Will There be Another Day Tomorrow!
By Dr Marwan Asmar
By 1 pm Wednesday morning the whole of the Middle East region could turn pitch black, utter darkness. No neons no flicker with pylons fizzling out. It’s a slippery-slope to disaster that started with the ultimatums given by US President Donald Trump about his worldview.
He long told the Iranian leadership in voice but more like dictation, either open up the Strait of Hormuz or he will order the US army to start bombing the country’s infrastructure, power plants and electricity grids in a way that he has never done before “bombing the country to the Stone Age.”
His ultimatum was first made on 21 March giving Iran 48 hours or else he would start bombing the power plants then on the 23rd day of the same month, he extended the ultimatum for five more and then these dates kept being pushed forward till today, when 7 April, 2026 came; it has become a solid, no nonsensense cut-off date. But we are yet to say!
Two things happened in the last two to three weeks or so that made him delay his threat: First pressure from leaders of the Gulf countries. Iran’s leadership was very clear to the initial threat made by Trump. Its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corp made it clear if their plants were struck they would turn their missiles on the energy plants and grids of the different Gulf countries which serve as lynchpins to their economies, societies and urbanizations.
Hearing of this, the Gulf governments quickly put the diplomatic pressure on the White House. For Kuwait, Qatar, UAE, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Oman, the Iranian threat which was very real since Iran has been striking with thousands of missiles of drones would be especially disastrous for the Gulf states which can’t live without electricity.
Second, from the first week of the war that started on 28 February, Trump, and realizing that something was seriously wrong – a point made clear by the unexpected ferosity of the Iranian missiles strikes and drones – made it clear that he was willing to stop the war if Iran surrendered its nuclear stockpile of enrichment and ended its ballistic missile program.
As the war “hotted up” and with Iran striking US ships in the Arabian Sea, US military bases in the Gulf states and Israel, Washington once again appealed for a ceasefire. But they couldn’t live up to this for they were already on the run as symbolized by the fact their destroyers – SS Gerald Ford which was towed away to Greece after wreckage and with SS Abraham Lincoln quitely moving 1500 kilometers away deep into the Arabia Sea – proved to be no match for the coming Iranian ballistic, and otherwise, missiles.
In came different actors like Turkey, Cairo, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan to try to bring the two sides together. Very quickly, Islamabad took the lead with the negotiations in an attempt to grab a deal that started at least since mid-March, and maybe before. There was an earnest interest to stop what was seen as war that was becoming devastating for the economies of the region and the world.
Not a single drop of oil was passing the Strait of Hormuz, in a once bustling waterway that controlled 20 percent of the global petroleum market. The deal today, despite talks hangs in the balance, it is illusive, beyond immediate reach for Iran had conditions.
On top of that, things are not that simple especially when ideologies are far apart. The Iranians were always suspicious of the men in the White House! Its leaders wouldn’t directly talk to the Americans and had serious misgivings about ongoing US envoys Steve Witkoff and Gerard Koshner, Trump’s son-in-law, were regarded as pro-Israelis that couldn’t be trusted.
Besides that Iran had iron-clad conditions. If they agreed to a ceasefire they demanded it should be long-lasting and that Trump wouldn’t start the war again, not a replay of the June 2025 confrontation when the US and Israel first waged a war on Tehran and asked for a ceasefire then broke it. Other conditions include compensation for the destruction of their country, an end to the Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon and new methods of payment for ships entrying and living the Hormuz Strait which they control.
Today, and despite the fact that Israeli cities like Tel Aviv are being struck on a daily basis from Iran, Hezbollah and now the Houthis from Yemen, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu doesn’t want the war on Iran to stop. He wants to continue hammering Iran even at the cost of his people for more than 6000 Israelis have been injured up until now, not to mention the fast devastation across Israel.
As the clock ticks to midnight Trump is verbally escalating. He said if Iran doesn’t agree to open the Hormuz Strait “a whole civilization will die tonight.” Iran’s Prime Minister Massoud Pezeshkian on the other hand is ready and waiting. He said 14 million people are ready to fight for Iran and called for human chains around the electricity plants all over the country.
Escalation is definitely reaching higher peaks. We wait for the next move. The conflict continues. The US Central Command says, and up-to-date the American Air Force carried out 13,000 raids on Iran.
By contrast, over 6000 missile and drone launches were carried by Iran on US warships, military bases, Gulf states and on Israel over the past 39 days of conflict. This is while Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said Iran has the ability to continue for at least another six months at the current rate of launching ballistic missiles in the region.
Meanwhile we wait for Trump’s utterings and see of he is really prepared to bomb the country back into the Stone Age. Will there be another day tomorrow? We shall see for the deadly war may still have many surprises.
Dr Asmar is a writer from Amman and blogs for crossfirearabia.com
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