Who won the Iran-US war — Trump or Tehran? And who lost?

Yet even before its signing, the agreement has faced serious tests, with Israel’s continued military operations against the Iran-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon threatening to derail the fragile diplomatic momentum.

Even as the fighting appears to be winding down, the main question remains unresolved — who actually won the war?

What Trump has claimed, and what the record shows

Trump has at various points described the US-Israeli campaign against Iran in sweeping terms, framing it as an unqualified win for Washington. Independent assessments complicate that picture considerably.

According to a PBS NewsHour fact-check, while the US and Israel achieved real battlefield successes, Pentagon officials told Congress that more than 80 per cent of Iran’s missile, drone and naval defence industrial base had been destroyed or damaged. Yet calling the outcome a total victory overlooks a significant shift in Iran’s favour.

As one analyst told PBS, Iran has effectively become the “gatekeeper” of the Strait of Hormuz, the chokepoint that normally carries about a fifth of the world’s oil and gas. That has handed Tehran a form of durable economic leverage it did not possess before the war began.

While Trump said over the weekend that an agreement could be signed as early as Sunday and that the Strait of Hormuz would reopen to all shipping immediately afterwards, CNN reported that plans for an in-person signing ceremony in Europe had quietly been dropped in favour of an electronic signing driven in part by Trump’s own travel schedule ahead of this week’s G7 summit in France.

Meanwhile, the deal gives just 60 days to resolve what to do about Iran’s stockpile of highly enriched uranium and its atomic programme. That took years to resolve in Tehran’s 2015 nuclear deal with world powers.

Trump unilaterally withdrew America from that accord in his first term, setting the stage for the tensions that culminated in the war.”Congratulations to all!” Trump wrote on social media as he celebrated his 80th birthday Sunday with a UFC cage match fight at the White House. He added, “I hereby fully authorise the toll free opening of the Strait of Hormuz, and, simultaneously herewith, authorise the immediate removal of the United States Naval blockade,” which was imposed in retaliation for Iran’s grip on the crucial waterway.

He soon hedged, however, saying the strait wouldn’t open until Friday’s signing. Iran’s deputy foreign minister, Kazem Gharibabadi, confirmed the agreement on state television but said Iran would not start implementing it until it was signed Friday. He said the deal followed talks with Qatar, another mediator.

What the deal appears to include

Pakistan was the first country to publicly announce that an agreement had been reached, with Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif saying both sides had agreed to the “immediate and permanent termination of military operations on all fronts, including in Lebanon”. Whether Israel has accepted that formulation remains uncertain.

Iranian state television, citing the secretariat of the Supreme National Security Council, said the war “will end immediately and permanently beginning tonight”, while insisting that the US blockade would be terminated “immediately and in full”.

Preparatory meetings involving mediators are expected to continue in Doha this week, while broader negotiations on unresolved issues, including Iran’s nuclear programme, are expected to take place over the next 60 days.

Iran has indicated that the timeline could be extended if necessary. Among the major unresolved questions is the fate of Iran’s stockpile of highly enriched uranium. The United States has pushed for the material to be removed from Iran altogether. Russia has offered to take custody of it. Tehran, however, has consistently maintained that its nuclear programme is peaceful and insists that it wants to retain the uranium, much of which is believed to be buried beneath three nuclear sites heavily damaged by US strikes.

So, who actually won?

The answer depends entirely on who is being asked. Trump has repeatedly portrayed the outcome as a decisive victory for the United States and Israel, arguing that military pressure forced Iran to negotiate and paved the way for a deal that would prevent Tehran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.

Iranian officials, meanwhile, have framed the outcome very differently. For them, the Islamic Republic’s survival despite months of bombardment amounts to a historic defeat inflicted on Washington and its allies.

Independent analysts are similarly divided, and many conclude that nearly everyone lost something. A roundup of international commentary compiled by The Week cast Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as one of the conflict’s principal losers, arguing that Israel failed to eliminate Iran’s nuclear programme while emerging more diplomatically isolated than before.

Several commentators reached similar conclusions about Washington, suggesting that the United States fell short of broader objectives such as regime change, while Iran’s continued influence over Hormuz may ultimately prove to be the conflict’s most consequential strategic outcome.

The Center for Strategic and International Studies offered a different lens, arguing that the outcome depends on how success is defined. While Washington’s goals evolved from ending Iran’s nuclear ambitions to broader political objectives, Tehran’s central objective was simpler: ensuring the survival of the regime.

By that measure, analysts argue, Iran has so far succeeded. Newsweek’s 100-day assessment offered a similarly mixed verdict. Iran’s conventional military capabilities have been severely degraded, but the Islamic Republic remains intact and retains enough leverage through the Strait of Hormuz to shape the terms of any eventual settlement.

Not every analyst accepts the winners-and-losers framework at all. A commentary by the Center for International Policy argued that focusing on geopolitical scorecards risks obscuring the war’s human cost, particularly inside Iran, where ordinary citizens endured months of bombardment, displacement and economic hardship

The uneasy peace ahead

Even if the agreement holds, experts caution that the region will not immediately return to normal. The war effectively shut down energy flows through the Strait of Hormuz, sending shockwaves through global markets. Benchmark Brent crude fell more than $4 a barrel on reports of an impending agreement, while Asian markets rallied.

But energy analysts say it could still take months for shipping and insurance companies to regain enough confidence for oil and gas supplies to move freely again.

What will happen to Lebanon remains unclear. Sharif said after the deal had been announced that “both sides have declared the immediate and permanent termination of military operations on all fronts, including in Lebanon.” It remains unclear whether Israel, which relies on the US but has launched wars against its enemies since Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attack on Israel, agreed to that term.

Iran has insisted that any deal must include a ceasefire in Lebanon, where Israel has been fighting the Iranian-backed Hezbollah militant group. Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz warned Friday that Israel could still act independently toward Iran and that the country would not pull out of the zones it is occupying in Lebanon, Syria and Gaza, nor would it withdraw from the northern refugee camps of the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

(With inputs from agencies)