Claim: Iran has submitted a “bold counter-proposal to the United States”, according to The New York Times, which reported that the Islamic Republic allegedly offered to “limit uranium enrichment to 3.67% for peaceful, civilian use” against a guarantee that “Israel dismantles its entire nuclear arsenal and commits to a nuclear-free Middle East”.
Fact: The New York Times did not publish any such report. Soch Fact Check also did not find any article about such a proposal from Iran published by other reputable media outlets.
On 19 June 2025, a claim circulated on multiple social media platforms that Iran had “submitted a bold counter-proposal to the United States”. Attributed to a report purportedly published by The New York Times, it said the Islamic Republic has allegedly offered to “limit uranium enrichment to 3.67% for peaceful, civilian use, only if Israel dismantles its entire nuclear arsenal and commits to a nuclear-free Middle East”.
Iran-Israel ceasefire
In the early hours of 24 June, US President Donald Trump announced that “a Complete and Total CEASEFIRE” to what he has termed the “12 Day War” had been agreed upon between Iran and Israel.
This came shortly after Iran launched missiles at the Al Udeid Air Base — America’s largest one in the Middle East — in Qatar. While it did not cause any casualties, the attack was a retaliation by the Islamic Republic against the US for dropping bunker-buster bombs on its underground nuclear facilities.
However, soon after the ceasefire, reports emerged of Iran and Israel violating the ceasefire. Trump slammed both, saying, “We basically have two countries that have been fighting so long and so hard that they don’t know what the f*** they’re doing.”
Iran-Israel war
In early June 2025, tensions flared up significantly in the Middle East when Israel launched a series of airstrikes on Iranian nuclear facilities and military assets as part of its Operation Rising Lion, just two days before talks on a nuclear deal were set to resume between the US and the Islamic Republic.
Some of these strikes were carried out by F-35 stealth jets, with Mossad operatives embedded in the Islamic Republic assisting in weakening Iran’s defences from within. Several high-ranking officials — including Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ (IRGC) top brass — were killed as a result and key parts of the country’s nuclear infrastructure damaged.
Among the deceased were:
- Iran’s Chief of Staff Maj Gen Mohammad Bagheri
- Gen Gholamreza Mehrabi, the deputy head of Iran Armed Forces’ Intelligence
- Gen Mehdi Rabbani, the deputy head of Iran Armed Forces’ Operations
- IRGC Commander-in-Chief Gen Hossein Salami
- IRGC Aerospace Force Commander Gen Amir Ali Hajizadeh
- IRGC Air Defence Commander Gen Davoud Sheikhian
- Brig Gen Mohammad Kazemi, the leader of IRGC Intelligence
- Gen Hassan Mohaqiq, the deputy head of its Intelligence wing
- Khatam-al-Anbiya Central Headquarters Commander Gen Gholam Ali Rashid
Ali Shamkhani, a close aide of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was reported to have been killed in the Israeli strikes as well but Iranian media said he was alive and recovering. An X (formerly Twitter) account in his name wrote that “game isn’t over” and “surprises will continue” as “enriched materials, indigenous knowledge, [and] political will remain”; it is unclear if the X account officially belongs to him.
Multiple Iranian nuclear scientists were also killed; Israeli media claimed 17 were assassinated. These included:
- Fereydoon Abbasi
- Saeed Borji
- Ahmadreza Zolfaghari Daryani
- Abdolhamid Minouchehr
- Mohammad Mehdi Tehranchi
- Seyyed Amir Hossein Faqhi
- Akbar Motlebizadeh
- Ali Bakaei Karimi
- Mansour Asgari
Iran retaliated with a large-scale missile and drone barrage targeting Israeli cities, including Be’er Sheva. The Islamic Republic’s operation is named True Promise.
In the midst, Trump announced that the US knew “exactly where the so-called ‘Supreme Leader’ [Khamenei] is hiding” but would not kill him, “at least not for now”.
The two countries continued to attack each other over a period of nearly two weeks, killing several, injuring dozens, and damaging key infrastructure, despite interceptions by the Iron Dome, as well as the United States and Jordanian defenses.
Later, after Iranian missiles hit a major hospital in southern Israel, the country’s Defence Minister Israel Katz threatened Khamenei, saying, “this man absolutely should not continue to exist”.
The US directly entered the conflict on 22 June, when Trump ordered strikes on three key Iranian nuclear sites — Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan — using B-2 bombers and Tomahawk missiles, while coordinating closely with Israel. He announced a “very successful attack” as part of the Operation Midnight Hammer in which “a full payload of BOMBS was dropped on the primary site, Fordow”, he said.
Trump has since issued more warnings and even indicated the possibility of a “regime change” but walked back on the idea later on.
The US urged caution to its citizens at home and abroad, with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) issuing a notice of a “heightened threat environment” and the State Department a “worldwide caution security alert”.
Iran called the strikes a violation of international law, warned of retaliation, and called for an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC). Its foreign ministry condemned the “brutal military aggression” by the US against its “peaceful nuclear facilities”.
Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian vowed that “the Americans must receive a response to their aggression” and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi also met ally Russian President Vladimir Putin, who said attacks against Iran were “completely unprovoked” and “without foundation or justification”.
