Iran has drawn a red line. It says any deal with the United States must allow it to keep enriching uranium and maintain control over the Strait of Hormuz.
This comes after US President Donald Trump claimed a draft accord was ready and approved by Iran's leadership. But Tehran's official IRNA news agency made it clear on Friday: giving up enriched nuclear material isn't on the table.
"Iran's right to enrich uranium and the retention of enriched material… will be emphasised with a view to their inclusion in the final agreement," IRNA reported.
The disagreement puts the brakes on a deal that Trump says is close. He even cancelled a wave of bombings against Iran on Thursday, saying the draft had been "brought to the highest level of Iranian leadership and approved."
But Iran's demands go beyond nuclear enrichment. Tehran insists on managing traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, a key waterway for global oil and gas shipments. Since the war broke out in February, Iran has blockaded the strait, letting only a trickle of ships pass and requiring vessels to get permission from its armed forces.
IRNA confirmed: "Iran makes no commitment in this text to cede the management of the strait or the restoration of conditions that existed prior to the American and Israeli military aggression."
The war started on February 28, when the US and Israel launched strikes on Iran. A ceasefire took effect in April, but sporadic violence has kept fears of a full return to war alive.
Meanwhile, Israel is pushing for a very different outcome. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said Trump promised him that any agreement would strip Iran of its enriched nuclear material and dismantle its missile infrastructure. Netanyahu repeated on Friday: "As long as I am the Prime Minister of Israel, Iran will not have nuclear weapons."
Iran's position is a direct challenge to that promise. The IRNA report suggests that Israel's demands were "not even on the table" during negotiations.
A draft deal published by Iran's Mehr news agency on Friday adds more detail. It says the agreement would end the war on all fronts, including Lebanon, release $24 billion in frozen Iranian assets, and set a 60-day period for nuclear talks. It also includes suspending sanctions on Iran's oil and petrochemical sales and lifting the US naval blockade on Iranian ports, which has been in place since April 13.
The draft also demands reparations from the US and its allies for war damage, and "reconstruction plans for Iran amounting to at least $300 billion."
But Iran isn't signing anything until it sees some action first. The draft says: "Final negotiations will not begin before the release of half of Iran's blocked funds, suspension of Iran's oil sanctions, and lifting of the naval blockade."
Trump remains optimistic, telling reporters on Friday that he understood Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, had approved the deal.
In Tehran, some Iranians are sceptical. A 29-year-old cafe worker told AFP on condition of anonymity: "I don't know if it will be good or bad for us. The main purpose of this war was for the US to remove the system and this didn't happen. So what does a deal do?"
For now, the gap between what Iran demands and what Israel expects remains wide. Trump's stock market rally and the drop in oil prices that followed his optimism may be short-lived if Tehran holds its ground.