It has been a massive week of news with the U.S-Israel war in Iran, and one of those times when trying to keep up with what’s happening feels nearly impossible.

I’m acutely aware that being heaped with more and more information when you’re struggling to understand what’s going on can be overwhelming, so in this edition, we’re going to slow it down and answer your questions.

As with all TDA emails, feel free to reply with any other questions, and we’ll do our best to get back to you.

Let’s start here, because I think this question captures the significance of the week that was.

It started when U.S. President Donald Trump announced a deadline of 7 April (U.S. time) for Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, the world’s busiest oil shipping channel. In announcing that deadline, he threatened “the entire country could be taken out in one night” if it was not met.

As we neared that deadline, there were conflicting reports about the state of negotiations between the U.S., Israel and Iran. Then, on the morning of 7 April, U.S. forces struck Iran’s Kharg Island. This was seen as quite a significant escalation given it’s the country’s primary oil export terminal and is closely guarded by the regime.

Hours later, Trump posted to social media, saying: “A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don’t want that to happen, but it probably will.”

At the same time, Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif (who was leading negotiations between the warring nations) suggested ceasefire discussions were “progressing steadily”.

As you can see, we had two very different messages coming almost instantaneously from different parties understood to be at the same negotiating table.

Then, just as the world was digesting Trump’s threats, another announcement came: a two-week ceasefire had been agreed to.

Obviously, the talks that led to that ceasefire being announced were all private, but U.S. outlet Axios reports that U.S, China, and Pakistan put significant pressure on Iran, which led to a change in the regime’s posture.

As is often the case, when nations are at war, they don’t exactly have diplomatic channels to directly talk to one another.

As such, a third-party mediator usually comes in to negotiate a deal. In this case, that party is Pakistan, a country that shares a border with and is an ally of Iran

It’s hard to give a yes/no answer here. A ceasefire is, by its very nature, fragile. Shortly after the deal came into effect, Iran fired at neighbouring countries in the region. Across global conflicts, we’ve seen pauses in hostilities translate into long-held peace plans, but we’ve also seen two-week pauses lead to a resumption of fighting.

You would’ve seen a lot of reporting about Israeli strikes in Lebanon killing over 300 people, and disputing claims about whether ongoing military action there constitutes a breach of the ceasefire.

When he announced the ceasefire, the Pakistani PM explicitly said the ceasefire applies everywhere, “including Lebanon and elsewhere”.

Hours later, however, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared on X: “There is no ceasefire in Lebanon”.

So does that mean the entire peace agreement with the U.S. and Iran is done? At the time of publishing (and it’s important to say that, given how quickly things change!) there is no formal notice of the ceasefire ending.

Israel has agreed to engage in direct peace talks with Lebanon imminently, and the U.S. will attend peace talks in Islamabad on 11 April (local time). We’ll know more then.

Depends who you ask. Announcing the ceasefire, Trump said the U.S. had “met and exceeded” all its military objectives (What were those military objectives? For one, the U.S. and Israel struck Iran because they wanted to reduce their nuclear capabilities.) We haven’t heard yet about the state of Iran’s nuclear infrastructure, so many analysts will be keeping an eye on it.

Pete Hegseth, the U.S. Secretary of War, also claimed this week that “Iran begged for this ceasefire and we all know it”.

On the other hand, Iran painted the deal as a victory, where they successfully forced an end to U.S. and Israeli strikes while maintaining the regime’s power and the bargaining chip of the Strait of Hormuz.

It must be said that we don’t know the specifics of the deal, beyond what’s been made public (the Strait needing to open and a two-week pause on fighting), so we can’t say for sure what concessions were made by both sides.

Not immediately. Especially because the Strait of Hormuz is still not fully open, which Iran has said is because of Israel’s strikes on Lebanon.

According to Dr Lurion De Mello from Macquarie University, “the majority of the ships are anchored and waiting. It’s not like starting a car and just driving out… the actual out of the Strait of Hormuz could take time”.

Given the passage has been closed for so long, there will be a big backup that needs to be cleared before any ships can coast through easily. That will take time, and will be made harder if restrictions continue.

Australian Energy Minister Chris Bowen agrees. In a press conference this week, he said: “Obviously, we hope a ceasefire takes hold and becomes the permanent arrangement. The sooner that happens, the better it’ll be for fuel prices around the world.”

De Mello suggests remaining cautious and “not planning too many day trips” in the meantime.

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