Iran has kept the door open to negotiations with the incoming Donald Trump administration, while warning the US president-elect that any attempt to reimpose “maximum pressure” on the Islamic republic would fail to extract concessions.

The Biden administration had warned that the United States would consider any Iranian attempt on Mr. Trump’s life to be “an act of war,” officials said.

Is Iran so scared of Donald Trump that it’s starting (or pretending) to play nice? That’s the question on the minds of U.S. national security officials and analysts as Tehran braces for another four years of Trump.