DOMINANT ANGLE
Jakarta is first measuring the threat to "annihilate" Iran made by Trump at the UN, before the announced resumption of dialogue with Tehran.
Dominant angle identified — does not reflect unanimity of this country’s media
KEY POINTS
- 01
Trump warned he must choose between letting Iran rebuild or "wipe out the Islamic Republic... without giving them a chance to kill and destroy people and countries again," according to CNN Indonesia citing Reuters.
- 02
Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner led a meeting in New York that Trump called "very productive" with Iranian mediators, with an agreement hoped for "just after the midterm elections".
- 03
The Iranian embassy in Indonesia published a cartoon comparing the United States to a Schrödinger's cabinet whose plates, labeled sanctions, debt, and proxy wars, threaten to collapse.
ANALYSIS
Jakarta, September 23, 2026. The Indonesian press first picked up on the word that rang out on Tuesday at the UN podium: "annihilate". According to CNN Indonesia, citing Reuters, Donald Trump warned that he could destroy the Islamic Republic "in an instant" if there is no agreement to end the war between Washington and Tehran since late February. "Should I annihilate the Islamic Republic and do it quickly, without giving them the chance to kill and destroy people and countries again?", the American president said, presenting this choice as a decision that would be his alone.
The same article reports that negotiators from the two countries met on the same day in New York: emissary Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner led, on the American side, a meeting that Trump described as "very productive" with Iranian mediators, before estimating that an agreement could be reached "just after the midterm elections". Tempo English notes, citing DW, that Trump also described Tehran as the "bully of the Middle East" and linked its intransigence to the 9/11 attacks and those of October 7, 2023, carried out by Hamas, which he claims is supported by Iran.
On the diplomatic front in Jakarta itself, the Iranian embassy in Indonesia responded with satire, according to CNN Indonesia: a cartoon published in Indonesian compares the United States to a Schrödinger's cabinet, a stack of plates ready to collapse, labeled global hegemony, sanctions, national debt, proxy wars, and declining credibility. "From the outside, everything seems solid. But behind the closed door, the pressures are accumulating", the caption comments.
The Indonesian press is also following the arrival in New York of Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, presented as a gesture of defiance: Washington has reduced the number of visas granted to the Iranian delegation and prohibited the purchase of luxury goods by some of its members, but Pezeshkian is expected to speak at the General Assembly on Wednesday. For Jakarta, the sequence illustrates less a shift towards peace than an ongoing balance of power, while the two camps maintain their naval blockade and oil prices remain under tension since February.
