GENEVA — President Trump and Vice President JD Vance secretly signed the Iran peace deal Sunday — with officials describing plans to give Tehran “small antes” of money as nuclear talks continue.

The electronic deal-signing was a surprise because a formal ceremony had been booked for Friday in Geneva — and also because the text of the deal is not yet public and may not be released for days.

“The Iranians don’t get a dime unless they behave and change their behavior. And this means that Iran will never have a nuclear weapon,” Vance told Fox News’ “Hannity” Monday evening about the preliminary deal. “They never get a dime of American taxpayer money. Ever. Full stop. Not even close.”

“What we have said is there’s a lot of economic benefit in the United States, relieving a lot of sanctions and welcoming them back into the world economy. There’s a lot of benefit. They’re not American money,” he added. “But for you to be a successful country, you’ve got to give up on this threat. You’ve got to give up on this desire to have a nuclear weapon.”

The memorandum of understanding will reopen the Strait of Hormuz and sent oil prices crashing to near-prewar levels — bringing hope for lower gasoline prices — with parallel stock gains. The Dow Jones Industrial Average notched a new all-time high.

But the mystery over the MOU is causing suspicion and propaganda on all sides.

Officials confirmed the document will reopen the strait with no tolls this week, but the status of the waterway and Iran’s specific nuclear commitments remain unclear — stirring concern among foreign policy hawks and Israel advocates. 

Follow The Post’s live coverage of President Trump and national politics for the latest news and analysis

“I would describe it as an agreement to continue to argue about the important issues in the region,” retired Gen. Wesley Clark scoffed in an interview on CNN. “But I do think if we get the strait open and there’s no toll, that would be positive.”

Vance will head to Switzerland for the signing ceremony on Friday and spent Monday making media appearances to sell the deal to skeptics, while also promoting his second memoir, “Communion: Finding My Way Back to Faith.” 

It is believed Secretary of State Marco Rubio and CIA Director John Ratcliffe weren’t consulted on the final version of the Iran deal sealed on Sunday. A State Department official denied that Rubio was sidelined, while a source familiar with Ratcliffe’s thinking said: “That’s not exactly right.”

“He’s not a policymaker so hasn’t been involved in the substance of the deal or the negotiations… but has provided the policymakers intel every step of the way, every day, and multiple times a day in the lead-up to the MOU,” the Ratcliffe source said.

Meanwhile, Axios reported Rubio, Ratcliffe and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth have expressed concerns and raised questions about the deal internally, while Vance and US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner advocated for it.

Trump, for his part, hasn’t committed to attending the signing ceremony on Friday with Vance.

Aside from nuclear concessions that comprise Trump’s major war aim, the post-conflict status of the Strait of Hormuz was described differently by the parties.

Iran claimed a last-minute change in the deal meant Iran and Oman will be recognized as the sole authorities over the crucial waterway, Iran’s Fars news agency reported.

“For the next 60 days Tehran will guarantee free passage through the strait, but after that period vessels will be required to pay tolls to cover security, navigation, environmental and insurance services,” the propaganda organ reported.

However, a senior US official said that the 60-day window is interpreted differently by American negotiators.

“On the toll question, we’re quite explicit in this MOU. The straits will be open toll-free for 60 days, and we expect that to become part of the final agreement as well,” the official said.

The follow-up talks are expected to focus heavily on Iran’s nuclear program, with progress expected within 30 days, a different senior US official said. 

Vance made clear that the US and Iran still need to work out key details such as ensuring Iran won’t enrich uranium to high levels in the future and how inspections of the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program will be conducted.

Trump recently has given in-principle support for the down-blending of Iran’s near-weapons-grade 60% enriched uranium, which could then be left in Iran.

How exactly the material would be excavated remains unclear.

US officials on Monday openly acknowledged plans for sanctions relief and the unfreezing of assets, along with a $300 billion Arab-led infrastructure fund for Iran.

But those officials said it all would be tied to certain benchmarks, with the progress ceasing if funds flow to regional proxies such as Hezbollah in Lebanon or the Houthi movement in Yemen.

“You’ll see in the MOU, we discuss the possibility of releasing frozen funds, sanctions relief, a big $300 billion fund to rebuild their country, and all of these things are going to be tied to performance,” a Trump administration official told reporters.

“We’re still at the early phases where we’re building trust, and I think what you’ll see is that we are prepared to release frozen funds and we are prepared to relieve sanctions, and we’ll do some small gestures of that in the beginning if they make some small gestures to us that show that they’re willing to meet their commitments as well,” the official said.

“Those will be kind of small antes to kind of see the cards, but that’ll be based on performance, and we’re going to get together this week and talk about what we want to do, and when we do it.”

“We’re being very open,” the official added, “about the fact that we are going to be willing to release some of the frozen funds in phases, but it’s all going to be tied to verifiable milestones.

“Again, there’s not a lot of trust.”

Two senior US officials insisted that “zero” dollars of frozen funds had been released — countering weekend news reports that regional US allies had started to dispense cash.

Trump and Vance electronically signed the order, with Iranian parliament speaker Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf signing for his nation, the officials said.

It’s unclear why the signing occurred without a public event — or when precisely it happened on Sunday.

Finalization of the MOU was announced at 5:15 p.m. Eastern Time Sunday by Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, shortly before Trump had an 80th birthday dinner with family and then hosted a UFC cage match that ended well after midnight.

“We have done a great job,” Trump said Monday while greeting French President Emmanuel Macron at the site of the G7 outside Geneva.

“Hopefully it is going to be a good relationship and we are going to get along. If we don’t, we go back to where we started, but I don’t think that is necessary.”

Trump said that “the Iran deal will bring a lot of success to the world. Because the oil was really clogged up there for a while.”

Trump called the MOU “a really powerful document” that was “not like the Obama documents.”

He said, however, that the text might not be released until “sometime after Friday” — longer than a 24-48-hour window cited by one US official. Vance cited “diplomatic protocols” as the reason for the MOU text being kept under wraps, but noted the president could change course and release it sooner.

Vance was also optimistic about the possibility of a mending of fences between the US and Iran after his weeks of diplomatic engagements with Tehran.

“What’s fascinating to me about their system is that we’re seeing even people that I would have assumed are hardliners who are kind of saying, ‘You know what? Maybe it was a mistake for us to do the things that we’ve done over the last 40 years. Maybe we should turn over a new leaf in the relationship with the United States,'” the veep said.

“We don’t trust anyone. We do verify,” he added. “We do extend this hand and say, ‘Look, if you guys are willing to change, we’re willing to change how we’ve dealt with you, too.'”

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), a leading war hawk, called on Trump and Vance to treat the agreement like a treaty and submit it for congressional approval.

“I look forward to reviewing the final product and I believe it is imperative that the architect of the deal, Vice President Vance and his negotiating partners, be part of the process in presenting the final deal to Congress,” Graham said.

“Congratulations to all in getting us to this point. Time will tell.”