As the Iran-P5+1 nuclear talks continue in New York, Iran may employ the latest lever that emerged in its negotiations tool kit: the Islamic State.

An Iranian official who spoke with Reuters Sunday on condition of anonymity said his country is ready to work with the United States to fight Islamic State militants if the West shows flexibility in the ongoing nuclear negotiations. Despite Western calls for Iran to dismantle about 90 percent of its uranium-enrichment centrifuges, Iran insists on keeping all 19,000—ten thousand of which are operational. The West has been hesitant to reach full agreement in the talks out of concern for Iran’s potential breakout capacity to produce nuclear weapons.

Military cooperation between these sworn adversaries, Iran and the United States, has been a complicated and controversial issue that neither side has been willing to entertain, much less publicize. Observers have had to fine-tune their analytical dials amid an array of mixed signals from both sides.

Iran has indirectly cooperated with the U.S. by supporting Shia and Kurdish Peshmerga militants in their fight against the Islamic State. Earlier this month, Iran’s Ayatollah Khamenei reportedly authorized Gen. Qasem Soleimani, commander of Iran’s elite Quds Force, to work with the U.S. against the terrorists in Iraq. Iran later denied that report and has since been much more critical of the United States.

Last week, Khamenei clarified that Iran would not cooperate with the United States against the Islamic State, saying America’s “hands were dirty and intentions murky.” Iranian President Hassan Rouhani derided U.S. strategy as “ridiculous.”

As far back as June, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry spoke of the possibility of working with Iran. He said the U.S. was “open to discussions” with Iran and that it “would not rule out anything.” But Kerry responded to questions raised by Sen. Marco Rubio at a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on September 17 by insisting that he “never said anything about coordinating” with Iran or Syria. But, he said, “If we are failing and failing miserably, who knows what choice they might make” in an effort to “take on [the Islamic State].” Two days later, Secretary Kerry said at a United Nations Security Council meeting on Iraq that “there is a role for nearly every country in the world to play, including Iran.”

The murkiness surrounding United States-Iran cooperation shows just how much leverage Iran can wield in nuclear negotiations when it comes to fighting the Islamic State.

But as Commentary magazine’s Jonathan Tobin wrote on September 3, “The U.S. doesn’t have to choose between an [Islamic State]-run Iraq and a nuclear Iran. Both are disasters that must be averted at all costs.” Tobin concluded, “Strong American leadership could rally the world behind the fight against [the Islamic State] and efforts to isolate Iran until it renounces its nuclear ambitions forever. Unfortunately, that appears to be the one thing lacking in Washington these days.”

Indecisive action on Iraq, Syria and Iran is haunting America and empowering some of the nation’s fiercest enemies. We can expect these effects to continue getting worse, as our Trumpet Daily program “America Urges Mortal Enemy to Save Iraq” explains. In reality, this situation is certain to deteriorate until God intervenes to impose permanent world peace and cooperation among all nations.