A spokesperson for Iran’s Khatam-al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, Ebrahim Zolfaqari, was quoted as terming Trump a “gambler” and warning that the US attack had “expanded the range of legitimate targets”.
Iran also threatened to close the Strait of Hormuz and its lawmakers are now considering withdrawing from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
So far, over 600 people have been killed in Iran, according to its health ministry, while the Israeli government announced there were 28 fatalities.
Amid the escalation, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) — a UN nuclear watchdog — issued multiple updates and its director-general, Rafael Grossi, told the UNSC that Iran informed them “there has been no increase in off-site radiation levels at all three sites”. While warning “that armed attacks on nuclear facilities should never take place and could result in radioactive releases with grave consequences within and beyond the boundaries of the State which has been attacked”, he called for “maximum restraint”.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the US’ actions were a “perilous turn in a region that is already reeling” and urged for a “halt [to] the fighting”. The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) has demanded that Israel end its aggression towards Iran, but it did not mention the American strikes.
Fact or Fiction?
Soch Fact Check scoured The New York Times’ website but did not find any such report.
In an emailed response, a spokesperson for the publication told Soch Fact Check: “I can confirm The New York Times did not publish the quote you shared with us. Readers can follow live updates from the Israel-Iran conflict here.”
We also did not find reports of any such proposal from Iran published by other reputable media outlets.
Iran talks, proposals
Before Israel attacked Iran, Axios reported on 15 May that Trump’s administration had offered a “written proposal” for a nuclear deal to Iran, but no details were provided; however, the president said he had presented “an olive branch”.
The same day, NBC News interviewed Shamkhani, Supreme Leader Khamenei’s close aide. “He said Iran would commit to never making nuclear weapons, getting rid of its stockpiles of highly enriched uranium which can be weaponized, agree to enrich uranium only to the lower levels needed for civilian use, and allow international inspectors to supervise the process, in exchange for the immediate lifting of all economic sanctions on Iran,” it wrote.
Shamkhani was also quoted as saying, “If the Americans remove the Bibi effect, they can easily sign the deal,” using a common nickname for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
On 3 June 2025, The Associated Press reported that Trump appeared to undermine Steve Witkoff, his special envoy to the Middle East, maintaining that Iran would need to “fully dismantle its nuclear enrichment program as part of any deal to ease crushing sanctions”.
The publication explained that Witkoff’s proposal “would allow Iran to retain low levels of enrichment for civilian uses like nuclear medicine and commercial power if it agrees to shut down its heavily protected underground sites for a period of time”.
Khamenei dismissed that proposal, Reuters reported on 4 June, and vowed “to keep enriching uranium”. A day later, media reports suggested Iran was “drafting a counter-proposal” to the US, Shamkhani saying Trump’s offer did not address lifting sanctions on the Islamic Republic.
On 9 June, the spokesperson of Iran’s Foreign Ministry, Esmaeil Baqaei, said the counter-proposal his country intended to submit was “reasonable, logical, and balanced”, AFP reported. On the other hand, Trump spoke of the Islamic Republic’s response to the Witkoff proposal, saying it was “just not acceptable”, according to The New York Times.
A few days later, the IAEA passed a resolution in which it said Iran was not obeying its obligations pertaining to nuclear non-proliferation, as per a UN press release dated 12 June. Tehran said the move was “politically motivated”.
European leaders then met Iran’s Araghchi on 20 June, aiming to push his country to restrict its nuclear programme, The Wall Street Journal reported. A day later, the foreign minister said there would be no further negotiations with the US “until [the] Israeli aggression stops”, according to Reuters.
Iran, US, JCPOA, and Israel
In 2018, during his first presidential term, Trump had pulled out of a landmark nuclear agreement with Iran that was signed in November 2013 during his predecessor Barack Obama’s tenure.
Called the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), it ensured that “Iran’s nuclear program is and remains exclusively peaceful” and, following compliance, the US said it would “begin lifting its nuclear-related sanctions” on the Islamic Republic.
It’s also important to note that Israel is the only Middle Eastern country widely believed to have nuclear weapons yet it is not party to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). It claims that its war is to prevent Iran — which it considers a truly existential threat — from acquiring nuclear weapons. Tehran has consistently denied this claim, saying it is for peaceful purposes.
Presently, US intelligence has concluded that while Iran “has a large stockpile of enriched uranium”, it is nowhere “close to creating a weapon” — in direct contradiction with Trump, who has said it was only “a few weeks” away.
Another preliminary US intelligence assessment revealed that the American attacks failed to destroy Iran’s nuclear capability and “only set it back by a few months”, contrary to Trump’s claims that they had “obliterated” Tehran’s facilities, Reuters reported on 25 June 2025.
Virality
Soch Fact Check found the claim shared here, here, here, and here on Facebook, here and here and X, and here, here, here, here, and here on Instagram.
It was also posted here on Threads.
Conclusion: No such report was published by The New York Times. Moreover, Soch Fact Check did not find any articles about such a proposal from Iran published by other reputable media outlets.
Background image in cover photo: Rhythm Goyal
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