The full text of the memorandum of understanding (MOU) between the United States and Iran was disclosed Wednesday evening after a senior American official outlined its fourteen points to reporters on a background briefing call, according to the New York Times. The document, which was reportedly signed electronically on Sunday by President Donald Trump, Vice President JD Vance, and Iranian parliamentary speaker Mohammad Ghalibaf, lays out a framework for a ceasefire, nuclear discussions, and sweeping economic relief — while leaving the most contentious issues to follow-on negotiations.

The MOU declares “the immediate and permanent termination of military operations on all fronts, including in Lebanon,” with both countries pledging not to initiate war or use force against each other. It also commits to protecting the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Lebanon. A final deal is to be concluded within 60 days, extendable by mutual consent.

On the Strait of Hormuz, the U.S. pledged to begin lifting its naval blockade upon signing, with full removal within 30 days after a final deal. Iran, for its part, committed to arranging safe passage for commercial vessels within 30 days, pending the removal of technical and military obstacles and demining. Tehran is to conduct dialogue with Oman on future administration of the Strait, in line with international law.

The document commits the U.S. and regional partners to develop a plan of at least $300 billion for reconstruction and economic development of Iran, with the mechanism to be finalized within 60 days. The U.S. further agreed to “terminate all types of sanctions against the Islamic Republic of Iran,” including United Nations Security Council resolutions, IAEA Board of Governors resolutions, and all unilateral U.S. sanctions, primary and secondary, on an agreed schedule as part of a final deal.

On the nuclear dimension — widely seen as the crux of the dispute — the MOU states only that “Iran reaffirms that it shall not procure or develop nuclear weapons.” The two sides agreed to resolve the disposition of enriched stockpiles through a mutually agreed mechanism, with the minimum being “down-blending on site under the supervision of the IAEA.” Questions of enrichment and other nuclear matters are left to the final deal. Iran agreed to maintain the current status quo of its nuclear program in the interim, and the U.S. agreed not to impose new sanctions or deploy additional forces in the region.

In what amounted to significant immediate sanctions relief, the U.S. committed to issuing “waivers for the export of Iranian crude oil, petroleum products, and derivatives, and all associated services, including banking transactions, insurances, transportation,” effective upon signing. Frozen Iranian assets are also to be made fully available for use upon the MOU’s implementation, with procedures to be negotiated. An executive mechanism will be established to monitor compliance. The final deal is to be endorsed by a binding U.N. Security Council resolution.

President Trump forcefully defended the agreement at a closing press conference of the G7 summit in Evian-les-Bains, France, on Wednesday, arguing that continuing the bombing campaign would have caused an “economic catastrophe.”

“If we didn’t do this deal, we could have dropped more bombs for another three weeks, two to four weeks, [but] you would never have the Hormuz Strait open. You would never have success,” Trump said. “Your market would have, instead of going up at levels that nobody’s ever seen before, would go down at levels that nobody ever saw before.”

Trump acknowledged that the last two days of U.S. bombing alone cost approximately $200 million, and revealed that the U.S. would have run out of munitions within roughly four weeks had the campaign continued. “We run out of reserves in about four weeks,” he said, adding that reserves “all over the world” were at risk of being depleted. He also said he had deliberately avoided bombing Iran’s oil facilities and desalination plants to prevent a humanitarian crisis and avoid what he called a potential “international depression.”

Trump opened the press conference declaring that the deal “achieves everything we set out to accomplish — ending the current conflict, reopening the Strait of Hormuz, and preventing Iran from ever obtaining a nuclear weapon.” He expressed optimism about Iranian intentions going forward. “I think they’re going to behave much differently. They see a different way of life that they were never exposed to,” he said.

At the same time, the president was blunt that his threat of resumed military action is what will keep Iran in line, not any legally binding enforcement mechanism within the MOU itself. Pressed by a reporter on whether the agreement contains anything actually enforceable to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, Trump replied: “There doesn’t have to be.” He explained: “What else am I going to do? Am I going to say, ‘I’m going to take you to court’? ‘Let me just sue you’? No. We’re gonna bomb the hell out of them if they violate the agreement.”

