But he added, “We don’t want to do that.”
On this 12-hour journey to the capital, vehicles are now forced to take a detour down winding rural roads because the main bridge linking the northern city of Tabriz to Tehran via Zanjan collapsed under missile fire last week.
The targeting of civilian infrastructure has been met by a growing chorus of criticism from legal scholars who warn of violations of international humanitarian law and possible war crimes. The US and Israel insist they’re only striking military targets.
We spot those targets too, including a flattened barracks of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the IRGC, on the outskirts of Tabriz. A huge flag is draped across the rutted pillars protruding from the ruins like concrete teeth. Other military and police bases, as well as factories, were also hit in this region.
Trump’s apocalyptic threat on 7 April that “a whole civilization will die tonight” comes to mind when we stop at a roadside restaurant – a hundreds-year-old caravanserai, a travelers’ inn of old – with vaulted stone ceilings and stained-glass windows – just a hint of Iran’s rich thousands-year-old civilization.
The Iran of today is also visible everywhere we stop, with some women wearing veils and scarves and others, of all ages, bare-headed. It’s a legacy of the 2022-2023 Women, Life, Freedom protests. Women now refuse to turn the clock back, even though strict rules on “modesty” and severe punishments are still the law of this land.
A roadside restaurant inside a centuries-old building – Trump’s threat that “an entire civilization will die” prompted widespread condemnation
But there are more pressing priorities for Iran’s theocracy in this moment.
New banners stretch over highways with portraits of the three supreme leaders since the 1979 revolution: Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini; Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was assassinated in this war’s first salvos on 28 February; and his successor, his son Mojtaba Khamenei, reported to have been seriously injured in that attack and who has not been seen or heard in public since then.
He, however, is said to be playing a role in trying to forge a new political and security doctrine in the wake of this devastating war and the historic high-level efforts to resolve age-old rifts with its arch enemy over Iran’s nuclear programme, and new red button issues such as Iran’s control of the key Strait of Hormuz shipping lane.
On Wednesday more details emerged about what transpired behind closed doors over 21 hours, when a US delegation headed by Vice-President JD Vance met face-to-face in Islamabad with a large contingent of Iranian officials led by Parliamentary Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, a hardliner linked to the now all-powerful IRGC, who is seen as a possible pragmatist – even if he is not the only, or the main, decisionmaker.
Since that Sunday morning when Vance boarded his plane at dawn, saying he had put the US’s “final and best offer” on the table – suggesting a take-it-or-leave-it approach – both he and Trump have given a series of interviews which present a more nuanced picture and highlight that diplomacy is not dead.
Is the US blockade of Iran working?
Inside Iran, there’s a sense that people are taking things one day at a time
On Wednesday, Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei ended Tehran’s relative silence and spoke of what had been discussed in Islamabad, reflecting some of what Tehran wants to gain: a “full end to war, lifting sanctions, and retribution of damages of US-Israeli attacks on Iran”.
Reports from Washington have meanwhile highlighted American red lines – no nuclear enrichment for Iran, which must dismantle enrichment facilities; remove all highly enriched uranium; open the Strait of Hormuz; and end funding for its partners and proxies in the region, including Hamas and Hezbollah.
Sources say Tehran has rejected a demand for a 20-year moratorium on nuclear enrichment and proposed the five-year pause it had presented before hostilities erupted.
It has also pushed back against the demand to hand over its 440kg stockpile of highly-enriched uranium, sticking to its earlier concession to dilute the 60% enriched uranium, which is dangerously close to weapons grade.
And despite Trump’s blockade of Iran’s vital oil tankers and other vessels through the strategic chokepoint of the Strait of Hormuz, Tehran shows no sign of buckling – although Trump’s statements continue to indicate his mistaken belief that Iran will soon capitulate under this mounting military and economic pressure.
On Wednesday, the powerful commander of Iran’s highest operational command, Ali Abdollahi, upped the ante by threatening to stop “any exports or imports to continue in the Persian Gulf, the Sea of Oman, and the Red Sea”.
As we made haste to Tehran, Pakistan’s Army Chief, Field Marshal Asim Munir, landed in the capital to accelerate mediation efforts and narrow the gaps on these and other issues.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt has confirmed that discussions are underway for a second round of talks between the US and Iran, expected to take place in Islamabad, with Pakistan mediating. Reports swirl of an extension to the two-week truce.
From Washington come assessments that America’s shooting war – or at least the worst of it – could be over for now. Inside Iran, there’s a sense that people are taking things one day at a time, whatever their many different views on their country’s future.
It’s only mid-April. Iranians have already lived through extraordinary nationwide protests crushed with lethal force, which killed many thousands, an unfinished external war, and restrictions, including a widespread internet blackout at home.
It has left many wondering whether, if it’s ever done, a deal will finally lift crippling sanctions and bring the change they want to see.
By Lyse Doucet
BBC Chief International Correspondent
