As President Donald Trump voiced growing frustration Wednesday with Iranian negotiators, accusing them of lying and cheating, the latest escalation has exposed an even more fundamental problem for Washington: whether the officials at the negotiating table have the power to deliver an agreement — or whether anyone in Tehran does."I don’t know if we’re going to have a deal.We may just do it without a deal," Trump said at the NATO summit in Ankara.
"These people, they lie and they cheat."But Trump’s frustration with Iran’s negotiators is only part of the problem.Since the death of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, it has become increasingly unclear who in Tehran has the authority to make — and enforce — an agreement.TRUMP SAYS IRAN CEASEFIRE IS 'OVER' AFTER IRANIAN ATTACKS TRIGGER MASSIVE US RESPONSETehran has deployed a new front on social media including an influence campaign to sway Americans and undermine President Donald Trump's push for a nuclear deal. (Hamed Malekpour / Middle East Images / AFP via Getty Images)Mojtaba Khamenei succeeded his father as supreme leader after the elder Khamenei was killed in the opening U.S.-Israeli attacks on Feb.
28.But Mojtaba has not appeared publicly since the attack, and U.S.
assessments cited by Reuters have described authority as dispersed among senior Revolutionary Guard commanders and powerful civilian officials.Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, a former IRGC commander who led Iran’s negotiating delegation, has emerged as one of the country’s most powerful surviving political figures.Banafsheh Zand, an Iranian-American journalist and editor of the Iran So Far Away Substack, said power inside the Islamic Republic has fractured since the death of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, leaving the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as the country’s dominant force."The person who is negotiating with the U.S.is not necessarily someone who is endorsed by the others," Zand told Fox News Digital.She described Ghalibaf...