Gulf officials announced Wednesday that plans were being finalized to hold direct talks between the U.S. and Iran in Oman on Friday, with the U.S. pushing for the negotiations to cover the Islamist regime’s missile arsenal range and its crackdown on protestors, along with its nuclear program. The planned summit comes amid hostile drone and naval activity that Iran has directed toward American ships near the Persian Gulf.

After initial reports stated that a U.S.-Iran summit would take place in Istanbul, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Wednesday that Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s regime had changed its mind and wanted to shift the location to Oman. U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff is expected to attend the meeting, which Rubio emphasized needs to be substantive.

“In order for talks to actually lead to something meaningful, they would have to include certain things, which include the range of their ballistic missiles, their sponsorship of terrorist organizations across the region, their nuclear program, and the treatment of their own people,” he underscored during a press conference. But soon after, a senior Iranian official remarked that the Friday meeting would only address the country’s nuclear program and that discussions about their missile program “are off the table.”

The tensions came amid a standoff between U.S. naval and commercial vessels and Iranian assets near the Persian Gulf. On Tuesday, an F-35 U.S. fighter jet shot down an Iranian drone that “aggressively” approached the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier in the Arabian Sea. An Iranian news agency claimed that the regime had lost connection with the drone for unknown reasons. Meanwhile, in a separate incident in the Strait of Hormuz Tuesday, two Iranian gunboats and a Mohajer drone approached a U.S.-flagged and crewed merchant vessel “at high speeds and threatened to board and seize the tanker.” After a nearby U.S. Navy warship arrived on the scene and escorted the tanker, no further incident occurred.

The ongoing hostilities emanating from the regime leave lawmakers and observers highly doubtful about any good intentions that the Iranian regime may have for Friday’s talks. As noted by National Review’s Noah Rothman, “Tehran wants to roll back the clock and reset its relationship with the Trump administration to the status quo that prevailed before the U.S. Air Force decimated Iran’s nuclear program.”

Lawmakers like Senator Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) agree. “I don’t think [Friday’s meeting] will bring about anything different than all the other meetings over the course of the decades, because I think you’re dealing with a regime that can’t be trusted,” he told Tony Perkins during Tuesday’s “Washington Watch.” “… [T]hey’re certainly demonstrating it right now with the way they are slaughtering their own people who dare stand up to them. And we all remember the decades [of] promises of presidents from the United States that led to no real outcome that was favorable to the freedom-loving people of Iran. But it’s not just about them. It’s also about just stability in the Middle East.”

Cramer further emphasized that the amount of U.S. military assets in the region could point toward a possible military operation. “[W]hen you look at the Lincoln Strike Force that’s … in the Arabian Sea, and you see other military assets being positioned, [it] isn’t going to be a surprise if Donald Trump decides to flex. It shouldn’t surprise anybody, nor do I think it will be much of a competition.”

The senator went on to argue that clearly defined nuclear inspections by a third party are unlikely to solve a future Iranian nuclear threat. “I think the only way to have it is to have a very transparent enforcement process, and even that means you have to trust somebody other than the United States. [It would need] to be, say, the United Nations or some other group that would be at the front end of enforcement and inspections. … I just don’t see Iran as having the type of regime that’s going to want to become part of the civilized [world] because they’re religious zealots, and we can never forget that.”

Cramer concluded by contending that the West’s secularization and loss of its Christian foundations has led to a shortsightedness in seeing the serious threat of Iran’s Islamist extremism.

“We’ve lost some of that moral authority and that understanding within the Western thought process,” he lamented. “[I]t’s up to the church and those of us who do proclaim Jesus Christ as not just Savior, but Lord, to help … our colleagues better understand that … this religious zeal of Iran is dangerous not only to Christians, but even to other more moderate Muslims. This is why … it’s not just about the United States and Israel even. It’s about the peace-loving, freedom-loving Arab world states that … are looking to us for leadership in this particular moment. And I certainly hope we don’t disappoint them.”