Trump did concede that his threat is personal rather than structural. “That’s with me as president. If you have a weak, pathetic president, maybe that doesn’t happen,” he said.

Trump continued to downplay the urgency of securing Iran’s stockpiles of highly enriched uranium, claiming they are buried deep under rubble at the three nuclear sites the U.S. bombed, and that Tehran cannot access them in any case. “It’s actually not valuable, but we’d like to get it psychologically,” Trump said. He added that the U.S. has “Space Force cameras” monitoring the sites and that only the U.S. and China have the equipment to reach the material.

Analysts note that it has not been publicly confirmed that all stockpiles are located at those three sites. Iran is also believed to hold uranium enriched to lower levels at other locations, material that can also be converted into a weapon. Despite his relaxed posture, Trump said the issue will nonetheless be at the top of talks with Iran over the next two months. “They’ll work closely with us to turn over the so-called enriched material,” he said.

On Iran’s ballistic missile program — a major concern for Yerushalayim — Trump similarly pushed back on calls for complete disarmament. “They have to have some [missiles] because other people have some. You gotta have some,” he said, mocking what he described as hawkish advisers who want Iran to have none. “They’re going to let Saudi Arabia have missiles, but [Iran] can’t have them? It doesn’t work that way.” He added that missiles “hurt a little location, but they don’t blow up the planet.” Trump did acknowledge that Iran’s missile program, support for proxy forces, and the enriched uranium issue will all be addressed in the upcoming follow-on negotiations.

The president acknowledged he was facing sharp criticism from hawkish allies and commentators over the deal. “There are some writers — some who I thought were friends of mine — but I don’t want them as friends anymore, because they’re either stupid or they’re bad people,” he said.

A senior U.S. official on the briefing call sought to explain the decision to immediately waive sanctions on Iranian oil exports, saying that Iran had been selling oil to China regardless of the sanctions regime, at a steep discount. “It’s absurd to sanction Iranian oil in such a way that they are still allowed to sell that oil,” the official said. A second senior official argued that the sanctions relief will amount to only “single digit billions of dollars” compared to the hundreds of billions in damage Iran sustained during the war, and added that easing the oil sanctions also benefits global oil prices.

The officials also revealed that the sanctions waiver is embedded in the text of the MOU itself and takes effect immediately — an apparent departure from earlier administration messaging that sanctions relief would be contingent on Iranian concessions in follow-on nuclear talks.

Trump, for his part, said that any broader U.S. sanctions relief would be “based on merit,” even as preparations for the oil waiver were already underway. He also said that the $300 billion reconstruction fund, while in the MOU’s text, does not actually obligate Washington to contribute.

The senior U.S. official on the briefing call took aim at both Israeli and Iranian media for what he described as mischaracterizing the deal. “This is fundamentally an agreement that allows us to open the Strait of Hormuz immediately, commits the Iranians to destroying the nuclear dust, and then gives us a dial where, if the Iranians dial up their good behavior, we respond by dialing up the kind of economic and sanctions relief that could make them a more prosperous country,” the official said.

The official insisted that the U.S. side incurs no binding obligations. “It commits us to quite literally nothing, but if Iranians do a lot of good, then we want to reward that good behavior and transform their relationship with the Middle East and the world,” he said. Critics, however, point to the oil export waiver and the frozen assets provisions as immediate, concrete U.S. concessions that appear in the text itself.

Relations between Washington and Yerushalayim appeared strained Wednesday amid the controversy over the deal. Israel is said to overwhelmingly oppose the MOU, on the grounds that Iran’s sole formal commitment on nuclear weapons is a pledge not to obtain or develop them — a pledge nearly identical to the one Tehran made in the 2015 Obama-era nuclear agreement — with all broader concessions from Iran left merely for discussion in follow-on talks during which Iran will receive significant sanctions relief.

