■ The U.S. faces a Thursday deadline for the next step in its Iran sanctions.

Deadline Thursday on whether to cut off foreign companies

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s “maximum pressure” campaign against Iran is at a crossroads.

His administration is trying to decide whether to risk stoking international tensions even more by ending one of the last remaining components of the 2015 nuclear deal. The U.S. faces a Thursday deadline to decide whether to extend or cancel sanctions waivers to foreign companies working on Iran’s civilian nuclear program as permitted under the deal.

Ending the waivers would be the next logical step in the campaign, and it’s a move favored by Trump’s allies in Congress who endorse a tough approach to Iran. But it also would escalate tensions with Iran and with some European allies, and two officials say a divided administration is likely to keep the waivers afloat with temporary extensions.

An announcement on the issue has been postponed twice, according to the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo rejects suggestions the U.S. strategy on Iran is less than clear-cut.

“America has a strategy which we are convinced will work,” he said this past week. “We will deny Iran the wealth to foment terror around the world and build out their nuclear program.”

Trump withdrew the U.S. last year from the 2015 deal Iran signed with the U.S., France, Britain, Germany, Russia and China. The agreement lifted economic sanctions in exchange for limits on the Iranian nuclear program.

Trump, who called it “the worst deal in history,” began reinstating sanctions, and they have hobbled an already weak Iranian economy.

Iran responded by blowing through limits on its low-enriched uranium stockpiles and announcing plans to enrich uranium beyond levels permitted under the deal.

Sometime before Thursday, the administration will have to either cancel or extend waivers that allow European, Russian and Chinese companies to work in Iran’s civilian nuclear facilities.

The officials familiar with the “civil nuclear cooperation waivers” say that a decision in principle has been made to let them expire but that they are likely to be extended for 90 more days to give companies time to wind down operations.

Trump has been coy about his plans. He said this past week that “it could go either way very easily. Very easily. And I’m OK either way it goes.”