Trump revived a long-standing grievance against Binyamin Netanyahu at the G7 press conference, again accusing Israel of pulling out of a joint 2020 operation to kill IRGC Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani. Trump said Israel was “all set the night before the attack” and then backed out, at which point the U.S. proceeded alone. He had largely refrained from airing this complaint since becoming the Republican presidential nominee in 2024, when his ties with Netanyahu improved markedly — but those ties appear to have frayed in recent weeks over disagreements about Israel’s conduct in Iran and Lebanon.

Even as he aired the grievance, Trump spoke warmly of Netanyahu personally. “Bibi Netanyahu happens to be a good man, but he gets a little excited sometimes,” Trump said. He called Netanyahu “an amazing prime minister” and said that Israel acknowledges the U.S. as “the big partner.”

On Lebanon specifically, Trump said he has urged Netanyahu to “do a little softer touch” and criticized what he described as Israel knocking down a building every time a Hezbollah member enters it. He reiterated his preference for Syria to fight Hezbollah in place of Israel, and suggested Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa might be open to doing so with greater precision, though he acknowledged the idea may not be broadly welcomed. He also said Israel had by Wednesday received a copy of the MOU — reportedly after having initially been denied access due to American concerns about leaks.

Trump said he told Netanyahu directly that Israel should be grateful for the agreement. “I told Bibi, ‘The biggest risk was that they drop a nuclear weapon into the middle of Israel.’” He said the most important thing Israel sought was protection from a nuclear strike — and the deal provides that. “So, I think they’re happy,” he said.

Senior American officials told Israel’s Channel 12 that Washington had kept Netanyahu fully informed about the terms of the MOU throughout the process. They claimed Netanyahu described the agreement as potentially a “home run” if implemented as written, even while expressing skepticism about whether it would be. The officials denied reports that Yerushalayim had been excluded from knowledge of the agreement’s content, saying that even if Netanyahu had not seen the complete text in the past day or two, he was aware of what it contained. They said Netanyahu never formally requested to see the full document. The Prime Minister’s Office declined to comment on the report.

Channel 12 had previously reported that Israel had yet to be briefed on the official terms and that a request to review the document was turned down by Washington over fears of a leak.

Separately, according to a report by Axios, both Washington and Tehran, as well as mediating parties, were Wednesday weighing an electronic signing of the MOU as early as Wednesday itself, rather than at a planned in-person ceremony in Switzerland on Friday. The reported impetus was to reopen the Strait of Hormuz as quickly as possible. Axios noted a potential added motivation: political pressure on the administration to release the text of the agreement publicly. One diplomatic source indicated no prior electronic signing had actually taken place, contradicting earlier administration statements that Trump, Vance, and Ghalibaf had signed on Sunday. A second source characterized any Wednesday signing as a “second signing.” The outlet noted it was unclear why two digital signings would be required. The in-person meeting in Switzerland between Vance and Ghalibaf was said to remain on schedule for Friday regardless of any remote signing.

A senior U.S. official confirmed that Tuesday marked the first day since the outbreak of the war on which Iran did not fire on vessels in the Strait of Hormuz. The development was seen as a positive indicator that Tehran is beginning to implement its MOU commitment on Strait access, though the official timeline for full commercial traffic restoration allows up to 30 days for demining and removal of technical obstacles.

The developments on Wednesday came amid continued active military operations in the region. The IDF reported that it destroyed a launcher used by Hezbollah to fire rockets at Israeli troops. The broader question of what the MOU means for Israel’s ongoing campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon remains in dispute, with Trump publicly pressing for a softer approach even as the agreement pledges a halt to hostilities on all fronts including Lebanon.

Follow-on negotiations between the U.S. and Iran are expected to begin imminently, with the deadline for a final deal set at 60 days from the MOU’s signing, with the possibility of extension by mutual consent.